[jp_sc@yahoo.com: Re: [Kde-accessibility] KDE/Qt at the 2nd Linux Accessibility Conference]
Navindra Umanee
navindra@cs.mcgill.ca
Sat, 30 Mar 2002 01:02:41 -0500
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Good stuff, JP. I'm forwarding this to editors so that maybe some of
your points can be included in a dot story/report. I'm not sure if
Dre has volunteered for that or not :-), but I'm sure he's busy with
the KDE3 announcement right now, so no promises on how soon we get
this out.
I fear the only way something will really get done in KDE/Qt is if
*Trolltech* does it. That is, if Trolltech has enough incentive to
include accessibility support in Qt, it will happen, just like i18n
did. Once it's in Qt then it will more easily percolate to KDE.
That's my theory.
Otherwise KDE needs a coherent plan, and enumerated steps (checklist)
for what needs to be done and issues to consider.
Cheers,
Navin.
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Date: Fri, 29 Mar 2002 21:43:02 -0800 (PST)
From: JP S-C <jp_sc@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: jpsc@users.sourceforge.net
Subject: Re: [Kde-accessibility] KDE/Qt at the 2nd Linux Accessibility Conference
To: Navindra Umanee <navindra@cs.mcgill.ca>, kde-accessibility@mail.kde.org
In-Reply-To: <20020330001216.A29973@cs.mcgill.ca>
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Hi Navindra,
Long time no see! :-)
> I mean as far as I know a grand total of 0 developers are developing
> any code for KDE in this project...
This is quite true.
> It seems to be mostly talk about
> things that should be done if someone felt like it. The only way to
> make something happen is to actually do it, unfortunately.
I think this is where we disagree. This project is not just like writing
another KDE app or adding a feature to KWrite or inventing DCOP. We're
talking about changing Qt substantially, inspecting all KDE apps for
keyboard navigatability, alt. text, etc. It's hard for me to think
of another task that requires the amount of familiarity with and changes
to Qt that this does. Fundamentally, you're adding functions and an entire
subarchitecture that allows people to use a fundamentally visual interaction model in
a non-visual way. We're taking something that was meant just to paint pixels, click, and
accept keyboard input and essentially abstracting all input, output, and navigation to allow for
various devices and access methods. It's really hard to think of a parallel.
> It seems to be mostly talk about
> things that should be done if someone felt like it. The only way to
> make something happen is to actually do it, unfortunately.
So directly addressing this <snippet> again :-)...
To describe it as talk about things that should be done if someone felt like it is
somewhat true on one level. But on another level, to say it "should be done if someone felt like
it," is also looking a little narrowly at what accessibility is. If we want to advocate KDE/Qt,
if we want to have it used by [U.S. and other] governments or have KDE in federally-funded schools
or libraries, we need to have KDE/Qt be accessible. So yes, it "should" be done if we're content
with our current user base and audience, but it "must" be done if we want to gain adoption into
large institutions and agencies.
Regarding "the only way to make something happen is to actually do it, unfortunately", I know what
you're saying, and I've heard this many, many times before as part of the KDE philosophy. I'll
say this: this is not a one person job, it's not something one person can just "actually do" by
him or herself in any reasonable amount of time. Between the crew at Sun, engineers working on
accessible Mozilla in China, OpenOffice in Hamburg, and Nauiltis, the engineers working on
Gnopernicus in Germany, and the programmers and people working on GNOME Onscreen Keyboard at U.
Toronto, just starting to make GTK+/GNOME accessible has required a very large number of full-time
employees. So I'm not sure if the KDE notion of "just go out and do it yourself" applies here.
I think the combination of the legal _need_ for accessibility and the enormity of the task merit,
in my mind, showing this report to the KDE community. To me, it's more about showing the KDE
community what's happening in the Linux accessibility community, what's not happening in the
KDE/Qt arena, and the choice we have to make about what work we do and where we want KDE to be
used.
Just some thoughts, thanks so much for your reply :-)
Best,
--JP
P.S. I believe there are many more reasons other than just the legal ones for accessibility, but
they didn't seem applicable right now.
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