Re: Draft blurbs for BAD outreach on wiki for comment

Hi Wayne,

Maybe I'm missing something here. If I do, please help me understand.

Even though I'm not in any position to really argue with you as I am not a screen magnifier user myself (though I seldom test with them for accessibility purposes), I disagree with you when you're saying they're nothing more than a pair of 6x glasses.

While using software like ZoomText in 5x mode for example, you actually get only 1/25th of the page presented to you. You are therefore missing a lot of information that is presented outside the viewport. It can hardly be considered the same as wearing a really strong pair of glasses as you're still seeing the whole interface, not simply 1/25th of it (or in the case of said glasses, 1/36th if transposed to the same technology baseline).

>From my understanding, while you are wearing a pair of 6x glasses, you will be focusing on a specific parts of the content (like most people do), but you're still getting the global picture of the web page. Screen magnifying software does not allow that.

To me, it's a very different thing and therefore leads me to believe that the context in which screen magnifying software is used actually makes it an assistive technology just like screen readers - though serving different needs obviously. and that'S especially true when the tool is used in conjunction with a screen reader.

So, Am I missing something? :)

Best,

/Denis



On 2012-01-24, at 12:52 PM, Wayne Dick wrote:

> Hi Again,
> I forgot one point.  Web accessibility and  and screen magnification
> are disjoing technologies.
> 
> I think we should stop using screen magnifiers as an example of
> assistive technology that require accessibility.  Actually screen
> readers do not provide accessibility support, they provide
> inaccessibility enabling.
> 
> WAI literature is filled with the notion that screen magnifiers have
> something to do with accessibility.  They don't.  Screen magnifiers
> are no different than good strong pair of reading glasses, like my 6x
> pair.  You can read with them, but it difficult and uncomfortable.
> Magnification is better than nothing, but it's not even OK.  The book
> you read with prescription reading glasses is still inaccessible
> media.
> 
> We are EO on a new project.  We don't need to attack magnification as
> a tool, but we don't need to promote it.
> 
> Wayne
>

Received on Friday, 27 January 2012 05:45:54 UTC