RE: Why isn't Open Office on Windows Accessible?

  • From: "katherine Moss" <plymouthroamer285@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 18 Aug 2010 12:18:06 -0400

Holy moly!  What's going on there?  What's Oracle suing Google for?

 

From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Don Marang
Sent: Wednesday, August 18, 2010 2:38 AM
To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Why isn't Open Office on Windows Accessible?

 

Is all Android app development based on Google's version of Java?  Are there
reasonable resources I can point developers to for Android accessibility
implementation?  As a potential user / tinkerer, I would like to know as
well and hopefully be in a better position to provide positive feedback.

 

Will the threatened Oracle lawsuit of Google over Java damage Android's
success?  Will it destroy inovation and Open Source if they win?  

Don Marang

 

There is just so much stuff in the world that, to me, is devoid of any real
substance, value, and content that I just try to make sure that I am working
on things that matter. 
Dean Kamen 

 

From: Ken Perry <mailto:whistler@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>  

Sent: Monday, August 16, 2010 7:52 PM

To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 

Subject: RE: Why isn't Open Office on Windows Accessible?

 

This is sort of what Android is doing even if they have not went far enough
yet.  They have an accessible event that is thrown by all controls excepting
static and some other problems but at any rate if you use basic controls you
get the accessible events if however you want to make a custom action you
can also throw accessible events that the screen readers like talk back will
catch and speak or the accessibility tools like kick back and sound back can
catch and do something with.  So its part developer putting in special
access and part developer using the controls that are already accessible.
The unfortunate problem is what you get is only part accessible in most
cases.  I am not saying Android is not accessible I am saying what Android
is once again proving is if you leave it up to the developer at all us as
developers are too lazy to do it.  Take me for example if I as a blind coder
wrote a scrabble game I would not think of special cases for high resolution
graphic cards to have spinning tiles or something to make the game more
interesting for a sited player.  I would be shooting for my target audience.
The reverse is even worse not only are sighted programmers used to rapid
development and anything that slows them down out, but they wouldn't know
what we need to have sent to make something accessible unless we point it
out.  Here is an example under the Android platform.  The default media
player has very accessible artist and song lists. But when you open them
they say nothing for example When you open the media layer you are on a tab
screen and when you arrow left and right it says artist albums and songs.
If you click on artist nothing happens or at least as a blind person hears
it nothing at all happens.  If however you are sighted you will notice that
a whole list below opens up sort of like a tree but it's more like an
expanded list.  If you don't know what you're doing and you click on it
again because you thought nothing happened it would close the list.  Now a
sighted coder wouldn't know this is a problem and the current access frame
work doesn't take this into account.  What should have happened is a open
event should have been thrown even though focus didn't change there should
have been a notification.  Well it would have cost maybe 10 lines a code to
make this work but those lines are not easy to find and if you don't know it
needs to be there well you're not going to go looking in the View.java class
and the accessible_inf_event.java class to figure out how it works because
you don't know you need to.  

 

So how do we fix this?  My answer is better thought out tool kits. Once the
developers can just use and it will be accessible.  If they make accustom
control then don't do something for accessibility it will error.  Will this
ever happen.  My answer is no but shrug I hope I am wrong.

 

Ken

 

From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Jay Macarty
Sent: Monday, August 16, 2010 1:29 AM
To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Why isn't Open Office on Windows Accessible?

 

One of the ideas I have been toying with for the java screen reader (either
we4java or jac) is providing a set of runtime annotations which could be
used to enhance an application's accessibility by allowing the app developer
to put in self voicing annotations. There are differing schools of thought
on self voicing. Some say it is good because the developer knows the app
best and where self voicing would be helpful. On the other hand, putting in
self voicing without providing the user a way of controling it or turning
off certain levels of it, takes away from the user's control over the
accessibility feedback. If we put self voicing annotations into the java
screen reader, a developer could add them in if desired but the base screen
reader code base would still have control and could provide a common
mechanism for allowing the user to adjust the self voicing feedback.

 

----- Original Message ----- 

From: Ken Perry <mailto:whistler@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>  

To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 

Sent: Friday, August 13, 2010 5:20 PM

Subject: RE: Why isn't Open Office on Windows Accessible?

 

I agree with Chris H.'s answer but I want to point out it's our fault it's
not already accessible.  I wrote a simple talking java screen reader that
did very little but it made it so I could use  Open Office. Crappily but the
buttons talked and all and I did this in like 200 lines of code.  I know
that code got passed around and I have since lost my copy but it  can be
done by replacing the access bridge with self voicing code.  It just takes
someone actually doing it. 

 

I am interested to see where Open Office goes now that it is Oricals.  I am
worried about all Java stuff now that Orical is trying to Sew Google into
stopping Android.  It's a crazy world.

 

Ken

From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Kerneels Roos
Sent: Friday, August 13, 2010 3:30 AM
To: programmingblind
Subject: Why isn't Open Office on Windows Accessible?

 

Hi List,

Sorry if this question has been raised before and dealt with. Does anyone
know exactly why the Windows version of Open Office is only partly
accessible with a screen reader, while the Linux version is streets ahead?
Because Open Office is written in Java I assume the code base is 98%
identical across platforms. Is the problem mainly with the JAB (Java Access
Bridge) or with the screen readers themselves? Could the JAB not be open
sourced so it can be updated to bridge Java, MSAA, UIA and any other access
middle ware standard? 

NVDA works the best with Open Office, so I would assume it makes the best
use of the JAB. Is there other Java to access technology middle ware in
common use today?

I can remember a really long thread that in part had some info on Java
accessibility, but I just can't justify going through all that to possibly
find out more.

Keep well


-- 
Kerneels Roos
Cell/SMS: +27 (0)82 309 1998
Skype: cornelis.roos

The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese!

 



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