getting off my windows dependency

[Janina Sajka]

jim grimsby writes:
> 
> But, haven't you configured your browser to provide you navigation in
> the rendered content? I'm unaware that sighted users would have such a
> requirement. I would rather expect they woudln't.
> There are plug-ins that provide just this type of functionality for
> internet explorer they are for sighted users that wish to use the
> keyboard for selecting text.

Really? You have to get a special plugin to use the keyboard to select
text in Win? My, but it's behind the times.
Amazing anyone bothers with it.

>  Also a number of sighted people I have
> spoken with say that making the link stand out on a line on its own is
> helpful.
Wait a minute here. Are we talking about navigating from link to link?
Or are we talking about accessing whatever text may appear around and
among the links?

I thought you were speaking of the latter, not the former.
Clearly, it's a browser function to provide navigability from link to
link. That's not what I was talking about.

Is this an issue of imprecise words being thrown around? Or just of
tossing unrelated bits into a different topic discussion?

  I took a web design class a few years ago and was told to
> always put the link by it self on its own line and to draw attention to
> it.  To make it catchy to the eye was the way he frazed it.  He also
> said it was a good idea to write a simple web page with as few graphics
> as possible for though users who were still using dialup modems.  He
> also said to avoid the naming of links like click here.  He said it was
> a good idea to include the hole title of the link for example click here
> to return to the home page not click here 
> To return to the home page with click here being the name of the link.  

All good advice, but this is link navigation, not web page content
navigation. Apples and oranges, I believe. OK, they're both fruit, but
they're not the same fruit.

> And, that takes me back to my first question: Isn't reviewing content
> line by line, or word by word, or char by char, our requirement for
> assistive technology, and not the browser? Seems to me it belongs with
> AT, not browsers.
> What does it matter.  Either way whether it is built in to the browser
> or the screen reader as long as you have the feature.  Your point is
> basically is it is not the function of the program you are using but the
> function of the screen reader to provide a access technology feature.
> My point is that as long as the feature is provided it really does not
> matter who is doing the providing.  Remember the more programmers who at
> `key are needs in to account the more accessible the said programs will
> be.

I actually do think it matters. For one thing, I'd like to see clashes
avoided.For another, our needs are not the only accessibility needs that
require support.

So, I think a clear understanding of where responsibility for various
functional features rests is a smarter strategy far more likely to get
more accessibility into more applications then the occasional tidbit of
support in some random application.

My goal is accessibility support directly provided by the toolkits that
developers use to create applications.

Besides, there really is expertise involved in developing good screen
reading software, or good sip and puff interface software, etc.