Re: Scott's Hypothetical Intranet

Hi, Gregory

The issue of reasonableness might come into play, also.  Suppose that
a company switches to call center software which is based on IE 4/5
because that is the only browser which provides certain desirable
functionality which increases the efficiency of the employees
in the call center.

Which is cheaper for the company?  To pay to get the call center
software specially tailored at an additional cost or to pay for the
employee to learn JAWS and IE 4/5?

Scott


> aloha, kynn!
> 
> one cannot just sit down and quote learn JAWS unquote and MSIE in one fell
> swoop and expect to be proficient with both...
> 
> take the blinders off, kynn -- or, rather, put them on...   fire up JAWS
> (after, of course, unplugging your monitor and mouse) and quote see unquote how
> far you get (although you have an unfair advantage in that you are already
> proficient using MSIE, even though i know that it is not your first browser of
> choice)
> 
> oh, and don't read the printed manual or use the printed cheat sheets, either
> -- as long as the monitor's off, you might as well use the audio cassettes or
> the braille help sheets, too...
> 
> now, still using JAWS to navigate the web using MSIE, go to the HWG site...  go
> through your online course pages...  the world quote looks unquote quite a bit
> different, doesn't it?  i'm not suggesting that the HWG site is inaccessible,
> but it is a lot different than you might expect when you experience it
> aurally...
> 
> no, real life isn't burger king, and you can't always have it your way, but
> neither is the hypothetical blind employee a slab of frozen meat by-products,
> to be slapped down upon a one-size-fits-all flame broiler...
> 
> learning how to use a new screen reader _AND_ a new application (not to mention
> a spatially slash visually oriented environment) isn't as easy as picking up a
> new browser WITHOUT having to rely on an assistive (and intermittently buggy)
> intermediary...  when the employee without a disability is told quote the
> company switched, deal with it unquote, nine times out of ten that employee
> will
> be able to quote deal with it unquote, because he or she can jump start their
> perusal of the intranet by simply pointing and clicking, and despite the
> vagaries of rendering between MSIE, Netscape, and Opera, the basic principle of
> pointing-and-shooting remains the same...  and as for the differences in user
> interface, those are most pronounced when one is using the keyboard, and least
> pronounced when one is simply using a mouse and a toolbar to perform the bulk
> of one's work...
> 
> but what happens when you can't see the targets?  what happens when you use the
> mouse emulator to listen to the toolbar, and all you hear is
> 
> graphic number 173
> graphic number 454
> graphic number 291
> graphic number 279
> graphic number 69
> graphic number 86
> graphic number  99
> 
> even though you've sat down with a sighted co-worker not once, not twice, but 5
> times to manually label each individual icon with the graphics labeler, only to
> have the labels you defined (or which came prepackaged with JFW) ignored?
> 
> what if your assistive technology, and not YOU, is the one who is shaping your
> perception of the content being presented to you?
> 
> with all due respect (and i do respect your work and all of your efforts in the
> area of accessibility) this _IS_ an accessibility issue, kynn,
>         gregory.

Received on Wednesday, 27 October 1999 00:14:51 UTC