Hi Scott,
Thanks for the kind words. We're just at the beginning of this
effort - but if we're not working in a vacuum (i.e. we're taking
part in community discussions) maybe some exciting things can
happen. The current version of katieplayer was developed well before
the release of 10.4 Tiger (which includes VoiceOver and a wealth of
other accessibility developer resources) and intended primarily as a
useful_right_now solution for RFB&D Members and other folks reading
DAISY 2.0/2.2 "text + audio" books. We're now, admittedly, playing a
bit of catchup - updating katieplayer to take full advantage of Mac
OS X's accessibility features. In the very short term, this
translates to a few updates and enhancements to beef up the current
version. For later this year, it means the first native Cocoa version
of katieplayer. Apple has provided some really good resources for
development of accessible applications - now it's really up to us to
make proper use of them. Really, the Apple developer resources are so
good that there really is no excuse. The hope is - if we "put
ourselves out there", allow some transparency and do our part to
listen and contribute in community discussions - we may have a good
shot at doing this thing right.
There are more than a few developer types and experienced
technologists on this list. Here are just a few that I know of
(hopefully I'm not out of line in dropping a dime on these
folks...but they deserve to be outed):
Greg Kearny - has developed some open source, cross-platform DAISY
production tools, done plenty of other accessibility work and is
always working on something new, useful and interesting
Travis Siegel - is an experienced developer who has volunteered - on
more than one occasion - to contribute to the katieplayer effort.
David Poehlman - a very respected and experienced accessibility
technology expert (and skilled on all of the popular computing
platforms).
...and I'm sure there are others who have been quietly contributing
their expertise.
Joe
On Feb 25, 2006, at 8:39 PM, Scott Howell wrote:
You know I think that is really decent of you. I hope other
developers will consider joining this list. I think all benefits in
many ways.
I have not yet looked at this package, but have heard enough I
think I just might be doing that soon.
Scott
On Feb 25, 2006, at 3:36 PM, Kafka's Daytime wrote:
Hi All,
I'm one of the katieplayer developers and happy to contribute to
any discussions regarding the katieplayer software. We still
provide direct support to registered users, of course...but
sometimes posting a difficulty, concern or recommendation publicly
leads to a valuable public discussion. I might also be able to
help with some succinct answers to support questions I've seen
posted here. katieplayer development, support and outreach is very
time consuming but I'll try to make myself available here
often...daily, if possible.
Kind regards,
Joe W.
