ANNOUNCE: Mono Accessibility 2.1

["Mario Carrion" <mcarrion novell com>]

Hello

The Mono Accessibility Team is happy to announce the 2.1 release of the Mono Accessibility project, our first release of the 2.0 series. 

This release enables all types of users to access System.Windows.Forms and Silverlight applications from Linux using Orca and other ATK-based Assistive Technologies (ATs), as well as access Linux applications from UI Automation (UIA) based ATs.

What's changed since version 2.0?
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Added:
* Improved compatibility with AT-SPI2, including fixes and performance.
* More compatibility with Silverlight Accessibility for UIA Clients.
* Caching improvements in UIA Client API.
* Support for custom providers and client-side providers.

What is Mono Accessibility:
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The Mono Accessibility project enables Winforms and Silverlight
applications to be fully accessible on Linux, and allows Assistive
Technologies (ATs) like screen readers and test automation tools that
depend on UI Automation APIs to work on Linux.

Mono Accessibility is released under the MIT/X11 license.

Get it!
=====================================

Mono Accessibility is available for a variety of Linux distributions, including:

* openSUSE 11.2
  http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/Mono:/UIA/openSUSE_11.2/mono-uia.ymp
* Ubuntu Karmic Koala - Package Archive on Launchpad
  https://edge.launchpad.net/~mono-a11y/+archive/releases
* Fedora 12 - Repository on openSUSE Build Service
  http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/Mono:/UIA/Fedora_12/
* Source tarballs
  http://mono-a11y.org/releases/2.1/sources/

A Note About at-spi2
=====================================

Accessing GTK+ applications with the UIA Client API requires the most recent development version of the new dbus-based at-spi2, which is known to cause system instability.

AT-SPI2 packages are relocated, this means you have to explicitly enable AT-SPI2 using gconf-editor toggling the key "/desktop/gnome/interface/at-spi-dbus" to use AT-SPI2, by default AT-SPI is used. Notice however if you have plans to use UIA Client API you require to use AT-SPI2.

We are working hard to identify these issues and hope to aid the GNOME Accessibility Team in stabilizing at-spi2 in the near future.

Find out more
=====================================

Navigate to http://mono-project.com/Accessibility for all the latest information, and ways to contact us.

Enjoy!
- Mono Accessibility Team