Microsoft Backtracks On Accessibility In Windows Phone 7 54
beetle496 writes "One of the things Microsoft has done well for many years now (since they got called on the carpet about Windows 95) is providing compatibility with assistive technology used by the blind. Their current push is for a set of APIs called User Automation. Many of us in the field have remained skeptical of the early promises, especially those related to cross-platform compatibility. The news that Microsoft is now backtracking is disappointing, but hardly surprising. It looks like IAccessible2 is the way to go."
Re:Blind people using a touchscreen? (Score:5, Informative)
I've heard they really love the iPhone. Here [behindthecurtain.us] is an example article.
When I was in school a few years ago I had a blind gentlemen in a few of my classes. I remember him telling me about how hard (and insanely expensive) it was to get a new cell phone (Symbian based) that included voice software so he could use the menus and such, and that it was basically pretty bad.
The iPhone works as a phone, a web browser, a music player, a compass, and tons of other things, and doesn't cost $3k.
Re:Blind people using a touchscreen? (Score:5, Informative)
I've heard they really love the iPhone. Here is an example article.
Reading that article tells me that the enthusiastic user isn't blind. He's legally blind.
One of the problems /. (and the world in general) has with blindness is that we forget that many (perhaps even most??) of the people categorized as blind can still see. They just see very poorly.
However, in terms of accessibility of devices, and things like internet access its a huge difference. We think of the blind and then try to imagine someone ourselves operating a touch screen with our eyes closed and no tactile feedback at all and naturally scoff at the absurdity of it.
But try squinting your eyes almost shut so you can still see the phone, but can't read anything on it. Your now "legally bind", but you can still make out the little blobs for the apps... you can pick them out easily by touch -- identifying them by position and colour. A bit of slick software to read out the text you that you can see is there but can't actually make out by double-tapping it... and voila... a very useful device.
TFA vs TFS (Score:5, Informative)
Summary:
Article:
Quoth http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_UI_Automation [wikipedia.org]
Seems to be a decade missing there.
Re:Blind people using a touchscreen? (Score:5, Informative)
Users who are using Voiceover aren't responding to colored blobs, they are using Voiceover's auditory scanning. It reads aloud what is on the screen, such as the labels on the icons, and the user doubletaps anywhere on the screen to select one. You don't have to see the screen at all.
Re:So where is credit due? (Score:2, Informative)
Apple. They have a screen reader integrated into their OS, and it is actually quite useable.