Re: free/not free proprietary

On the one hand I think Nick is right. What many blind users appear to want
is a system that is designed for their needs, not something that sort of
copes. The exception is that some people work in environments where they can
only get support for a limited range of typically GUI-oriented software.
(Others still work in environments where line-mode and text-based tools are
the norm, of course).

For such people Sun and IBM are putting a lot of money and effort into making
GNOME an accessible environment, and the resultss are pretty good by all
accounts. This of course builds on the work on projects like Mercator - a
screenreader for X that was developed many years ago, and I believe led to
the development of the outspoken screen reader.

And there is a project to make javascript work in a text-only browser - I
think lynx code is the basis. But I would prefer to see something thoughtful
done like Niick is describing - Javascript in the user intereface can often
be a barrier if it isn't well considered.

just my tuppence 'orth

chaals

On Thu, 2 May 2002, Nick Kew wrote:


  On Thu, 2 May 2002, Martin McCormick wrote:

  > 	I agree.  Put simply, there is not presently a browser
  > that works with script for UNIX users who do not use X windows.
  > Making X windows accessible is a huge order.
  >
  > 	The minimum functionality should be a browser engine that
  > can at least follow all links and call auxiliary programs to
  > handle content that the browser can not display as text.

  For blind users, any kind of GUI would seem particularly pointless
  (correct me if I'm wrong:-).  So a commandline-based system with,
  for example, Lynx+Pine+Speech would be an ideal way of getting
  online.  That is to say, subject to accessibility considerations.

  One of the goals of my accessibility proxy proposal is a javascript
  engine that will deal with scripting-based links on behalf of users,
  whether of Lynx or of any other browser without scripting, or
  anyone in a security-conscious environment.



-- 
Charles McCathieNevile    http://www.w3.org/People/Charles  phone: +61 409 134 136
W3C Web Accessibility Initiative     http://www.w3.org/WAI  fax: +33 4 92 38 78 22
Location: 21 Mitchell street FOOTSCRAY Vic 3011, Australia
(or W3C INRIA, Route des Lucioles, BP 93, 06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex, France)

Received on Thursday, 2 May 2002 18:10:30 UTC