Re: User Contexts: identifying assistive technologies

:-)


Rich Schwerdtfeger



From: raman@google.com (T.V Raman)
To: Richard Schwerdtfeger/Austin/IBM@IBMUS,
Cc: raman@google.com, jason@jasonjgw.net, public-indie-ui@w3.org
Date: 06/05/2013 03:19 PM
Subject: Re: User Contexts: identifying assistive technologies



Glad we agree.  Let's make sure we dont go down the user-agent rathole:-)

Richard Schwerdtfeger writes:
 > Yes, that is similar to what we had proposed (although not in that
detail) in AccessForAll. We had an ATInteroperable property which stated:
 >
 > A preference for resources that is compatible with assistive
technologies.
 >
 > Resources that are interoperable with AT should be selected whenever
possible.  Interoperability is indicated by compliance with WCAG 2.0
checkpoints: 1.1.1, 1.3.1, 1.3.2,
 > 2.4.4, 3.1.1, 3.1.2, 3.3.2, 4.1.1 and 4.1.2.The specific details of the
AT are normally provided by a user agent or the operating system.  The
example of ‘atInteroperable=
 > true’ expresses this statement: “resources that are interoperable with
AT should be selected whenever possible”.
 >
 > In our extended model we refined this for more detail in terms of
AccessibilityAPI as a property which contained an enumerated list that
included AndroidAccessibility,
 > WAI-ARIAv1, MSAA, and so on.
 >
 > To your point, it would be cleaner to state what web technologies were
needed to support interoperability regardless of what it is used to
support.
 >
 > We could then refine that to say
 >
 > Rich Schwerdtfeger
 >
 > In"TV. Raman" ---06/05/2013 10:18:19 AM---1+ on what Jason says -- to
see how this can go badly downhill, we only have to see how the user-age
 >
 > From: "TV. Raman" <raman@google.com>
 > To: Jason White <jason@jasonjgw.net>, public-indie-ui
<public-indie-ui@w3.org>,
 > Date: 06/05/2013 10:18 AM
 > Subject: User Contexts: identifying assistive technologies
 >
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 >
 > 1+ on what Jason says -- to see how this can go badly downhill,
 > we only have to see how the user-agent string over time has been
 > abused --- I dread the day where as the asymptotic convergence of
 > the process that Jason fears, we end up in a situation where the
 > string identifying the user's assistive tech ends up enumerating
 > all the AT-names that have been deployed over time.
 >
 > We might be better off exposing what parts of the Web Access
 > standards stack the user's AT  is depending on --- e.g. ARIA-1.0,
 > Indie-UI-Events etc.
 > --
 >
 > --
 >
 > On 5/31/13, Jason White <jason@jasonjgw.net> wrote:
 > > I'm on record as expressing doubts about whether User Contexts should
allow
 > > active assistive technologies to be disclosed, primarily for the
reason
 > > that
 > > this could harm interoperability and standards-conformance by
encouraging
 > > Web
 > > application authors to write to the implementation rather than to the
 > > specifications and to introduce AT-specific hacks that work around
bugs.
 > > This
 > > practice reduces the incentive for AT developers to fix bugs or to
achieve
 > > greater interoperability, and thus could be bad in the long run even
if it
 > > assists users in the short term.
 > >
 > > Nevertheless, if we are going to disclose assistive technologies, as
was
 > > pointed out to me off-list in response to my requirements-gathering
 > > proposal,
 > > the current requirements and spec are inadequate: they cover only
screen
 > > readers and allow only one name and version to be retrieved, whereas
there
 > > could be several independent assistive technologies (screen reader,
screen
 > > magnifier, etc.) active on a user's system simultaneously.
 > >
 > > Proposal
 > >
 > > dictionary assistiveTechnology {
 > >   DOMString name;
 > >   DOMString? version;
 > > };
 > > then return a sequence or array of the above.
 > >
 > >
 > >
 >