RE: Discussion of DOM with Glen Gorden of Henter-Joyce (A) (A)

In response to RIch's comment
There is no statement that MSAA would be used as a cross plateform
solution.  MSAA is ONE TECHNIQUE developers could use, currently only on
some microsoft windows operating systems,  to provde access to information
about information being rendered to the user agent.  

We would certainly include informaton about other accessibility APIs like
the Java accessibility tool kit for people developing Java based user
agents.  

The key I believe is to state the prblem assistive technology has in
accessing user agent interface information and then use the techniques
document to describe the different methods that can be used to by user
agents and assistive technology to solve the problem.  This allows
inovation in improving the interface.

Jon




At 08:12 AM 2/9/99 -0600, schwer@us.ibm.com wrote:
>
>
>
>I am not sure that I would use MSAA as a cross-platform solution. I think
>that this cross platform object model access should be closer structured to
>what we have in Java whereby events are handled on more of an object by
>object basis. I am not trying to make a political statement for which is
>better. Having looked at earlier versions of MSAA, my concern is MSAA's
>stronger dependency on offscreen model technology. Maybe this has changed
>and MSAA has become more object oriented where we can connect directly to
>document/application component objects.
>
>Rich
>
>
>Rich Schwerdtfeger
>Lead Architect, IBM Special Needs Systems
>EMail/web: schwer@us.ibm.com http://www.austin.ibm.com/sns/rich.htm
>
>"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
>I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.",
>Frost
>
>
>
>"Denis Anson" <danson@miseri.edu> on 02/09/99 07:35:36 AM
>
>To:   "Charles McCathieNevile" <charles@w3.org>, "Charles Oppermann"
>      <chuckop@microsoft.com>
>cc:   w3c-wai-ua@w3.org (bcc: Richard Schwerdtfeger/Austin/IBM)
>Subject:  RE: Discussion of DOM with Glen Gorden of Henter-Joyce (A) (A)
>
>
>
>
>
>I'm not sure that the goal of cross-platform AT devices is even a
>reasonable
>one.  For a DOM-like interface, or even MSAA, we are talking about code
>that
>runs on the host platform.  It would theoretically be possible to write AT
>software in Java, and have it run cross platform, but at the current state
>of the art, even that is fairly platform specific.  This means, in
>practice,
>that AT must be developed independently for each platform.
>
>However, the concepts behind a generic AT interface are good ones.  What I
>have problems with is the idea that HTML documents would use one generic
>interface, word processors another, and spreadsheets still another.  This
>is
>one step better than having each program use a completely different
>interface, but not as good as the concept of a broad interface for AT that
>would communicate with equal facility to browsers, word processors,
>spreadsheets, and databases.
>
>I agree with Chuck that asking Unix boxes to support MSAA would be fatuous.
>On the other hand, the types of calls that are found necessary on any given
>platform would probably be useful on another, so the API developed for
>MSAA,
>for example, might well be a guideline for developing a UnixAA, or MacAA.
>
>Something like 8 years ago, Randy Marsden of Madenta Communications
>proposed
>an AT interface very similar in concept to MSAA for the Apple platform.
>While others in the industry thought it would be a good idea, no one wanted
>to invest the energy to make it happen.  Microsoft has, at least in part,
>made it happen in Windows.  That work should be extensible to other
>platforms, and make building AT more a user interface issue than a reverse
>engineering of each application, be it browser or video game.
>
>Denis Anson, MS, OTR
>Assistant Professor
>Computer Access Specialist
>College Misericordia
>301 Lake Street
>Dallas, PA 18612
>
>RESNA
>The International Organization of Assistive Technology Professionals
>
>Member since 1989
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: w3c-wai-ua-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-ua-request@w3.org]On
>Behalf Of Charles McCathieNevile
>Sent: Monday, February 08, 1999 8:07 PM
>To: Charles Oppermann
>Cc: w3c-wai-ua@w3.org
>Subject: RE: Discussion of DOM with Glen Gorden of Henter-Joyce (A) (A)
>
>
>If we had a DOM which encompassed the scope of web documents (in which I
>am including multimedia 'documents' and the range of other beasties that
>are out there on the horizon) then the DOM would indeed be a very powerful
>approach. It is also completely Open and platform-independent, which means
>it is possible to develop applications which use it in standardised ways.
>However, DOM level 1 is a long way from that promise. It seems that the
>group needs to decide whether it wants to support DOM 1 and thereby
>signpost its expectation that DOM2 and DOM3 and DOM4 and so on will
>represent the best way forward, or whether the group would rather leave
>the question of what interface should be used to User Agent developers.
>
>Charles McCathieNevile
>
>On Mon, 8 Feb 1999, Charles Oppermann wrote:
>
>  Remember what DOM means - Document Object Model.  It's not an assistive
>  technology interface, it's not even a user interface object model.  It's
>an
>  object model for documents - HTML documents to be specific.
>
>  Text object model developers find DOM inadequate to represent higher end
>  markup and layout.
>
>  I caution the group not to put too much stock into DOM.  While I feel
>it's
>  very useful to improve access to the web content - that is one small
>piece
>  of a users experience with a computer.
>
>
>--Charles McCathieNevile            mailto:charles@w3.org
>phone: +1 617 258 0992   http://purl.oclc.org/net/charles
>W3C Web Accessibility Initiative    http://www.w3.org/WAI
>MIT/LCS  -  545 Technology sq., Cambridge MA, 02139,  USA
> 
Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
1207 S. Oak Street
Champaign, IL 61820

Voice: 217-244-5870
Fax: 217-333-0248
E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu
WWW:	http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
	http://www.als.uiuc.edu/InfoTechAccess

Received on Tuesday, 9 February 1999 11:04:23 UTC