How to Find Knowledge Base Articles That Are Useful to People with Disabilities

This article describes how to use the kbEnable keywords to find articles that are useful to people with disabilities.

The kbEnable keywords are:

• kbEnableSight
• kbEnableHear
• kbEnableMove
• kbEnableLearn

Generally, people who have limited abilities in basic life activities have physical or cognitive conditions called disabilities. Basic life activities include taking care of oneself, breathing, walking, seeing, hearing, speaking, learning, working, performing manual tasks, and taking part in community events and activities.

In meeting the needs and preferences of people with varying degrees of physical abilities, accessible computers and software programs can make it possible for more people to use technology successfully in work, education, and recreation.

The following keywords are designed and applied to articles in the Knowledge Base that highlight tools, techniques or methods that can assist people with disabilities or highlight issues of interest to them.

Blindness or Limited Vision

The keyword kbEnableSight is used in articles that can help people with visual limitations. In addition to blindness, this can include dimness, haziness, extreme far-sightedness or near-sightedness, color blindness, and tunnel vision.

Topics would include:

• How to use keyboard shortcuts, macros, or other keyboard alternatives to procedures performed with a mouse.
• How to adjust or workaround issues with fonts, colors, sizes, images, or appearance schemes.
• Articles that reference assistive aids such as screen readers or magnifiers.
• How to provide visual information as text in addition to or in place of graphics, colors, or other non-textual means.
• Information on alternative forms of documentation to printed or on-line materials.

Physical Disabilities

The keyword kbEnableMove is used in articles that can help people with mobility problems.

Arthritis, stroke, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, and loss of limbs or digits are common causes for this disability and share with both vision and learning disabilities the need to simplify operations and provide alternatives to using the mouse. Topics would include:

• How to use the keyboard or keyboard options to perform mouse operations.
• Articles that reference assistive aids such as on-screen keyboards, mousesticks, non-standard keyboards, eye-gaze pointing devices and sip and puff systems control by breathing or items such as MouseKeys, SerialKeys in Windows.
• Techniques for limiting or simplifying the user's actions.
• Alternatives to timed events or prompts that may be difficult for people with mobility limitations to respond to quickly.
• How to use, customize or workaround issues with keyboard filters such as StickKeys, FilterKeys, ToggleKeys, and Dvorak keyboard layouts in Windows.
• Details on alternatives to printed or on-line documentation.

Deafness or Hard of Hearing

The keyword kbEnableHear can help people with hearing difficulties find articles that help adjust or enable alternatives features for them.

Topics would include:

• How to customize sounds.
• How to configure software to provide visual feedback in addition to or in place of sounds, such SoundSentry in Windows.
• Articles that deal with captioning in audio or video media content.
• Articles that reference TTY/TDD software or hardware.

Cognitive or Developmental Disabilities

The keyword kbEnableLearn is used in articles that can help people with problems including dyslexia, memory problems, difficulty with solving problems or perceiving sensory information, or problems comprehending and using language.

Topics would include:

• Techniques that correct or clarify confusion in the user interface, unexpected behavior or use of language in the product.
• How to customize text, color, images and appearance schemes or workaround problems with them.
• Highlighting simplified procedures, such as using a mouse rather than remember complex keyboard combinations.
• Articles referencing reading aids or other tools that can assist in readability.
• As with mobility problems, articles that limit the user's actions and prevent unintended operations.
• Articles that explain how to customize a product's user interface, including simplifying the visual display, reducing number of options, reduce visual distractions, or improve readability.
• Articles that provide information on alternative forms of documentation to printed or on-line materials.

Other Accessibility-related Articles

The general keyword for articles that do not fit into other areas is kbEnable. Examples of this might be articles that cover general accessibility features or specific topics not already identified, such as seizure disorders.

Using kbEnable Keywords

The best way to use these keywords is in combination with other keywords to narrow the scope of your search, as in the following example:

kbEnableMove win98x

This keyword query searches for articles of interest to people with mobility problem dealing with Windows 98. For more information about how to query or what keyword can be used with the keywords listed in this article, please see the following article: For additional information on product features and other services to people with disabilities, visit the Microsoft Accessibility Web site at the following address: