SuperNova Access Suite Case Study: SuperNova Wins in Court.

SuperNova aids Swedish lawyer.

My name is Sture Lyreskog. I have been visually impaired since birth and I did most of my compulsory school education at Tomtebodaskolan in Stockholm, which is an Educational Institute for Blind and Visually Impaired children. After graduating from upper secondary school and obtaining a Master of Laws degree at the university in Uppsala, I have been practicing law since 1981.

After employment as a lawyer at the Gävle-Dala house-owner association in Gävle for 11 years I have been working with firms of solicitors since 1995. After my appointment as a lawyer and member of the Swedish Bar Association in 1998 I have been running my own barrister's office in Gävle since 2002. I have not much useful sight left but I can read text with a magnification of 32 times only. In the beginning of 1990 I made contact with Labyrinten to understand the range of products from Dolphin. Their technology offered me tremendous opportunities to develop and work as a lawyer. Together with my laptop I use Supernova with the Orpheus speech synthesizer and Cicero together with my application programs.

At an average of 10 hours a day I use MS Office, Infolex and Karnov (a database program for lawyers), Eniros telephone directory and other computer programs both faster and easier than with any other reader magnifier on the market. The Infolex application is a commonly used database program containing words of Act, legal cases and preparatory work. These data based sources are the most important tools for a lawyer. By using Supernova I can put together and draw up legal documents almost as fast as my sighted colleagues.

The use of Cicero is also important as you can quickly scan documents and books that are not accessible in electronic format. I am also using Supernova daily for email communication and to read news subscription services on the Internet. I am working with the computer and the screen reader when appearing in court and similar situations. By using an earphone it is possible to follow up notes and other documentation that are stored in the computer. Regularly I have the playback speed set to around 300 words a minute. I also use the Dolphin software for private matters. I scan books or other documents. I sometimes use Supernova together with speech recognition software called Voice Express to dictate by a microphone after which the speech is converted to text. I do not use the Braille functions within Supernova but sometimes the magnification function in Supernova.

Most of all I appreciate the immediate playback of text after the command. The software is also proportionately easy to use and very easy to install. Using the Dolphin products for 10-12 years I do not recall any occasion of disturbance from the computer or from other computer software when using them together with Dolphin’s screen reader or speech synthesizer. Web accessibility has improved during the last years using Supernova. The support section at Labyrinten has been extremely helpful on the rare occasions when I needed assistance with Supernova. They have also resolved any application specific problem very quickly by creating map files or an application specific setting in Supernova. I find the Dolphin software manuals very comprehensive and easy to use.

The possibility of updating the software on the Internet is also very good. My judgment is that it would be completely impossible for me to work as a lawyer without a screen reader and speech synthesizer. Supernova is “self-going” in many ways and the functionality can be adjusted almost endlessly by using map files. For a visually impaired user I find Supernova to be by far the best product available. It is a very reliable, very stable and flexible product. The comparatively low price is also significant for the individual or by the financier.

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