Matt, I stand corrected, and I appreciate the information. It's great to know that these technologies have progressed so much. In the space I work within we don't deal with 508 compliance, and it's been several years (though not quite THAT far back) since I personally had to look at it with any depth. You've put me straight, as I was 'parroting' the comments of other threads I've read in the past on various web development forums, and similar outdated articles on the topic.
I'm happy to be wrong. Sorry for propagating the myth. Thanks again for the information. Steve "Cutter" Blades Adobe Certified Professional Advanced Macromedia ColdFusion MX 7 Developer _____________________________ http://blog.cutterscrossing.com Matt Morgan-May wrote: > On 4/8/08 2:00 PM, "cf-talk" <[email protected]> wrote: >> From: Cutter (CFRelated) >> >> I'm not positive, but I would think you're out of luck with any of the >> assistives, with regards to Ajax. Most assistives won't even run >> JavaScript at all (or very limited). Look at the developer plugin >> category of Firefox plugins. I seem to remember several emulators that >> might help you 'view' your work the way these browsers might. > > This is not the case anymore. A number of Ajax toolkits, including Dojo, > YUI, and jQuery (plus our own toolkit, Spry), are implementing the WAI-ARIA > specification, which helps make Ajax directly accessible. Microsoft, Mozilla > and Opera are building support for it in their browsers, and the two top > screen readers are implementing it as well. > > Statements like "Most assistives won't even run JavaScript at all" have not > been true for several years. _Every_ modern screen reader has some ability > to deal with content manipulated by JavaScript, particularly if the > developer is using the DOM to work with the content. This is one of a class > of myths that used to be true maybe seven years ago, but aren't anymore. > Still, they resurface with mind-numbing regularity. > > I don't mean to pick on any one commenter here, but when comments like this > get parroted thread after thread, year after year, it makes accessibility > look like the enemy of new technology, and that's bad for developers as well > as users with disabilities. Please don't dismiss things like JavaScript, > Ajax, Flash, Flex, or PDF out of hand with regard to disability until you've > done some research on your own, and don't believe anyone who tells you > "(Technology X) is inaccessible" without a _very_ comprehensive body of > supporting material. > > And for what it's worth, many of the assistive technology "emulators" are > worthless, to be honest. Especially on web apps. You get more mileage out of > downloading the demo versions of JAWS and Window-Eyes, which are free, and > give you 30-40 minutes of time to test your stuff out. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;192386516;25150098;k Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:303001 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.4
