On Sunday, April 14, 2013, Guenter Milde wrote: > On 2013-04-13, Fernando Botelho wrote: > > I consider TeX and LaTeX, a potentially extremely useful technology for > > the blind, because it can allow wonderful formatting even for someone > > who is blind. LYX, or the idea of accessing the power of LaTeX without > > having to learn all the tags, is especially promising for the blind, > > since just like with those who can see, the majority of the blind are > > not technically inclined and would rather enjoy the benefits of Latex > > without learning all its complexities. > > Actually, I believe that a dedicated LaTeX editor (TeXworks, TeXmaker, ...) > is better suited for generating of LaTeX documents for blind people. > > LyX heavily relies on visual feedback and for this introduces an additional > layer (and own file format) that only complicates matters if you are after > a latex editor for blind people. >
There's nothing in the LyX GUI that makes it inherently less accessible than, say, Microsoft's Word. The main problem with adding accessibility is in using an API that keeps LyX portable. There's lots of little details that need to be addressed in order to make a GUI easily accessible by the sight-impaired, but it's definitely in the realm of the possible. Consider that many apps of similar GUI complexity are in fact accessible by the sight-impaired, even web browsers! The little details have to do with making navigation efficient and straightforward, like making sure that all graphical element have meaningful labels, that there are suitable keyboard shortcuts for all actions, and so on. Input from an actual sight-impaired power user would be most useful. Nico --
