Re: LIFT Text Transcoder

I agree with what's been said here.  I would add though that for  
those situations where access is needed and not supplied, it would be  
good if there was a user playable solution which there used to be but  
may no longer.

-- 
Jonnie Apple Seed
With his:
Hands-On Technolog(eye)s


On Feb 24, 2006, at 6:39 AM, Léonie Watson wrote:


Patrick Lauke wrote:

"I'll be contentious and say: if a site is built well from the start  
(e.g. separating content from presentation - no tables for layout,  
for instance - and proper structuring via headings etc) there is no  
difference between using a "proper" text browser, screen reader, or  
other AT with content that's been passed through the transcoder. In  
my mind, this is only useful if the original site is not built with  
standards etc to begin with...a band-aid solution, at best."

	Eloquently put. I'd add to this technical argument by saying that  
for many people a text only option is a second class solution.

	It's rare to find a text only site that offers the same quality of  
content as a primary site. Even with tools such as Betsie or the  
transcoder, as Patrick later said, there are always elements that  
can't be touched by this kind of technology.

	If the site is designed right in the first place, there's no need to  
take on the burden of an additional site, paying the licence for  
another tool to make up the shortfall of poor design and no need to  
relegate people to a second best site.

Regards,
Léonie.

-----Original Message-----
From: w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org] On  
Behalf Of Patrick H. Lauke
Sent: Thursday, 23 February 2006 19:05
To: WAI Interest Group
Subject: Re: LIFT Text Transcoder


ATI wrote:

> I have the following two questions if anyone has used or using the
> LIFT Text Transcoder http://transcoder.usablenet.com/tt/index.html
>
> 1. Can I use the LIFT Text Transcoder offline? I mean, if I provide
> the web content or the product by CDS, can a blind user use the LIFT
> Text Transcoder with out connecting through the internet line?
> You know, some people are using very slow internet connection and
> others even don't have internet connection at all.

  From what I can see, it's a server-side solution that needs to  
fetch web content, transform it, and then re-deliver it via the  
browser...so my guess would be no.

> 2. who is the main beneficiaries of LIFT Text Transcoder?

I'll be contentious and say: if a site is built well from the start  
(e.g. separating content from presentation - no tables for layout,  
for instance - and proper structuring via headings etc) there is no  
difference between using a "proper" text browser, screen reader, or  
other AT with content that's been passed through the transcoder. In  
my mind, this is only useful if the original site is not built with  
standards etc to begin with...a band-aid solution, at best. And, if  
the original site is *badly* inaccessible, even the text transcoder  
won't be able to magically make it accessible (e.g. if you have  
videos embedded in pages, not using structural markup, or similar  
situations, LIFT won't automatically generate text transcripts or  
give proper structure to the pages either).
I'd argue that it's a server-side solution to a problem that, if the  
site is designed/built properly, does not exist. The core  
functionality and a lot of the customisation options that the  
transcoder provides (such as changing font size or colour) are things  
that, in my view, should all be handled client-side.

P
--
Patrick H. Lauke
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Received on Friday, 24 February 2006 11:52:23 UTC