All About Access

Yesterday when I read Peter Korn’s announcement that OpenDocument v1.1 is now an OASIS standard, I almost whipped out a quick entry. Now I’m glad I waited because there’s even more good news thanks to the accessibility guys at OpenOffice.org: Version 2.2 for Linux/UNIX, currently in development, now exposes tons of text attributes to assistive technologies, which means screen readers such as Orca can now provide those details to the user. And that, of course, means that users who are blind can identify exactly how the text in their documents is formatted and be confident that what they have produced looks the way they intended. Thanks guys!!!

I was just glancing over the list of General Sessions for the upcoming CSUN conference. OpenDocument Format and open source solutions are certainly well-represented this year:

• Collaboration and Web Access using the Orca Screen Reader


• Creating Accessible Documents in OpenOffice.org


• DAISY: Free, Open-source Tools from the Urakawa Project for Authoring Accessible Multimedia


• IBM’s Accessible Open Computing Strategy: Usable Access of Emerging Technologies and Platforms


• Obtaining and Installing Ubuntu Linux Using the Orca Screen Reader*


• Opening Doors with Open Source: Screen Reader Access to Linux/UNIX*


• OpenOffice Document Access using the Orca Screen Reader


• Remote Access Bridge: Cross-Platform Accessible Remote Access to the Linux Desktop


• Sakai: A Case Study of Accessibility in Open Source Applications


• Tools for Improving OpenDocument Format (ODF) Accessibility


• Topics in Java, UNIX, and Open Document Format Accessibility

*Disclosure: I am one of the co-presenters in this session.

There are at least two additional presentations addressing the barriers posed by the high cost of commercial assistive technology products, including:

• A Review of Lite Tech Low Cost Communication Devices (Those under $1500)


• Accommodating Seniors on $100/Computer or Less

(The fact that “low cost” and “under $1500” are used synonymously speaks volumes, doesn’t it? )

Should be an excellent conference for folks interested in finding ways to bridge the “digital divide.”

Do you remember the DECtalk Express, the only decent external speech synthesizer we had available to us before the advent of software speech synthesis? Sure, getting a DECtalk Express required coming up with 1000 bucks, but the quality of the speech justified the expense. I have two of them in my possession, and they still work! Well, that’s not entirely accurate. One works as long as I sit very, very still because I managed to snap off a piece that is (was) on one end of the serial cable. Thus the synthesizer keeps getting disconnected. The other works using the damaged cable, but its own cable went AWOL long ago. So I have $2000 worth of equipment, $1000 of which is currently serving as an amusing paperweight, and $1000 of which is flakey at best.

If you don’t remember the DECtalk Express, you’re probably wondering why I don’t just run out to my local computer store and pick up some replacement serial cables. The thing is, I can’t. You see, Digital Equipment Corporation, in its infinite wisdom, created its own special serial cable for use with this synthesizer: On one end there’s a standard 9-pin female connector, but on the other end there is an RJ12. Only it’s not an RJ12. As I learned recently, it’s an “RJ12 MMJ”—a special creation brought to us by Digital Equipment Corporation. I would order replacement cables from Digital were it not for the fact that they went bankrupt a number of years ago. So what does one do??

I tried looking around for serial cable wiring diagrams—and found plenty— but so far haven’t come up with anything for DB9 to RJ12. And even if I find the appropriate diagram, I would still need to track down and order the proprietary RJ12 MMJ connector.

I did find a company that sells an adapter that sounded like what I need, but the product arrived today and is only part of the puzzle. I called to inquire. After reminding me that I was dealing with 20-year-old technology made by a defunct company, and then listening to my plea for assistance, the gentleman on the other end of the phone took pity on me and said they would make me the missing piece (bless him!).

Regardless, this is taking far too much of my time, energy, and money—and none of it would be necessary if Digital had simply gone with a standard serial cable rather than this proprietary nonsense….

So why am I telling you all of this? Admittedly in large part because I feel the need to vent. But also because it is yet another reminder of why proprietary anything is bad—be it a cable or a file format. When we depend upon a single entity for access to our items in perpetuity, we’re asking for trouble: One never knows what that entity might do down the road, or if that entity will even continue to exist. Relying upon standards that are not just open, but created and supported by multiple entities, is the only way to go.

Technorati Tags: DECtalk Express, proprietary formats, ODF, Open XML

ODF 1.1, which has been described as “the most accessible document file format, bar none,” is now available for public review according to this announcement from OASIS:

The public review starts today, 27 July 2006, and ends 25 September 2006. This is an open invitation to comment. We strongly encourage feedback from potential users, developers and others, whether OASIS members or not, for the sake of improving the interoperability and quality of OASIS work.

Links to the specification can be found at OASIS as well as on Peter Korn’s blog.

Peter Korn blogs:

Daniel Carrera at the Open Document Fellowship has developed a text-only ODF reader (which is part of their more general ODF Viewer project) that converts ODF to HTML and then invokes the Lynx web browser to read it. I just downloaded this early “alpha” edition of the code, and started playing with it. Thus far it opened my two test text files just fine (one of which was committee draft #2 of the ODF 1.1 specification – a 735 page document that worked out to some 3,416 “pages” on my Lynx 80×24 character terminal window). Unfortunately it didn’t do anything useful with a test spreadsheet I gave it.

I’ve had similar success with text files. Unfortunately it didn’t do anything useful with the presentation I gave it either. At least not yet. After all, it IS only an alpha version….

