- From: Lauren Wood <lauren@sqwest.bc.ca>
- Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 11:58:16 -0800
- To: "Gregory J. Rosmaita" <unagi69@concentric.net>
- CC: User Agent Guidelines Emailing List <w3c-wai-ua@w3.org>
On 3 Dec 99, at 14:46, Gregory J. Rosmaita wrote: > aloha, charles! > > you raise a very valid question -- do assistive technologies need to use the > write functionalities of the DOM in order to provide access to content, but the > working group has -- so far -- heard extremely little from ANY of the adaptive > technology vendors whose opinions we've solicited, and whose representatives > have sat amongst us, detailing exactly what it is that they need from the > DOM... this is input that needs not only to be plowed back into the UA WG, but > the DOM WG as well... One of my reasons for doing the DOM in the frst place was to give adaptive technology vendors a standard interface so they could write tools that hook into browser, editors, etc which implement the DOM. So I think such tools should implement the DOM, to enable this. There is, to my mind, little point in implementing a proprietary interface when a standard one is available, particularly since the WAI groups have input to the standard interface and not to proprietary interfaces in general. If adaptive technology vendors (screen readers, etc) implement hooks to be a client of the DOM, they should be able to hook into any DOM implementation with minimal changes. Otherwise they need to change their client interface for each tool. For example, SoftQuad Software's HoTMetaL and XMetaL implement the DOM (more with each release) and Mozilla implements the DOM, and MSIE implements the DOM, and .... so why reinvent the wheel each time? If these tools can't use the DOM for some reason, then the DOM WG needs to know about this. Lauren
Received on Friday, 3 December 1999 15:03:56 UTC