Re: Linux Window Managers and Accessibility

[Bill Haneman <bill haneman sun com>]

"Carl R. Witty" wrote:
[...]
> 
> OK, I think maybe I understand things a little better now.  How does
> this sound?
> 
> Applications (via the toolkits) get some sort of unique id from the
> AccessibilityBroker.  They place this id on the ACCESSIBILITY_ID
> property of their top-level windows.
> 
> The AccessibilityBroker uses the same freedesktop.org protocols that
> are used for an external pager, to map windows onto desktops, etc.
> This means that the AccessibilityBroker must connect to the X server
> to monitor the window manager properties; it also monitors the
> ACCESSIBILITY_ID property of top-level windows.
> 
> The details of this are hidden behind the Accessibility API, so that
> nothing X-specific is revealed.
> 
> This provides a unique mapping from accessible applications to
> windows, and the window manager isn't touched at all -- this should
> work with any GNOME/KDE window manager.

Sounds like the right solution, and along the lines of what I hoped
was possible.  I was unclear of the relationship between WM, pager,
and X.

It may be a little messier in the broker itself dealing with these
properties via the X server, but no biggie.  Since the apps can place
this property on their toplevel windows it makes sense for them to get
it from the broker, as you suggest.

best regards,

-Bill

> (BTW, I stopped mailing to 3 mailing lists and several individual
> people; feel free to forward this to anybody you think should see it.)
> 
> Carl
-- 
--------------
Bill Haneman
Gnome Accessibility / Batik SVG Toolkit
Sun Microsystems Ireland