Peter adds:

At the moment this version works on UNIX systems, but as Lynx also runs on Windows and Macintosh, and the conversion is simply an XSLT transformation, there is little reason why this couldn’t be easily ported to Windows and Macintosh.

However, his entry does not mention what porting the ODF reader to Windows can mean for users who are blind. And it can mean a lot.

As we are all too aware, there are some pretty significant barriers to information access for individuals who are blind or visually impaired:

• The cost of the computer iteself


• The cost of the mainstream software (e.g. Windows and MS Office)


• The cost of the assistive technology required to access the mainstream software


• The cost and availability of quality training

As a result of these expenses, there are a lot of users out there who are running old versions of their screen reader. While JAWS and Window-Eyes have come a long way when it comes to providing solid access to MS Office, the major improvements have all been relatively recent. If you want to be able to effectively access complex documents, spreadsheets, and presentations, you really need to have a recent copy of your access software. If that is not an option—and for many users, it is not—the information in question winds up being functionally inaccessible.

There are other users who do have the latest greatest versions of everything, but have never received the training on how to use their office suite or the more advanced features of their screen reader. If you have no idea how to use Excel or PowerPoint and to do so in conjunction with your screen reader, spreadsheets and presentations wind up being inaccessible.

This all boils down to the following: There’s a heck of a lot of information out there—information which is technically accessible—that still cannot be accessed by users who are blind. Porting the ODF reader to Windows can change that.

Once the ODF reader is ported to Windows, and is further developed to support spreadsheets and presentations, suddenly all sorts of information that was previously inaccessible due to the aforementioned barriers becomes accessible: All you have to be able to do is open it in your web browser. That is going to make a big difference to a lot of people.

The Software Freedom Law Center is an organization whose mission is to “provide legal representation and other law-related services to protect and advance Free and Open Source Software.” Yesterday, the SFLC cleared ODF for free software use:

“A number of our clients asked us to determine whether ODF is truly free of patent, copyright and trademark encumbrances. We looked into the issue, and are confident that developers can use ODF in free software,” said James Vasile, SFLC Legal Counsel. “ODF is GPL-compatible.”

With this assurance, more developers will feel comfortable creating products that incorporate ODF, which means we’ll have even more choice regarding which tools we use. This is great!

It does raise an interesting question, however: Microsoft is trying to compete with ODF by producing their own open format. Will their format be similarly cleared by the SFLC? Or will Open XML require the use of MS Office due to the potential legal risks of implementing the format elsewhere?

The other day I blogged about Microsoft’s announcement that they would be supporting ODF after all —an announcement in which they could not resist taking a jab at ODF. At the time, this jab struck me as defensiveness. But the more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve come to believe that this jab is not mere defensiveness; it’s more than that: It’s fear mongering. And at the risk of sounding paranoid, it’s aimed at least in part at us.

Think about it: In their press release Microsoft argues that their formats are “distinguished by their approach to accessibility support for disabled workers” and then goes on to say that “support for accessibility options” is a “key gap” in ODF. They’re trying to get our attention. But they don’t back their claim with actual evidence; they simply declare it to be true. That doesn’t make it so, of course. Besides, who is defining “accessibility” and “more accessible,” and how are they being defined? As Peter Korn observed:

It is kinda like saying “our encryption system is more secure because we didn’t have invited security experts look at it”.

Indeed. And we’ve all seen where that has gotten us…. I suppose that’s another entry for another day (like the next Patch Tuesday).

Peter goes on to say:

To make an accessibility comparison of the two file formats, you need to undertake an independent review of ODF and the Microsoft Office file formats for accessibility, and see how they both fare.

Absolutely! Without such a review, all I can conclude from Microsoft’s currently-baseless claims is that they are hoping to fill us with renewed concern and doubt so that we’ll rally behind them and attempt to slam the brakes on the Commonwealth’s migration. Personally, I’m not buying what they have to sell, and to be honest I’m rather offended that they’re trying to sell it.

What I didn’t realize until Peter pointed it out was that such an independent review has already been conducted by Dr. Cheiko Asakawa and and Rich Schwerdtfeger of IBM. The findings?

Microsoft Office’s file format failed to provide for relative font sizes, failed to encode table headers and logical tab orders in documents, and failed to provide label association for forms. Furthermore, outside of the accessibility context, the Microsoft Office file format provides no way to encode image maps (with or without appropriate ALT tags), or 3D shapes (both of which ODF provides for). Their analysis also found accessibility issues with ODF, all of which have been addressed in the ODF 1.1 proposal submitted to the ODF Technical Committee. So as I noted in late May, with these incorporated into ODF 1.1 later this year, ODF will be the most accessible document file format, bar none.

If ODF will be the most accessible document file format, bar none, then ODF is what we should be using. Period.

Peter’s conclusion?

So, I guess in a way Microsoft was correct when they said in their press release “certain compromises and customer disclosures will be a necessary part of translating between the two formats.” At least when it applies to accessibility and ODF 1.1 later this year, exporting an ODF 1.1 file to Microsoft Office file format will mean a loss of some accessibility information, because there is simply no way to express that information in the Microsoft Office file format…

If you want to learn more about the accessibility of ODF, I highly recommend reading Peter’s entry in its entirety. In and of itself it is quite informative, and it’s filled with links to other important information which will help us get more up to speed on the issues at hand.