RE: why are we pursuing this idea? (was: Implementation Details request on Issue 204 Decision)

Steve Faulkner wrote:
> 
> "I also think that some AT will simply not implement the rich hidden
> content model as described, The NVDA developers have not implemented
> longdesc due to it having no visible UI (for example)."
> 
> in other words it doesn't help to have stuff exposed by browsers if AT
> don't make use of it.
> 

Hi Steve, Leif,

At the CSUN conference of 2010, I had a long chat with both Mick and James
about a number of things, one being @longdesc, and the lack of support for
that in NVDA.  Along with what James wrote in his bug tracker (previously
referenced), he also mentioned to me that they did not want to be creating
"new" user interactions, but rather to map to existing browser interaction
patterns. In other words, 'exposing' the presence of something isn't enough,
there needs to be a native control that they can map to. Having Firefox only
expose the presence of a rich textual description is not enough: if there is
no way for the mainstream sighted user to interact with the element, then
NVDA cannot (or will not) create a new interaction method for non-sighted
users.

I want to thank you both (as well as Chaals and Ben) for continuing the
dialog. I've been slammed all day (after a short summer recess), but hope to
respond more fully to a number of points raised so far, hopefully later this
evening.

JF

Received on Tuesday, 21 August 2012 23:00:39 UTC