Several people are already using Second Sight on a regular basis. Here's what my friend Jeffrey has to say about it:
As a frequent user of Second Sight, I have found this web site to be invaluable for my spiritual growth, and on a more human level, the height of excellence for accessibility to Mrs. Eddy's writings for those of us forced to use a screen reader or other adaptive technology.
Prior to the availability of this product, the only access I had to Prose Works was through personal readers. Imagine the restraints one experiences when forced to schedule times when two people are free to spend time reading. The freedom to study independently is a huge blessing we tend to underrate until we are forced to schedule our sessions with others.
Using Second Sight I have had access to the marginal headings in Science and Health for the first time in a method that is natural and doesn't force me to jump through hoops. Although they are available on Spirituality.com, the table layout used there to preserve the integrity of the headings' positions relative to the main text is very awkward when using a screen reader.
Imagine having to read the marginal headings as they appear in the text — interspersed within the paragraphs and broken between lines. This is how screen readers work, since they read from top to bottom, left to right, by default. When reading the marginal headings with one's eyes, it is a simple matter to ignore them altogether (as is done on the CD recordings of Science and Health), or look at them before or after the paragraph is read.
Second Sight handles this very elegantly by providing the marginal headings above the paragraph in which they appear, giving the student a heads-up for what's coming. They also provide navigability through a chapter, enabling one to skip back and forth through a given chapter very easily.
Second Sight gives the user the opportunity to start at the beginning of a chapter, and read continuously without stopping, all the way to the end. This could not be done using Concord, (with screen readers, at least) because you had to continuously hit the page down key to advance the text.
With the additional access to Prose Works, and the accommodations provided for accessibility technology, I have found Second Sight to be personally indispensable. I could live without it, but I'd hate to have to do it.
As a frequent user of Second Sight, I have found this web site to be invaluable for my spiritual growth, and on a more human level, the height of excellence for accessibility to Mrs. Eddy's writings for those of us forced to use a screen reader or other adaptive technology.
Prior to the availability of this product, the only access I had to Prose Works was through personal readers. Imagine the restraints one experiences when forced to schedule times when two people are free to spend time reading. The freedom to study independently is a huge blessing we tend to underrate until we are forced to schedule our sessions with others.
Using Second Sight I have had access to the marginal headings in Science and Health for the first time in a method that is natural and doesn't force me to jump through hoops. Although they are available on Spirituality.com, the table layout used there to preserve the integrity of the headings' positions relative to the main text is very awkward when using a screen reader.
Imagine having to read the marginal headings as they appear in the text — interspersed within the paragraphs and broken between lines. This is how screen readers work, since they read from top to bottom, left to right, by default. When reading the marginal headings with one's eyes, it is a simple matter to ignore them altogether (as is done on the CD recordings of Science and Health), or look at them before or after the paragraph is read.
Second Sight handles this very elegantly by providing the marginal headings above the paragraph in which they appear, giving the student a heads-up for what's coming. They also provide navigability through a chapter, enabling one to skip back and forth through a given chapter very easily.
Second Sight gives the user the opportunity to start at the beginning of a chapter, and read continuously without stopping, all the way to the end. This could not be done using Concord, (with screen readers, at least) because you had to continuously hit the page down key to advance the text.
With the additional access to Prose Works, and the accommodations provided for accessibility technology, I have found Second Sight to be personally indispensable. I could live without it, but I'd hate to have to do it.