There is MSAA, Microsoft Active Accessibility, and a replacement with Vista, I believe, but don't remember what it is called. Don't know if they can be used by style sheets, but inquiry to enable@Microsoft.com might be in order.
Dave
At 12:45 PM 7/4/2006, you wrote:
Gentlebeings,
I have read a depressing and recent article suggesting that DOM manipulations are invisible to most screen readers [1]. There are some workarounds suggested in [2], but for the most part it looks like dangerous territory.
What's worse, there seems to be no way to detect screen readers reliably. I am determined to provide some JavaScript in the 'standard' interface, as it will make for enhanced ease-of-use for those sighted people using a modern browser.
(I think it would be good for screen readers, too, if there was just some way for me to control/hint the "focus" of the screen reader, but at the moment there doesn't seem to be. Screen readers don't even seem to support an aural/speech stylesheet, much less provide some JavaScript object that lets me know I'm in one.)
I found a page (that is eluding me at the moment) detailing a method for showing content to screen readers yet hiding it from 'regular' clients. I was thinking of adding a "Screen Reader Support On" link to the top of all pages that would only show to screen readers; does this seem like a good approach?
Note that this would be in *addition* to the ability to get a JS-free version of the interface by using a different URL prefix for any user agent that doesn't want the JS action.
~ethan