[access-uk] Re: New BBC IPlayer - can you work out how to use it?

Hi Ray

Latest JFW and flash Player don't help things much I'm afraid.  About to try SA 
to Go.  I think it would be perfectly possible for the beeb to do something 
here by building in a "back one minute" and "forward one minute" button into 
the flash content.  The have obviously done something to make buttons such as 
'play', 'pause' and 'restart' accessible since the previous version of the 
IPlayer, these now speak correctly without custom labels in JAWS.  So adding a 
couple of extra buttons would seem to be the way to go, also possibly an edit 
box which would allow you to locate a specific percentage or time position 
within the content.  As it is all we have is a slider control which by 
definition can't be made accessible, at least not within the environment of a 
browser.  For the same reason, i.e. the fact that we are dealing with a web 
browser rather than a standard application, scripting won't help here either.  
Another issue is that, at least with JAWS, you have to keep pressing insert 
+escape to force JAWS to refresh the virtual buffer whenever a page loads and 
then every time you activate one of the flash elements, this updates the 
information and controls that JAWS can see.  So it's not intuitive at all.

Cheers

James
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Rays Home 
  To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 
  Sent: Friday, June 27, 2008 9:22 PM
  Subject: [access-uk] Re: New BBC IPlayer - can you work out how to use it?


  James, glad someone else is concerned about this much less than perfect 
situation re. the new BBC Flash Player.

  Please repoort back when you've tried the latest version of JFW and Flash 
Player.  It might indeed be possible to script a solution, but I wonder at the 
same time whether we are waiting on Adobe to build in propper accessible 
controls.

  Not only should we be writing the Beeb on this one, but our assistive tech 
providers as well as Adobe, but I think in Adobe's case it is just another 
faceless corporation.

  Unless something's done we are going to hear a lot more here on this one.

  Cheers,
  Ray.
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: James O'Dell 
    Subject: [access-uk] Re: New BBC IPlayer - can you work out how to use it?


    Hi Ray

    I've been looking at the new version of the IPlayer, and whilst I can play 
programmes I haven't been able to access the rewind/fast-forward functions.  
From what I can tell these controls are sliders which have to be moved with the 
mouse.  If you look through the IPlayer Help there is a section on 
accessibility which says that the IPlayer follows accessibility standards - 
Hmmm!!  I have already sent an email to the BBC about this.  My understanding 
is that the Real Player streams will not be available in the UK from July 7th, 
as the IPlayer will detect where you are and automatically default to flash 
player if you are in the UK.  Great!  Anyway, keeping the old streams going 
isn't really much of a solution, as the sound quality on the Flash versions is 
better and we should have just as much of a right as anyone to be able to 
access them.  I am running JAWS 9 and will try installing the latest updates to 
JAWS and Flash Player to see if this makes any difference, but I would also be 
interested to hear from users of other assistive technologies to see if there 
is some way round these problems.

    Cheers

    James

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