[access-uk] Re: Google is more accessible from today
- From: "Adrian Higginbotham" <adrian.higginbotham@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 10:17:01 -0000
completely off topic IBM have apparently recently dropped HPR, or rather
they are no longer developing it which probably amounts to the same
thing.
Adrian Higginbotham
Project manager, Standards
British Educational Communications and Technology Agency - BECTA
Tel: Direct dial 024 7679 7333 - Becta switchboard 02476-416994.
Email: Adrian.Higginbotham@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Web: http://www.becta.org.uk/
BECTA, Millburn Hill Road, Science Park, Coventry, CV4 7JJ
________________________________
From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Graham Page
Sent: 16 November 2006 19:23
To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [access-uk] Re: Google is more accessible from today
supernova does as well as does IBM homepage reader though this is not
really a screenreader. I believe System Access does as well.
Regards
Graham
----- Original Message -----
From: Adrian Higginbotham
<mailto:adrian.higginbotham@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 4:43 PM
Subject: [access-uk] Re: Google is more accessible from today
Good to hear that it is more than just one product that support
navigation by heading, can anyone advance on JFW and W_E? of course if
more sites like Google implement structural mark-up then other assistive
technology venders may follow suit and this would be a positive thing.
What worries me about the Search results as Headings as implemented by
Google is not so much that they have done it, afterall so many people
have already said how helpful it is, and I am indeed finding it is
making my own life much easier, but rather that the Web development
community at large may latch on to the idea that in order to make your
Website accessible to screenreader users you should mark-up important
information in an #h' tag. of course I might be too sinical and
actually Google are leading the world in using structural mark-up
something which many of us have been campaigning for for a long long
time and not just on the Web. here's hoping that every document author
follows their example. Let us however stay on their case and make sure
that such a useful tag is used appropriately otherwise it will sease to
be effective. My concerns are in the main based on some work I did with
a consultant a year or so ago who had used a screenreader user to test
some of their work. He had watched the individual navigating the Web for
a while and concluded that in the main he did not use site navigation
but rather tended to read content and follow links from there in, often
following a very round about route to reach his destination. His
particular solution to this was to enhance the access support in the
content (good news) but to let loose with the role-over drop down menus
and other javascript dependant objects within navigation structures
purely because his experience was that this would have little impact.
Yes that was one developer and one insidence but it does demonstrate the
power behind messages such as "thanks for putting headers on every
paragraph". developers like the rest of us look for easy solutions to
difficult problems and I do feel that as a community we need to be
cautious about over simplifying what are lets be honest complex issues.
Similar examples are evident as far back as the early days of
the WAI guidance, particular ones which spring to mind are the RNIB
advocating the use of the star symbol (*) as an alt tag for esthetic
images rather than a null value. Viewing this on a scree in a training
room the star looked rather like a letter "x" and for a year or two
there was a spat of UK Websites with sporadic xs' here and there for no
obvious reason.
So yes lets offer praise where praise is due but lets also
temper it with a reminder that there is more work still to be done - has
anyone for example had cause to use the Google audio capchure feature
lately - excellent that they found a work around for the visual only
capchure but I'm not sure that the numbers spoken over a garbled
background noise is satisfactory, has anyone with hearing loss tried to
use this ?
Adrian Higginbotham
Project manager, Standards
British Educational Communications and Technology Agency - BECTA
Tel: Direct dial 024 7679 7333 - Becta switchboard 02476-416994.
Email: Adrian.Higginbotham@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Web: http://www.becta.org.uk/
BECTA, Millburn Hill Road, Science Park, Coventry, CV4 7JJ
________________________________
From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of Tristram Llewellyn
Sent: 16 November 2006 11:15
To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [access-uk] Re: Google is more accessible from today
"is it an improvement to accessibility or just a confluence by
design or
miss-fortune of one feature within one popular screenreading
product and
the semantics of a single website."
In the spirit of discussion I would argue clearly not, as more
than one screen reader navigates by headings for the rather more
academically erudite and upright purpose that the WAI WCAG may aprove
of. Rigorous self contained interpretation of guidelines is one thing,
and real life is another, and there is a danger in thinking that
committees that make up WAI WCAG guidelines can do everything. There
is, if you want to think of things that rigorously no such thing as
technology independant accessibility, it is in fact a web of
interconnected technologies and standards. Even assuming such bodies
can think of or decide upon some other kind of structural mark up that
would have this effect, a screen reader or for that matter another type
of accessibility aid would still have to be coded for this if the
guidelines are to remain as such rather than a top down literal standard
that all websites should follow.
Regards.
Tristram Llewellyn
Sight and Sound Technology
Technical Support
www.sightandsound.co.uk
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