At 11:10 22/07/2007 -0400, someone masquerading as Eye Two Herbs wrote:
I do not understand why your program is not formatted for
disability. you cannot even find how to shut it off. You have not
made this very user friendly and I am about to the end of dealing
with companies like you when we those with eye problems should have
the same availability that others have. If you wish it to be used
you need to get with the program and make it able for all to find
the way out not hide it behind areas that are not viewable to people
with dualities.
This Users mailing list is what it says: for users, just like you and
me. So OpenOffice is not my or our application any more than it is
yours. There are ways of suggesting improvements to the product if
you wish: see the web site. In particular, this suggests that you
can participate in the work of making OpenOffice more accessible
using the mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list. You
may like to try that.
OpenOffice shouldn't need to tell you how to close it, since it
responds to all the standard methods. You seem to be using Windows
(but you kept that bit a secret). You can terminate OpenOffice using
Ctrl+Q (for "quit") or Alt+F4 or Alt+F, X. All these are standard
for Windows applications: you need no new information from or about OpenOffice.
User-friendliness - like beauty - is in the eye of the beholder, I
think. I'm not trying to defend OpenOffice here, but I don't know
what other users in your position would say about the interface. How
well have you customised your copy to suit your needs? I am not an
expert on this, but quick look suggests that you can do various things:
o You can choose icons or text or both for buttons.
o You can choose Extended tips.
o There are a number of high-contrast help display options.
o Larger icons area available, as are high-contrast icons.
o On top of this, you can scale the user interface up to 130% of normal size.
o You can change very many coloured elements to suit visibility.
o The zoom facility allows you to see large text on the screen
whilst keeping the line and page structure of your documents as they
will appear when printed in more normal size text.
o You can choose to "[u]se automatic font color for screen display":
this enables you to read the screen in high contrast (usually black
on white) even when you are preparing documents to be printed in more
challenging colour schemes.
There are other obvious techniques:
o Choose fonts, sizes, line spacings, and text and background
colours to suit screen visibility whilst typing. Prepare and edit
the text before worrying about format and appearance. Apply the
effects you want to see in the printed document only at a late stage
in document preparation. OpenOffice's styles make this particularly
easy: learning about styles would almost certainly repay the effort.
o Make good use of the AutoCorrect and AutoText facilities. These
can reduce the number of errors you have to spot and correct as you work.
Have you looked at the documentation for OpenOffice
accessibility? This is available at:
http://ui.openoffice.org/accessibility/ . See in particular:
http://ui.openoffice.org/accessibility/whitepaper.html .
This mentions that all user documentation is provided in HTML and PDF
formats and makes the point that this means that users can use screen
readers and magnifiers to read the documentation. You will know that
Adobe Reader also has a Read Out Loud facility for PDF files.
Another way to look at this problem is to see what you can do in the
operating system. OpenOffice claims to inherit some choices that you
make here, so selecting appropriate system fonts and so on may be a
way forward. Screen magnifiers and suchlike in Windows should work
for any application window.
It's entirely up to you, of course, if you wish to terminate your
interest in OpenOffice. One of the joys of free software is that you
won't have wasted much in the way of investment if you do!
My guess would be that you might benefit from talking to others with
the same needs as your own: they are most likely to have experience
of the best ways of making the software work for them - and for
you. Are there organisations you can contact? I feel sure there must be.
I trust this helps.
Brian Barker
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