For a long time now, I have been a user of Sendspace. For those
unfamiliar with it, Sendspace is a service that enables one to send
large files over the net. Basically, you upload a file to sendspace
and specify a recipient Email address. The recipient receives an
Email containing a link to download the file.
Uploading files can be accomplished via a web interface, or by using
the "Sendspace wizard", an application that allows you to easily
upload and download multiple files and folders. On the windows side
of things, this Sendspace wizard is very accessible, however, I was
incredibly disappointed with the Mac version which worked horribly
with VoiceOver. I submitted feedback concerning the accessibility
issues and was surprised to receive a positive reply within an hour.
According to the reply, the fine folks at Sendspace were aware of
the accessibility issues, consider accessibility a priority and hope
to have a VO compatible version out within a week, or two. I
replied indicating that I'd be willing to help beta test and was
offered a beta version for testing. Furthermore, they indicated
that I could freely share the beta with anyone interested in testing
with the understanding that it's a beta and as such, they know
things are broken. They're hoping to have an official version
released within a week, or two, so we may have to move pretty quick
on this one. That having been said, I'm very impressed with
Sendspaces commitment to accessibility on both the Windows and Mac
versions of their software.
before providing the links, let me explain how the wizard seems to
be working as although it's about 90% more accessible than the
current version, it's not totally there yet. On the program's main
screen, you'll find two "unknown" areas in addition to a standard
toolbar and menu bar. The second, or bottom of these "unknown"
areas just dings at me when I try to interact with it, so I'm not
exactly sure what it is. I suspect it's a transfer window or
something, but don't know for sure. Now we get to the top "unknown"
area and this is where things get a bit confusing. Interacting with
the top unknown area results in two additional unknown areas. The
first of these is the local browsing pane and the other is the
remote pane. Both of these areas are very similar and for the most
part very accessible. The file lists, both local and remote are
displayed in tables. Unfortunately, the only way I've found to
navigate to parent folder is to use the "move to parent button" cmd
+up arrow doesn't do anything. You can tab somewhat around the
wizard -- tab brings you through all the buttons and table of the
local file pane, then the buttons and table of the remote pane and
finally a third table which shows on-going transfers. Occasionally,
I've noticed that keyboard focus seems to get messed up -- switching
out and back into the wizard window seems to fix this for whatever
reason. In the options dialog, things are pretty accessible --
there are a few "unknown" areas but these can be interacted with.
OK, now for the links. In order to use the wizard, you'll need to
have a sendspace account -- a free account works with the wizard I
believe, but with a paid account, you can of course do more i.e.
multiple transfers and that sort of thing. You can sign up one of
two ways -- either go directly to www.sendspace.com or if you want
to be nice to me, use my referral link
http://www.sendspace.com/invite/puhj8v which which allows me to earn
points regardless of what kind of account you choose. The wizard
itself can be downloaded at
http://www.sendspace.com/file/wq0g65 .
Finally, I'd just like to say that I think we have a great
opportunity here to make a good product even better. It's wonderful
that they are not only interested in improving accessibility, but
are actually doing something about it. My hope is that with
constructive feedback, they'll go a long way and make this app work.
thanks,
Steve
