[gui-talk] Fwd: mac spoken interface (fwd)

[Travis Siegel]

API stands for Application Programming Interface.  Microsoft has one of
these too, but ask yourself, how many programs talk right out of the box
that weren't specifically designed for it? Zero, that's how many.
Apple has gone one step farther than MS did, and actually integrated their
speech api into the os directly, but still, if programs don't call the
api, they won't talk.  That's why I call it an API, and not a screen
reader as such.  If it were a real screen reader, it would read things
regardless of how they were coded.  Of course, it wouldn't do a very good
job with some things, and a fairly decent one with others, but it would
still work.  With Apple, if you don't code for the api at all, then it
won't talk at all.  (as evidenced by the terminal window that doesn't talk
at all, because Apple hasn't done anything with the non-graphical
c9omponents of their os)  Apple is calling it a screen reader, and to some
degree it is, but it's a screen reader that won't make a single peep if
the application doesn't do things properly.  that's why I call it an API
instead.  Apple's marketing department doesn't agree with me, but I think
it's a very important distinction to be made as speech api doesn't say the
os talks, where as screen reader built-in sets a level of expectation that
Apple and their vendors aren't ready to accomodate.