[ossrp-control] Re: Member Intro, Feature Suggestions and Questions

Let me suggest that a possible scripting model to emulate, or draw ideas from, 
is that of the Zeus for Windows editor (from http://ZeusEdit.com).  It lets one 
record a macro consisting of keystrokes and menu options, from which it 
generates code with the same functionality in any of several scripting 
languages one may choose:  JavaScript, Python, Ruby, SmallC, or VBScript.  If 
one wants to create a more complex macro that includes loops and conditions, 
one can edit the code accordingly.  Evidently, it abstracts the capabilities 
available to an underlying scripting engine that supports alternative, 
language-based implementations.  It may make use of the Windows Script Host to 
do this--I'm not sure.

Jamal

-----Original Message-----
From: ossrp-control-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 
[mailto:ossrp-control-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Matthew King
Sent: Tuesday, May 31, 2005 2:05 PM
To: ossrp-control@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [ossrp-control] Re: Member Intro, Feature Suggestions and Questions






Good comments on the JAWS scripting language.

An extensible screen reader should use a main-stream OO language with
good-quality libraries (with screen-reader-specific extensions) to support
interfacing with apps and the platform. This would make it easier to find
people who can extend the screen readers capabilities and customize it to
meet specific needs.

If user customization is supported with macros, ideally, the macros would
generate code in the chosen language.

Behaviors, extensions, etc., should be truly stackable. That is, I could
add extensions to default behavior from several different sources to a
stack of default behaviors. Similaraly, I could add extensions to behaviors
for a specific application to a stack that sits on top of the default stack
for a specific app.

Matt King
Accessibility End User Advocate
IBM Enterprise Services/Corporate Accessibility CoC
Phone: (719) 520-3006, Tie line: 8-656-3006
Internet: mattking@xxxxxxxxxx
IBM Internal Accessibility Tools:
http://w3.ibm.com/tools/it/ittools.nsf/main/pwd_PWDResources.htm
IBM Internal Accessibility Transformation Home:
http://w3.ibm.com/transform/cio.nsf/main/pwd_main.htm
IBM Accessibility Center: http://www.ibm.com/able



                                                                           
             "Rich Caloggero"                                              
             <rjc@xxxxxxx>                                                 
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             05/31/2005 11:19          [ossrp-control] Re: Member Intro,   
             AM                        Feature Suggestions and Questions   
                                                                           
                                                                           
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Very well articulated. I agree with every word.
Thanx Matt.

I believe that the Macintosh folks might also fall into the category of
trying to create an accessibility add-on (VoiceOver) which tries to make
the
blind experience of computing "as similar to that of their sighted peers as
possible". I don't think this is what is needed from a tool such as a
screen
reader. In fact, what is needed is a toolbox which can be customized for
our
own needs, easily and effectively.

Jaws, with its scripting language, is perhaps the closest thing to this at
the moment.  However, their scripting language lacks much which is common
in
programming languages found today (like arrays of any kind, objects, and
functions which behave as they should. Objects can be referenced but not
defined. Functions have a weird behavior: they don't recurse; when you call
a function from within itself, it calls back to the last different function
defined with that name.


-- Cheers, Rich

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew King" <mattking@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ossrp-control@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, May 31, 2005 12:44 PM
Subject: [ossrp-control] Re: Member Intro, Feature Suggestions and
Questions






Veli,

With all due respect, I think your "minimalist" ideas at:
http://www.student.oulu.fi/~vtatila/free_screen_reader.html
are too minimalist, not realistic,  and are counter productive.

For instance, rationalizing the exclusion of a feature because it is "too
different" from how a sighted person uses a computer seems baseless. The
same logic would say that using an audio interface to a visually oriented
system at all is "too different." The reality is that the very idea of a
screen reader, verses a computing platform designed from the ground-up as
an audio-interface computing platform, begs for accomodations to mitigate
the lack of efficiency inherent in bolt-on accessibility. Without such
mitigating accomodations, the audio-interface or tactile-interface user
will be left in the dust by his or her sighted peers.

