I think it would be cool to use the default voice set via system preferences and make it where the program can be self voiceing if needed. Also provide an option to turn on, or off the self voicing feature, this way if a user wants to use voice over, great, if not, he or she still can do what needs to be done. Also, I would make your labels for the U I, very discriptive but yet maybe slightly shorter for the interface that is viewed via a braille display. This way the point is made but only the absolutely necessary amount of cells are used, this way providing more room for other things, such as the value of the U I control. I may also advise you write your programs in cocoe as I hear that language is very very voice over friendly. Finally maybe provide an option for the program to be able to enable magnification in the program for low vision usersw. Also maybe provide an option to turn the programs U I color to high contrast.
This way it even helps low vision users as well as us like myself who are nearly compltely total. Chris. Do you use Twitter? If so, then, I'd love! for you to follow me. My twitter URL is: http://twitter.com/chris28210 ----- Original Message ----- From: Martin Pilkington To: macvisionaries@googlegroups.com Sent: Sunday, March 08, 2009 8:25 PM Subject: Understanding Blind User's Needs Hi All, Let me introduce myself. My name is Martin Pilkington and I'm a software developer on the Mac. I'm starting to do a big accessibility push and I'm trying to get many developers to join me. One of the key parts of this push is a pledge to make all my applications 100% accessible by the end of 2009. I've defined 100% accessible to mean 5 things: 1. The UI available to VoiceOver users should be as user friendly as the visual UI. 2. All UI elements should have titles and/or descriptions. 3. All custom controls should provide full keyboard access. 4. There should be a clear and logical order to navigating UI fields with the keyboard. 5. Every part of an application should be reachable without the mouse. Now I'm coming at this from the perspective of someone who hasn't got a disability, so I'm hoping everyone on this list could help me. Are there any other major points you would say an application needs to be 100% accessible to you? Are there any things you would like to find in an application as a user with a visual impairment that aren't part of the standard Mac accessibility tool? For example, an option to get a full text description of the current window and how to use it, at any point in the application Hopefully I can get a lot of other Mac developers to join me in my pledge, some others have already come on board with the idea. But getting the developers on board is just one piece of the puzzle. The most important piece is understanding exactly what your current problems and wishes are for accessibility in Mac apps so any feedback you can give me is greatly appreciated. Thanks --------------------------------- Martin Pilkington Writer of Weird Symbols pi...@mcubedsw.com --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
