Hello John, Will and all As somebody with vision looking in, so to speak, I frequently find it astonishing when I hear people criticising what Apple is doing with accessibility; particularly in view of the practicalities. For instance, unless you're a pirate and by definition, therefore, a thief, Freedom Scientific, GW Micro and Dolphin Access, to name but three vendors, charge a very great deal of money for their accessibility tools. Also, Microsoft charges for their operating system, even for the most basic version, over 5 times what Apple does. VoiceOver is a free and, most of the time, very reliable product. It gives the user access to a WYSIWYG, (what you see is what you get) interface to websites. Most of which can, if you take the time to learn to use it, be navigated extremely well using VoiceOver and Safari.
Ultimately, it really depends upon the individual. If you just want a sheet of virtual paper with a hand-holding web environment, by all means use your other products and I wish you the very best of luck in all you do. I, (and I count my lucky stars, believe me), have the advantage of vision and I have seen both sides of this. I do see some sites where VoiceOver just will not play nicely and yes, we have seen some pretty spectacular crashes at times. However, in the general scheme of things, the environment is more stable and just as, if not more, reliable than the competition if, and it is a very big if, the pilot of the machine takes the time and effort to learn to handle it. I sincerely hope that we see a time when Apple perfects their accessibility tools. But make no mistake about it; they are committed to accessibility and they will improve their offerings. Remember also that the competing products have been available far far longer than has VoiceOver. Yes, I know that you can't always go by that and I know also that Apple has been involved in the field of accessibility for around 8 years now. However, just cast your mind back to how things were before Apple entered the market. Apple really has made a difference, not only to their own products, but also the competition. I recall the vice president of one accessibility company saying: "It's all very well having an operating system with a talking installer. But that's not much use if you can't do anything with it afterwards." That statement was a direct quote. It was, and remains, the utterings of a frightened man who feared losing custom. As things have worked out, that is exactly what has happened. Literally tens of thousands of visually impaired users across the world have now migrated to Apple's products; desktop and mobile. Indeed, the vice president of Freedom Scientific himself is the proud owner of an iPhone. Make of that what you will! Anyway, I am ranting. But I sometimes find it really disappointing when I hear people complaining like this. People who have freedom to choose. The long and the short of this is: If you want perfection, you'll be waiting for a very very long time. If you are prepared to be flexible and innovative, you have the power at your fingertips, quite literally in some cases. If, however, you are happy with constant virtualisation, hand-holding and costly solutions, then perhaps Apple's platforms are not for you. yes, there are free and low-cost applications available out there for other operating systems. And that is to be applauded. However, you are still working within the confines of an often insecure, vulnerable and unstable environment. Which ever option you choose to take is entirely down to your preference. However, although I can understand a degree of frustration when things don't quite work out; and yes, it does happen to my other half as well quite frequently, the best thing you could do is to make the most of the failures. Try to reliably replicate them and, if possible, send your crash reports to Apple. That is the only way your problems will be fixed. It isn't reasonable to expect Apple to foresee every eventuality and I urge cooperation and patience. Believe it or not, as somebody with vision, I can tel you that Internet Explorer 9 and FireFox 15 are not invulnerable and do crash quite frequently, even without accessibility tools in the mix. Speaking personally, I learned to do much more than point and click and I learned most of it on an Apple Mac. I also made it my business to learn to use VoiceOver in order that I can interact with my other half who is, like many people in this group, totally bl ind. I feel for each and every one of you. But I urge you to try and make the very best of what you have available. Only in that way will you be able to evolve with the ever-changing world of technologies, assistive and otherwise. Ladies and gentlemen, I apologise for the rant. This is, however, a topic on which I hold passionate views. My very best and most sincere wishes to each and every one of you. Lynne On 29 Sep 2012, at 17:24, John Panarese <[email protected]> wrote: There are a lot of things you can do to fiddle and troubleshoot such issues. Do you have examples of sites and what you are specifically looking for? The reality is that VoiceOver and Safari are not perfect, but neither are web designers. Don't discount the possiblity of the site simply being badly designed. <--- Mac Access At Mac Access Dot Net ---> To reply to this post, please address your message to [email protected] You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Mac-Access forum at either the list's own dedicated web archive: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/mac-access/index.html> or at the public Mail Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/>. Subscribe to the list's RSS feed from: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.xml> The Mac-Access mailing list is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and worm-free! Please remember to update your membership options periodically by visiting the list website at: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/mac-access/options/>
