On 8/6/07, Benjamin Hawkes-Lewis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 8/6/07, zwetan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > but screen reader missing feature for Flash Lite and PSP player > > is kind of a joke > > I can only guess that you think this is a "joke" because you're making > assumptions about what visually impaired users wish to, and can in > fact, do, without looking into it at all. Visually impaired users want > to (and do) play games and use mobile devices. >
that's exactly my point, games does not adapt to screen reader, whatever technology you put behind it (even if this time you choose the Flash player as your guinea pig). And to support this view do you know any screenreader for xbox 360, Wii, PS3 ? I bet the answer is no, unless you just use your PS3 to run Linux and no games, I don't think you can find screen readers to play games. So now let's return to Flash player on such devices, what kind of flash content do you find the most on PSP and cell phones ? games (ok small games) Now tell me what is your point exactly ? that because the flash player is not open source, you can not implement screen reader functionality on such devices ? as I said this is a joke. not that impaired people does not have screen reader support, but to think that screen reader support would automagically allow impaired people to play games designed for non-impaired people in the first place. Take a computer desktop, fully supporting a screen reader, and lucky you running on an OS/browser that have a flash player that do support screen reader, now take a flash game to run on that system, unless that flash game (game design and game play) is especially oriented toward impaired people the screen reader would simply not make that game playable. So to make my point clear, you're blaming the technology (the flash player running the flash game) when you should blame the content provider (the creator/designer of the game). > Here's some discussions of inaccessibility issues of such devices on > the website of the American Federation of the Blind: > > http://www.afb.org/afbpress/pub.asp?DocID=aw080306 > > http://www.afb.org/Section.asp?SectionID=47&DocumentID=3577 > > And here's a blind gamer describing how to play Lord of the Rings on the PSP: > > http://www.brandoncole.net/gaming/LOTR%20Tactics%20Demo.mp3 > > Second, even more serious is the missing Flash support for screen > reader users of Firefox, Linux, and Mac OS X. > Again you're blaming the technology (an easy target) and not the content provider, based on this article http://www.digital-web.com/articles/ten_reasons_clients_dont_care_about_accessibility/ I can find a lot of web site that do use only HTML and no flash that brag to be accessible and are not, so in this case I should blame the HTML ? > > "hey why not hook my screen reader to use my cell > > phone or my PSP"...scenario > > There are dedicated screen readers for such devices, such as Nuance Talks: > > http://www.nuance.com/talks/premium.asp > having a phone screenreader to read the menu and be able to navigate inside a phone is one thing, but having a screen reader that make you being able to play a game is a totally different thing. > > I could even return this argument, > > Flash player Lite can play midi files, Flash player (browser plugin) can not > > does that make sens ? > > I think yes > > Not if universal functionality is used as rationale for keeping the > format closed, no. > > > Here another argument: > > it's not because something is open source > > that it is obviously better and spread better as "have to use tool", > > take the ogg vorbis format for audio, > > it's been around for quite some time now > > technically it got better features than the mp3 format and wouhou it's > > open source, > > but you know what ? > > how many people do use it on a daily basis ? > > is it more widespread than the mp3 format ? > > This analogy is irrelevant to my argument, which is that Adobe is > failing to provide consistent functionality. In my opinion Adobe is not failing at all to provide consistent functionality, but as you're focusing mainly on screen reader support, of course for this subject the flash player is not consistent. But take an open source flahs player as gnash, does it succeed better at making screen reader support ? are you a contributor to gnash and help implement screen support as you wish it should work ? would you be ready to donate all your screen support code to Adobe so they can use it and improve the screen reader support in flash ? > It's pretty obvious that > if you're a screen reader user who prefers Firefox, an open source > player you can use is better than a closed source player you can't. > that's not obvious at all sorry. I'm pro open source, but just based on the fact that a software is open source that does not mean at all that the software is better than a closed source counter part. > > mind me, if the flash player were open source, > > and some people contributed ogg playback inside flash, > > that would be cool for us geeks > > btu the mainstream would still want to use mp3 first. > > We're not talking about open sourcing the Adobe Flash Player. We're > talking about opening up the Flash specification to implementers of > /other/ players. yes so /other/ players can implement what they think is missing and then generate flash player branches that in the end would kill the flash player ubiquity. I totally understand that people are lobbying for their own interest, 3D in flash, flash running on AMD64, more screen reader support, etc. but here my point is whatever the flash spec is not open enougth, Adobe and before Macromedia did support things or try to support things that are not necessary directly usefull to their own business, it's kind of pi** me off big time that people just don't give them credits for what they already supporting. The flash player do support screen readers, ok not since v1, ok not on every OS out there, ok it's not perfect, but still Adobe is not ignoring this particular problem, so instead of just ranting because this or that is not working just do as any other guy do provide them feedback and wishlist, or even better show them how they could implement this or that screenreader (cf above about contributing to gnash). > > so yeah you can blame Macromedia/Adobe > > to have a closed source flash player and because of that > > you're stuck and can not playback ogg file format > > or whatever else features you're missing > > > > but on the other end Macromedia/Adobe did implemented > > the most wanted feature: playback mp3, and also > > most of the other features that make sens. > > Neither Zárate nor I are talking about adding missing features to > Flash; we're talking about providing consistent functionality across > platforms. that's the problem, you see inconsistent functionalities, me I see consistent functionalities. > I think that adding features to Flash would need to happen with > Adobe's oversight, rather than on an ad hoc basis. Banning other > implementers from reading the spec is an utterly ineffective way of > providing such oversight. > I personally don't want a fracture in the flash player implementation, I don't want that kind of scenario to happen http://redmonk.com/anne/2007/01/08/why-open-is-good/ " Frustration for current Flash developers. They might think back on the good old days when Adobe ensured that SWFs played the same on all platforms via their proprietary player. I think this actually might be the biggest obstacle for Adobe-any successful company like Adobe will have difficulty taking steps that change the rules of the game for current customers, that don't meet expectations of current customers. Anyone who tries to install a new model that threatens old ways of creating value will be treated by the corporate culture like a virus. " even if your main lobby is screen reader support in flash, and nothing wrong with that, I think it would be in the best interest of disabled users to face only one flash player, in fact the "one flash player" thing I think it's in the best interest of everyone. zwetan _______________________________________________ osflash mailing list [email protected] http://osflash.org/mailman/listinfo/osflash_osflash.org
