- From: Glen Gordon <Gleng@Hj.com>
- Date: Tue, 9 Feb 1999 09:52:04 -0500
- To: <w3c-wai-ua@w3.org>
Hi: Since my name seems to have become somewhat famous as the subject of so many messages in the past few days, I decided I should probably clarify my original answers to John and prove that I can communicate in slightly more than monosyllabic words. The preference I express for using a DOM rather than a more generic approach like MSAA stems entirely from the fact that a DOM inherently offers a richer array of information. This clearly is a double-edged sword since using a DOM requires additional coding to get at this richer information set. However, if the assistive technology tool has a scripting language which allows for accessing this information, then the efforts involved to incorporate it is greatly reduced and can often be done by members of the user community who embrace that tool. I am not advocating that MSAA and similar approaches be abandoned. Rather, I am saying that approaches to presenting information in uniform manner be based on DOMs. (This, as I understand it, is largely the approach MSAA has taken in supporting IE4.) If the accessibility aid wishes to go the extra mile and take advantage of the richer information set provided by a DOM, it should be encouraged to do so. In the case of JFW, we have chosen to use the IE4 DOM in an effort to more accurately predict the prompts which are associated with input fields on a form. Without access to the the underlying HTML tags, doing this is much more difficult and much more error prone. Even if MSAA were to engage in prediction of field prompts on HTML forms, who is to say that all accessibility aids will be happy with the approach that MSAA used. By making DOM information available, there exists the chance that some ISVs will go the extra mile and provide a more robust interface than that which is possible using something like MSAA which can probably never be all things to all applications. --Glen
Received on Tuesday, 9 February 1999 09:52:45 UTC