Take a look at how Opera’s Hakon Lie publicly blasted Microsoft for it’s lack of support of Web Standards! Lie states, “Opera has filed a formal complaint with the European Commission to force Microsoft to support open Web standards in its Web browser, Internet Explorer. We believe that Microsoft has harmed Web standards by refusing to support them; Microsoft often participates in creating Web standards, promoting them, and even promising to implement them. Despite their talent, however, they refuse to support Web standards correctly.” Wow! I think all of us in the accessibility world know the importance of harmonized web standards. Let’s hope that Microsoft steps up to the plate and does the right thing.
A number of interesting tools have been released recently. Andrew Kirkpatrick announced a new Flash player for Firefox that includes upgraded support for captions. IBM, through the Eclipse Accessibility Tools Framework initiative announced the release of AccProbe, designed to give developers MSAA and IA2 application properties.
While this isn’t new, I think it’s important for accessibility developers to continue supporting the Mac accessibility community. Along those lines, TPG’s Cedric Trevisan released a color contrast tool for the Mac platform.
At heart, I’m a usability professional. So it’s not surprising that I enjoyed the December 2007 issue of Computer Power User magazine and their interview of plain language icon Ginny Reddish. Do yourself a favor and download the article from the CPU web site (you’ll need to log in as a guest).
Earlier this week Judy Brewer announced the final call for the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, Version 2.0. Many of the WCAG 2.0 guidelines harmonize with the TEITAC provisions for web site and web application accessibility. The review period concludes on June 22, 2008.