Matt King
Accessibility End User Advocate
IBM Enterprise Services/Corporate Accessibility CoC
Phone: (719) 520-3006, Tie line: 8-656-3006
Internet: mattking@xxxxxxxxxx
IBM Internal Accessibility Tools:
http://w3.ibm.com/tools/it/ittools.nsf/main/pwd_PWDResources.htm
IBM Internal Accessibility Transformation Home:
http://w3.ibm.com/transform/cio.nsf/main/pwd_main.htm
IBM Accessibility Center: http://www.ibm.com/able




             Veli-Pekka Tätilä
             <vtatila@xxxxxxxx
             dent.oulu.fi>                                              To
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                                       [ossrp-control] Member Intro,
             05/28/2005 07:54          Feature Suggestions and Questions
             AM


             Please respond to
               ossrp-control






Hi list,
I thought I'd introduce myself and ask a couple of questions about the
screen reader.

I'm a 21-year-old sight immpaired FInnish guy and a lot into computers. I
do
have a little sight left on my left eye: enough to use magnification but
not
so much to be able to abandon screen reading completely. I prefer speech,
braille and the screen as output media in this order. FOr more info on my
sight, check out this Web-page:

http://www.student.oulu.fi/~vtatila/sight.html

As to development work I know C plus plus and Java at some level and have
done courses on software architectures
and object oriented design. Additionally, I'm naturaly into usability and
accessibility. In addition to human computer interaction basics and some
GUi
design, I did beta test the screen reader for MacOs X 10.4 and am currently
beta testing Dolphin screen reading products.

My first question is whether it is possible to create plug-ins for the
screen reader or if there's some other extension mechanism for this
purpose?
A plug-in based approach would promote customizability or even alternative
solutions to problems, in addition to enabling one to say emulate existing
screen readers.

I'd like to experiment with some ideas of my own or those that have been
proposed elswhere. Some examples:

a. I read in CSUN about conveying the current screen position with surround
sound. That would be great and I could actually try it out as I do have a
10x10 professional sound card for music and audio work. I think you should
arrange the speakers a litle unconventionally around the monitor, though,
such that moving up would mean up soundwise, too.

b. An optional redundancy filter could help in streamlining screen prompts.
That is it could compare the current and previous output and if there were
similar pieces, remove them possibly notifying the user. This way the
problems of file names, progress indicators or any other prompt text that
is
at least partially redundant could be mostly eliminated.

c. Though this is only my personal take on things, I've got a very specific
idea of how a screen reader should work overall and why. I call it the
screen reading philosophy and have a whole page dealing with it as well as
with the feature suggestions at:

http://www.student.oulu.fi/~vtatila/free_screen_reader.html

Based on this page, any ideas as to what kind of philosophy the screen
reader will have? Many of the more minimalist ones like Narrator,
Gnopernicus or VoiceOver seem to be close to what I'd like. In brief, my
screen reading philosophy is that the screen reader should not change how
the computer is operated unless that's absolutely necessary. Most of the
things I'm listing on the page stem from this basic rule.

Finally, is it possible for a sight impaired person to do Longhorn
development? Surely you need an existing Longhorn screen reader if the SDk
must run under Longhorn, don't you? A bit of a chicken and egg problem, you
could say, a screen reader for developing a screen reader.

Another thing I'm worried about is Visual Studio 2003. The menu colors
don't
conform to my high-contrast color scheme, which leaves sufficient contrast
between windows (fields) and dialogs without sacrificing readability,
unlike
most
high-contrast schemes. More importantly, though, large parts of the program
including the property panel in the forms editor and the right side of many
dialogs seem to be totally inaccessible with Dolphin Supernova 6.51.

Any thoughts or comments appreciated as usual,

PS: I hope this is the list posting address. I haven't received a real
welcome message just yet.

With kind regards Veli-Pekka Tätilä (vtatila@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
Accessibility, game music, synthesizers and programming:
http://www.student.oulu.fi/~vtatila/

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