#CSUNATC17 – The Accessible Copier from Canon

Each year, the California State University of Northridge (CSUN) holds their assistive technology conference. This year the conference was in San Diego California, and was held at the Manchester Grand Hyatt.

One of the biggest things that people go to this conference for is the exhibit hall, and iAccessibility was there and we continue to bring you articles based on several product seen at the exhibit hall.

One exhibitor that was in attendance this year was Canon, with cameras and copiers that provided accessibility features, which include speech and voice activation.

How do Canon Accessible copiers work?

The new copiers that are accessible look very similar to traditional copiers of today. They have touch screens and buttons for dialing a fax, but there is a new speaker to allow for speech output, and a new button for voice activation. The touch screen will allow for the user to use the machine with speech access, and you can also hold the voice command button to speak to the copier.

Text To Speech functionality

The Canon copiers have text to speech capabilities so it will speak when you make selections on the touch screen or enter commands on the keypad.

Voice Activation

The new canon copiers also have a voice activation feature for those who prefer to use their voice to complete actions, or for those with disabilities that prevent the use of touch screens and key pads. The folks at Canon demonstrated where you could say, “Make 2 copies,” or make, “Scan document,” to complete basic copier tasks.

Conclusion

There has been a need for accessible copier technology in office environments for as long as we have had copiers. I am very happy to see Canon go as far as they have to make copiers more accessible, and I hope they continue to work on this goal of accessible copier technology. I also hope this gets other copier manufacturers into the accessible copier space.

Leave a Reply