Hi Tris. Many thanks for the hands-on experiences. Especially from someone who's coming from a screenreader angle. My other sticking point is I want Ultimate edition. So a few pennys will be saved. What can I say, I'm a geek! Anything less would just annoy me even if I dont' use every, single, feature right away I want to know I can without having to upgrade! I think that's a very nice feature Microsoft has went for with the all versions in one approach. Hmm, that search thing fromt he Windows Globe sounds erksim. I suspect that will annoy some more than others though and am wondering if there's a way of turning it off? Even if their isn't I guess getting used to the fact that we can't have everything in a nice, neat and scripted package isn't a bad thing. Cheers again! Barry Ôà ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tristram Llewellyn" <tris-l@xxxxxxxxxx> To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, December 14, 2006 11:43 AM Subject: [access-uk] Re: Vista delaying adopting Hi Barry "I'm curious in terms of usability will a screen reader user notice much difference to their sighted peer?" The short answer is yes you will and sighted people will have what I would regard as training issues with it too as well as screen reader users. Straight away when you open the start menu you will, focus lands on a search edit field which you will need to use cursor keys to navigate out of unless you wish to search. Also whilst switching to "classic mode" was for a time both necessary and possible in the early days of Windows XP, VISTA is a different story, whilst there is a non-graphical front end things stay in much the same place. The Desktop can be navigated in the same way you know and love in Windows XP so no change there. I haven't checked out the Sidebar in speech, but I may have some time doing this over Christmas as a way to digest the turkey, unfortunately the machine I have this going on is somewhat below ideal spec and consist of a number of bodges I have concocted to get it going and it's RC2 so there is still tons of debugging code which make things more ponderous than they should be. It would appear that VISTA is quite flexible and the task panes configurable to some extent, this is probably most useful for sighted users but it could mean they could install a link to go to a particular folder on a local machine or network location that is not covered already by VISTA. Control Panel is also a qualitatively different experience even once you drop the category view though and it's a bit hard to explain exactly how, but imagine a main control panel that leads to a sub control panel where you pick up the individual dialogues or even dialogue pages. Things have also shifted around so there have been one or two things I have been looking for that I haven't been able to find based on knowledge of XP. On the positive side the search is ubiquitous and much more effective than in XP. It is not as good as Google Desktop or for that matter Spotlight on the Mac, but I think it's actually useful now. Unless anything has changed very recently each sound producing application will have it's own volume setting that you can access which may be of some use to screen reader users, I haven't played with this in anger but it would seem to have a utility for such users. IE7 is now somewhat a known quantity to some of you already, Windows Mail is a paint job on Outlook Express with some new security measures built in. I believe that Windows watchers had hoped that this would grow into a mini-Outlook. Microsoft are taking us in a new direction and that is part of the reason for the increased hardware. Also a VISTA is inherently upgradeable, you buy a CD that can not only give you potential for 32bit or 64bit platform but allow you to upgrade Editions online, so if you have a VISTA home basic I think you could upgrade to a Home Premium, or a Home Premium you will be able to upgrade to an Ultimate edition, although who will do that given the price I don't know, pricing and exact feature comparison is probably a little opaque at the moment. Microsoft I expect judge that Home Premium to be the volume seller on PCs, this is currently only similar to Windows Media Centre which is actually part of the XP Professional line of products so what VISTA does as a product line is more logical than before. Vista is going to be your way to vastly expanded memory, even VISTA basic will address 8GB of memory, premium I think 16GB whilst the business ones can address more memory than any one can afford or install on current motherboards. VISTA is going to be a longer game than just the launch, there are things to be added hopefully like WinFS, and of course the inevitable service pack as well. Microsoft have indicated one or two surprises in store, one has already escaped into the wild is Motion Desktop, which is shorthand for an animated Desktop, not much use to screen reader users, but is only available on the Ultimate Edition users. You can think of Ultimate Edition as a cut and shut between Home Premium and the VISTA business editions with a mega plus pack on top of it. We await a launch and the usual flurry of publicity, a few teary upgrade stories, and the first critical updates. Regards. Tristram Llewellyn Sight and Sound Technology Technical Support www.sightandsound.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: Dj Paddy To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Thursday, December 14, 2006 10:53 AM Subject: [access-uk] Re: Vista delaying adopting Tris. I'm curious in terms of usability Will a screenreader user notice much difference to their sighted peer? I've heard that things are shuffled about and some things are refered to differently. Surely this will be a change for everyone? Like Vanja I have a new machine that will take Vista no probs and likewise am not planning on getting it on the 30th. However, I also want to try it out. I'll probably install it as part of a dual boot untill i feel comfortable enough to switch completely. I realise this is a new OS and considerations need to be taken. I am concerned that people might be taking, (if diluted slightly), the same view to Vista when we moved from command line to GUI. It is a different platform granted but I do feel people are paniking a little too much. I also have a feeling that the business user viewpoint is being mixed in with the home user/enthusiast. I completely agree that anyone thinkign their going to install Vista and it will just work might be unplesently surprised. In saying this scepticism for scepticism sake is also a tad annoying. Barry Ôà ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tristram Llewellyn" <tris-l@xxxxxxxxxx> To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2006 5:02 PM Subject: [access-uk] Re: Vista delaying adopting Keep your eyes peeled on the FS website towards the end of January, you should notice something happening with regard to VISTA and Jaws about that time the free update for Jaws users is being worked upon as we speak. I do believe that some of the accessibility concerns are not as pressing as some may suggest, however it does take some getting used to and there will innevitably be some issues. Regards. 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