Re: UAAG 1.0: Some Linux Issues

Hi All,

Sorry for late reply, I was quite busy in recent months and found some time to 
read WAI archives just now.

On Wednesday 28 August 2002 4:36 am, JP Schnapper-Casteras wrote:
|  Hi all,
|     Today I read over UUAG 1.0 looking for Linux compliance issues.
|  Here are some of the main ones:
|
|  - One main problem is that, with the possible exception of Mozilla, I
|  don't think developers of Linux user agents are very aware of
|  accessibility or wholly W3C standards compliant in general.  For

You are wrong here.
Konqueror (http://www.konqueror.org) is based on W3C standards.
It has very good CSS and DOM support (much better than, say, MS IE).

as about "developers of Linux user agents":
*  those peole develop *browsers*, not user agents; and do it, in most cases, 
for fun.  They are not paid for those jobs.
* they are aware about accessibility issues. 
But, in most cases, they have other things to fix. There are numerous bug 
reports filed for both Konqueror and Mozilla, if you think that developers 
missed something - go to http://bugs.kde.org or Bugzilla, and file bug report 
for accessibility problem.

|  example, of the various Linux media players or media player plugins, I
|  would be (happily) suprised if there is support for captions.  Many of
|  the browsers and multimedia players / agents on Linux are still in
|  active development.  As a result, there is just limited functionality

Is this bad that those browsers or players are "still in active development"?
Or do you prefer Microsoft approach, where bugs ar enot fixed for 6-7 years?

|  when it comes to, say, adjusting the speed of a multimedia clip.
|
|  Possible Action Item (for me and /or someone else who volunteers): talk
|  to the creators of Konqueror and Nautilis (which uses Mozilla's
|  rendering engine).  Also, talk to the developers of multimedia players.

Susbscribe to <kfm-devel@kde.org>, post your suggestions/ideas.
If you have some code ready - feel free to share it.

|
|  - Another big problem is the assumption that there are standard APIs
|  and conventions for things like keyboard configuration, UI design, and
|  access to what the user agent is doing.  One part of this problem is
|  that the APIs don't exist in some cases (e.g., 6.1-6.6).  Another part
|  is that sometimes there are multiple APIs -- if there are several, how
|  do we judge which one is the standard?  Also, each desktop environment
|  tends to have its own way changing configurations (e.g., keyboard),
|  installing products, vieweing documentation, etc.  Each version or
|  distribution of Linux has its own mechanism for installing products or

There are basically just 2 methods:  RPM (a-ka RedHat Package Manager), used 
by RedHat, Mandrake, SuSE and many others, and apt-get, used by Debian.

|  "packages".  This question of determining what is "standard" or
|  "conventional" when there are multiple permutations of an OS is a hard
|  one.  There are similar wording complications when it comes to making
|  Linux 508 compliant.  I'm talking with some people from the
|  Accessibility Forum trying to figure this out, if anyone else is
|  interested.

You can think of XFree86 as *standard* and installed on 99% of Linux Desktops.
According to recent surveys, KDE is used by at least 60% of people, and GNOME 
by 20%. I think the rest (20%) is not interested in *Desktop* functionality, 
they launch Mozilla or Netscape 4.7 from xterm and use minimalistic Window 
Manager, like IceWM or BlackBox.
So, you should ask yourself: what part of those people you target?
Than I can help you on possible paths getting things *done*.

|
|  1.5: Does a common security arch exist?

Pardon?  What do you speak about here?

|
|  4.7: Does a truly global volume control exist (/me thinks so)
|
|  6.1 - 6.6: I don't think these APIs exist (e.g., Konqueror)
|
|  6.7: Are there more than one keyboard APIs?
|
|  Possible Action Item (for me and others who are interested): Continue
|  to think about if there is a reasonable way to determine what is
|  standard and conventional under Linux?  For example, can we base it off
|  the Linux Standard Base?  Also, can we incorporate
|  accessibility-related APIs into the LSB? (URL: www.linuxbase.org)

LSB covers just part of typical Linux distro.
I work in KDE3, and it feets my needs quite well.
If you want to add some accessibility features to KDE - you should talk to 
KDE-devel.
But pls don't think that someone would implement some complicated features 
which you think are important. Most people developing KDE are volunteers.

|
|  Comments, questions, and answers are all welcomed.
|
|  Best,
|
|  --JP Schnapper-Casteras
|  =====
|  -
|  Cell Phone  -  206-849-9032
|  Time Zone   -  Pacific (-08:00 UTC)
|  Home Page   -  http://ocularis.sourceforge.net

-- 

Vadim Plessky
http://kde2.newmail.ru  (English)
33 Window Decorations and 6 Widget Styles for KDE
http://kde2.newmail.ru/kde_themes.html
KDE mini-Themes
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Received on Monday, 11 November 2002 06:23:49 UTC