Accessible Android Accountability
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We, as blind or visually impaired users, feel that Google's new and innovative Android operating system is off to a great start with software accessibility. However, there's a few key points we'd like to see improved. They are as follows:
1. In order to use an Android device as somebody with a visual impairment, one is usually required to have sighted help to get Talkback or Spiel installed and working. These are the screen reading components essential for the phone to be operable by the visually impaired user.
2. In order to use Email, web browsing, and music, the user must install 3rd party applications to achieve these tasks. That's right, the default email and web browsing applications that ship with Android are not accessible to Talkback and Spiel. This is plain unacceptable for an operating system existing for a few years now.
3. Ongoing work is going into making the touch screen APIs accessible to Talkback. This is great. This needs to keep happening and should really be backported into the 2.x versions of Android. This would ensure that accessibility gets into the hands of current Android users sooner.
Accessible software is not a bolt-on afterthought anymore. It's just as important as the kernel that powers Android, and should be treated as such. If this fails to be resolved and worked on, we may see more and more frustrated VI users switching to more accessible alternatives.
Thank you.
1. In order to use an Android device as somebody with a visual impairment, one is usually required to have sighted help to get Talkback or Spiel installed and working. These are the screen reading components essential for the phone to be operable by the visually impaired user.
2. In order to use Email, web browsing, and music, the user must install 3rd party applications to achieve these tasks. That's right, the default email and web browsing applications that ship with Android are not accessible to Talkback and Spiel. This is plain unacceptable for an operating system existing for a few years now.
3. Ongoing work is going into making the touch screen APIs accessible to Talkback. This is great. This needs to keep happening and should really be backported into the 2.x versions of Android. This would ensure that accessibility gets into the hands of current Android users sooner.
Accessible software is not a bolt-on afterthought anymore. It's just as important as the kernel that powers Android, and should be treated as such. If this fails to be resolved and worked on, we may see more and more frustrated VI users switching to more accessible alternatives.
Thank you.
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