Re: single browser intranets

Hi, Charles

If you forgive me, your analysis is missing a point.  I've been using a
very rough efficiency analysis method of keypress counting.  In many
cases, using a key to trigger an explanation is more efficient than
using a link.  (It's something that sighted people can overlook.)  How
many keystrokes would it take a blind person to find and activate the
link?  It depends on where the link is and where the blind user is
focused.  However, in all most all instances, by the time the blind user
gets to the link and activates it, the number of keypresses is greater
than the one used to pop up a window with the information.  Also, since
the targetted user is blind, the issues of font size, style, etc,
aren't important so there's little benefit to using another web page.

The browser is based on interactivity.  The trick is to use the
interactivity to benefit the user without being intrusive.  It's kind of
what I tell the students I work with that a good interface is like a
good butler.  The butler helps you perform the tasks you want and can
often anticipate your needs while at the same time being as minimally
intrusive with few demands.

Scott


> If the pop-up were an ordinary link to an explanation of how this site works,
> it would be interoperable back to the CERN line-mode browser (which actually
> came after the graphical one that Tim started with, but...)
> 
> Which is why some sites do explain how they work. Using something
> interoperable like a normal hypertext link.
> 
> People like Jonathan Chetwynd have been reminding us that interactivity is
> very important to making content accessible to some people.
> 
> My point is to recognise that interactivity is good for some people, and can
> be bad for others - the challenge is to reconcile the two. It's not a very
> amazing point, and other people have made it better.
> 
> Charles McCN

Received on Wednesday, 27 October 1999 17:53:49 UTC