• RT @ppatel Webaim is conducting a screen reader user survey o gather more definitive data on screen reader users: http://tinyurl.com/3rmwte # 2008/12/18
• News: Apple Releases Mac OS X 10.5.6 http://www.lioncourt.com/?p=250 # 2008/12/15
• Retweet: @cookiecrook BusinessWeek: Apple is greener than Greenpeace says. http://tinyurl.com/57v4fp # 2008/12/08
• Retweet: @vmwarefusion : Fusion 50% off today, one day only. Details: http://is.gd/9Gqi Coupon code "CyberMondayDeal" # 2008/12/01
• It's Thanksgiving Day in the United States. We're thankful for Apple's commitment to accessibility in their products. # 2008/11/27

Olearia, the DAISY playback application for Mac OS X under development by Curtain University Center for Accessible Technology (CUCAT), has reached beta status. The current version, (v0.90b), can be downloaded from the Olearia site.

Olearia is a free and open source DAISY playback application for Mac OS X. The final release will boast playback of multiple DAISY formats, VoiceOver compatibility, and support for other Mac OS X technologies, such as Spotlight.

Today, MacSpeech announced the 1.2 release of their MacSpeech Dictate voice recognition software for Mac OS X Tiger (10.4.11) and Mac OS X Leopard (10.5.2 or later.).

Features new in 1.2 include a "Spelling Mode" which gives you the ability to dictate words or acronyms by spelling them out one letter at a time, phrase Training,many bug fixes, and a "Move" command to simplify verbal editing. Improvements have been made to the interface that will enhance the user experience.

MacSpeech Dictate sells for $199.00 USD, but existing users may upgrade to 1.2 for free. MacSpeech Dictate is VoiceOver compatible.

After three years in development and extensive testing, OpenOffice.org has announced the release of version 3.0 of their office productivity suite. In addition to a native Mac OS X version, OpenOffice.org V3.0 offers support for the Macintosh accessibility API’s, including VoiceOver.

It is not yet known whether this final release sports any significant improvements for accessibility over the previous Release Candidate (RC) versions we previous reported on.

OpenOffice.org V3.0 is a powerful, free and open source productivity suite which includes word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation features, among many others.

You can download OpenOffice.org from www.OpenOffice.org.

No, Apple hasn’t set James Bond into the Mac OS X operating system quite yet. The "007" only refers to this being the seventh distinct security update for Mac OS X this year. Security Update 2008-007 fixes several vulnerabilities in both the Unix under-pinnings and the Macintosh OS. It’s recommended for users of Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard and Mac OS X 10.4.11 Tiger. For full details visit this Apple support page.

As usual, you can download the update from the "Software Update" option in your Mac’s APple menu.