RE: single browser intranets

Just my personal thoughts

I didn't suppose (based on my experience of universities) that many
universities would be interested in buying JAWS for students. 

Anyway, the answer is "no, this doesn't automatically make the intranet
accessible, and it is likely that it is not". But if it works for all the
people who need it, and the comapny is prepared to make necessary
accommodations for any new employees then it may not matter much to the
outside world if their intranet is accessible or not. (I wonder what happens
when the IRS realises that their best auditor is blind - whose responsibility
is it to ensure the documents she needs to read are accessible. But I
digress)

But as you say, this does put companies and Universities in a difficult
position with respect to planning. Easier, and more sensible anyway, to start
from teh premise that things should be done in ways which are known to be
accessible. Besides, an accessibility-aware designer costs about the same as
an ignorant one (I discovered that I am the cheapest designer I could find,
so I put my prices up, but mostly I don't take on work anyway ;-), which is
still less than an accessibility consultant who does retrofits...

Charles

On Tue, 26 Oct 1999, Scott Luebking wrote:

  Hi,
  
  Suppose that a company buys JAWS for one blind employee who works
  well on the intranet with it.  The company hires a second blind employee
  who only uses lynx and refuses to use JAWS.  Is the intranet
  accessible or not?
  
  Scott
  
  PS  I've been working on a web-based system using sound navigation to
  help teach blind chemistry students about different chemical models.  It
  works with IE4/5 and JAWS, but relies on IE 4/5 features.  Is it
  accessible or not?
  
  
  PPS  This does put both companies and universities in an awkward
  position.  How can they plan, allocate resources, etc, if they
  don't know what is accessible and what is not?

Received on Tuesday, 26 October 1999 17:26:05 UTC