Please excuse my ignorance, but what are classic applications?
Classic refers to older Macintosh software written for OS 9 and earlier. Most PowerPC based Mac include the ability to run, and many even boot, OS 9. Carbon is a transitional technology that allows programs to run natively in OS X or 9. Cocoa, which is pretty much required for VoiceOver compatibility, is OS X only. Many contemporary applications, including iTunes, Apple Works, and Microsoft Office, are Carbonized. My hope was that Apple would not support Carbonization for Universal applications, thus forcing developers (including Microsoft) to move to Cocoa if they wanted their applications to run as fast as possible on the new Intel-based Macs. This would have done a great deal to improve VoiceOver compatibility, although mostly tangentially. As David Niemeijer predicted, things did not work out this way…
