On Sep 13, 2006, at 2:47 PM, Alastair Campbell wrote:
Joe mentioned that iTunes is built differently because they
maintain it on both OSX and Windows. I use it on both, it appears
pretty much identical.
This is an incidental clarification, but I meant to (and perhaps
didn't, or at least nor eloquently) distinguish between apps
developed and maintained for more than one platform (like iTunes) vs.
apps that are maintained for Mac OS X only i.e. the pertinent
comparison is not between iTunes Windows + Mac but iTunes and other
apps that aren't deployed on platforms other than Mac OS X.
However, that doesn't bode well for it being re-built from the
ground up, as Apple would then have to maintain two versions -
probably not economical.
Ah, the truth might be a little muddier...perhaps fortunately for
those of us who want to see iTunes fully accessible on Mac OS X.
1. It may not be necessary (or even desirable) to re-build the
application from the ground up to ensure its accessibility on both
platforms.
2. The bulk of the underlying codebase might be maintained more or
less as is and the User Interface can be abstracted by a level or two
(speaking deliberately conceptually here) so that, perhaps, most of
the special-cases are maintained at the abstracted, UI level (with
few or no changes required in the lower level code). In short, there
are quite a few options in between cross-platform and inaccessible +
cross-platform, accessible and maintained expensively as separate
applications.
3. The economics might not be so cut and dry, either. Apple has made
some pretty bold short term moves from time to time to help ensure
better things down the road. Even though we, quite justifiably, see
iTunes (in)accessibility as a major issue - it is only one in a
number of such major issues for which Apple will have to bite the
bullet, as it were. I think the long term economics might lead one to
guess reasonably that iTunes *will* eventually be fully accessible.
How, when it will happen and why it has happened yet is more
difficult to hash out.
Two solutions come to mind:
1. Apple build a script or customisation into Voiceover to deal
with iTunes. I wouldn't know if that's possible, but it isn't how
they have generally approached things so far.
2. Someone (any programmer) could build an accessible widget for
iTunes (or adapt one that's there already).
Anyone tried building widgets? I'm not sure how much of the
functionality you could access via a widget, I assume play lists
and searches would be very difficult.
Ah, there was some good list conversation on this quite a while back.
A few of us bounced around the idea of building an application that
would provide an accessible front end to iTunes. This is most
certainly doable. I did some initial work back then but ended up
shelving the idea since I (wrongly) guessed that iTunes would be
accessible by now. Travis also fiddled with the idea, I believe, at
least at the reasearch/conceptual/thought experiment level. Sadly, he
and his insight/expertise are at least temporarily gone from the list.
I don't, personally, believe that Apple is going to build this access
into VoiceOver and, for the long term - though it would neatly
satisfy a short term need - perhaps that is not the best way to
resolve the problem. For the short term, it's probably best for a
third party to develop a stopgap solution...keeping in mind that
ultimately this will almost certainly be done the right way with
iTunes directly accessible via VoiceOver.
I guess. :)
Joe
Kind regards,
-Alastair
