The DAISY Standard

Revision of the DAISY Standard: ZedAI Public Draft Available for Review (2010-05-21)

The DAISY (ANSI/NISO Z39.86) Authoring and Interchange Framework - ZedAI for short, is a specification that defines the next generation of DAISY XML. The ZedAI Framework is one of the two parts in the ongoing major revision of the DAISY Standard. The specification is intended to be submitted to NISO for formal standardization in the fourth quarter of 2010, with final approval expected in the spring of 2011.

The first major ZedAI public draft for review by the DAISY community is now available at the Z39.86-2011 Specification Document Working Area on the DAISY Consortium website. The review phase will last until the end of the third quarter of 2010. Updated working drafts will be made available during the review phase, as a result of community input.

Please use the ZedAI forum and/or the issue tracker to provide feedback. A list of items that reviewers are asked to focus on is available from the ZedAI User Portal.

NISO named the DAISY Consortium as the maintenance agency of ANSI/NISO Z39.86-2005, also known as the DAISY Standard. With this standard, NISO and the DAISY Consortium are working to radically improve reading experiences of those with reading disabilities. To learn more about the DAISY Consortium, please visit www.daisy.org.

The NISO membership approved the creation of a new working group to revise this standard in August 2008. The original revision proposal and a supporting business case can be found here. Additional questions can be sent to Karen Wetzel, NISO's Standards Program Manager, at kwetzel@niso.org.

Status

To follow the activities of this working group, visit the the ZedNext wiki where you can find working drafts, background information, minutes of conference calls, work plans, and timelines.

DAISY Revision Working Group Roster

Those names marked with an asterisk have focused their work on Part 1 (authoring) of the standard, but will not be as fully engaged with Part 2 (distribution).

Administrative Chair
George Kerscher
Secretary General, DAISY
E-mail: kerscher@montana.com

Technical Chair
Markus Gylling
Chief Technology Officer, DAISY, TPB
E-mail: markus.gylling@gmail.com

Josh Altherr
Accessible Solutions Specialist, GH LLC.
E-mail: jaltherr@gh-accessibility.com

John Brugge
Senior Software Engineer, Bookshare
E-mail: JohnBrugge@benetech.org

Marisa DeMeglio
Software and Standards Development, DAISY
E-mail: marisa@dinf.ne.jp

Keith Fahlgren
Publishing Technology Engineer, O’Reilly
E-mail: keith@oreilly.com

Reuben Firmin
Engineering Manager, Bookshare
E-mail: ReubenF@Benetech.org

*Matt Garrish
Canadian National Institute for the Blind (CNIB)

*Boris Goldowsky
Center for Applied Special Technologies (CAST)

Sean Hayes
Media Accessibility Strategist, Microsoft
E-mail: Sean.Hayes@microsoft.com

Ole Holst Andersen
IT Director, Danish National Library For Persons With Print Disabilities (NOTA)
E-mail: oha@dbb.dk (soon to change)

Kenny Johar
Manager Architecture, Innovations and Accessible Solutions
Enterprise Architect, Vision Australia
E-mail: Kenny.Johar@visionaustralia.org

Dominic Labbe
Project leader, Humanware
dominic.labbe@humanware.com

Dennis Leas
Director of Technology, GH LLC
E-mail: dleas@gh-accessibility.com

Sam Ogami
Accessible Technology Expert
CSU Office of the Chancellor
E-mail: sogami@calstate.edu

*Stephen Phippen
Royal National Institute for Persons who are Blind (RNIB)

James Pritchett
Manager, Technology Development, RFB&D
E-mail: jpritchett@rfbd.org

*Per Sennels
Huseby Kompetansesenter

Daniel Weck
Software Architect and Programmer, DAISY
E-mail: daniel.weck@gmail.com

Standard Information

ANSI/NISO Z39.86 - 2005 Specifications for the Digital Talking Book

Abstract: This standard defines the format and content of the electronic file set that comprises a digital talking book (DTB) and establishes a limited set of requirements for DTB playback devices. It uses established and new specifications to delineate the structure of DTBs whose content can range from XML text only, to text with corresponding spoken audio, to audio with little or no text. DTBs are designed to make print material accessible and navigable for blind or otherwise print-disabled persons.
ANSI Approval Date: 04/12/05
Status: Approved and Published Standard
Maintenance Agency: DAISY Consortium

Previous Version

This information regarding the 2002 version of the Digital Talking Book standard is provided for organizations which are still supporting the older version. The DAISY Consortium also has information related to the superseded version at their website: http://www.daisy.org/z3986/

Download Z39.86-2002
NOTE: This version has been superseded by Z39.86-2005