DAISY - Universally dsigned? Prototyping an approach to measuring universal design

Abstract

The DAISY system is currently used as the alternative reading format for print-disabled students in Norway. DAISY is denoted by many as universally designed. This is an important claim, ensuring suited learning opportunities for all students. Thus, to be able to determine this aspect of DAISY is important - as is the case for many information systems. However, methods for evaluating whether a software product is universally designed are lacking. This text builds on previous work investigating the use of DAISY in Norwegian primary- and secondary education, now looking into strategies to evaluate whether DAISY is universally designed. We argue that the term universally designed needs to be more strictly defined in order to become applicable to systems development. Further, we propose two related methods that measure to what degree DAISY is universally designed, using feature analysis methodology. © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.