Re: [g-a-devel] Accessible cross-platform toolkit?

["Steve Lee" <steve fullmeasure co uk>]

2008/8/26 Milan Zamazal <pdm brailcom org>:
[snip]  Although XUL is basically accessible, there
> are minor annoyances which may make doing some things difficult to
> impossible.
>
> The very first problem is that there is little real interest of
> supporting XUL in the accessibility infrastructure.
[snip]

> Additionally, XUL is not that great development environment.  JavaScript
> is handy for smaller tasks, but Java is IMHO much more suitable for
> larger applications.

or Python ;-)

Yes there are frustrations but I discovered Mozilla now have a basic
javascript module system and you can also create JS XPCOM components
both of which help with architecture. Theres aslo C++ XPCOM components
and perhaps one day Python. In addition I'm investigating using some
of Dojo's feature and it looks like it should be possible to use its
modules and classes simulation if you like that sort of thing. (I'm
actually using the data abstraction layer for easy local/remote data
access and parsing) plus it Django templating look easier than the
Mozilla system.

> XUL doesn't handle widget tree switching very
> well, apparently some things can't be managed right after they are
> created thus making certain actions tricky and complicated.

Here I have to agree I spent ages fighting with layout and the lack of
events on reflow completion means a fragile reliance on timeouts. Mind
you I have not yet asked the community about this yet and there may be
some simple fixes. (anyone?)

> Developer
> documentation is far from perfect (e.g. in comparison with Java
> documentation).

But it looks like the move is towards supporting the platform.

> As for accessibility related items, there are sometimes
> problems with keyboard navigation, focus handling is still somewhat
> mystery to me, there is no Firefox and/or screen reader support for some
> important concepts like table navigation, reporting statusbar changes or
> character reading.  Overall our XUL application works, but not
> perfectly, it's far from normally usable with JAWS and

> I was forced to
> use some ugly tricks, not speaking about time spent on experiments,
> googling and reporting.

Yes it can be painful. But I feel its is worth while in that I have a
solution using web technologies and associated benefits.

> One promising area, depending on the kind
> of application, may be HTML+ARIA.  There are some widget toolkits based
> on this, it's backed up by a W3C standard and it is likely to be well
> supported at least in Firefox and Orca (better than XUL is).

You know it is not an all or nothing situation as you can use a HTML
front end with a XUL backend using documents simple ways to
communicate between the 2 through DOM nodes and events. A XUL backend
gives you full platform access and HTML UI gives accessibility and you
can used Dojo or jQuery or other widgets if they are accessible and
work with file://  (which DOjo does). I decide not to this currently
due to time constraints and am just using XUL + modules + C++ XPCOM

Cheers
-- 
Steve Lee
Open Source Assistive Technology Software and Accessibility
fullmeasure.co.uk