Numerical information is often presented in graphical form. Unfortunately, current assistive technologies such as screen readers are not well-equipped to handle these representations. To provide accessibility to graphs published in "The Daily" (Statistics Canada's main dissemination venue), we have developed iGraph-Lite, a system that provides short verbal descriptions of the information depicted in graphs and a way to also interact with this information.

Designing graphs and charts visually by means of graphing applications such as OpenOffice or MS Excel is extremely efficient and cost-effective. However, one of the drawbacks of such approach is that graphs are sometimes involuntarily made less accessible by, for instance, using a text box as title. In this paper we evaluate a corpus of 120 ecologically-valid statistical graphs for accessibility problems, discuss possible algorithms to solve these problems and finally propose the OM (Object Model) Principle, which states that any digital object is made more accessible by simply using the application's model for that object: for instance, the title field for the title text.

Abstract. In this paper, we propose the use of hill climbing and particle swarm optimization to find strategies in order to play the Commons Game (CG). The game, which is a non-trivial N -person non-zero-sum game, presents a simple mechanism to formulate how different parties can use shared resources. If the parties cooperate, the resources are sustainable. However, the resources get depleted if used indiscriminately. We consider the case when a single player has to determine the "optimal" solution, and when the other N − 1 players play the game by choosing the options with a fixed probability vector.

Abstract. In this paper, we consider the use of artificial intelligence techniques to aid in discovery of winning strategies for the Commons Game (CG).The game represents a common scenario in which multiple parties share the use of a self-replenishing resource. The resource deteriorates quickly if used indiscriminately. If used responsibly, however, the resource thrives. We consider the scenario one player uses hill climbing or particle swarm optimization to select the course of action, while the remaining N − 1 players use a fixed probability vector. We show that hill climbing and particle swarm optimization consistently generate winning strategies.

Numerical information is often presented in graphs to take advantage of the human ability to quickly find visual patterns. Unfortunately, this medium is problematic for people who are blind or otherwise visually-impaired. To provide accessibility to graphs published in The Daily (Statistics Canada's main dissemination venue), we have developed iGraph, a system that provides short verbal descriptions of the information depicted in graphs and a way of also interacting with graphical information.