I've come across programs, like you're saying, drivers and such where the
installation utility program was totally worthless with a screen reader, but
if you browse the CD, find the folder for drivers or program folder itself,
there's a setup.exe file in there that you can run, it bypasses that first
installation thing you had trouble with and you can install it fine. Linksys
is a good one for that.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Martin McCormick" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2012 11:06 AM
Subject: Re: accessibility
> The one thing I have not heard anybody describe about
> the repeater directory is how they examined the CDROM and what
> was on it and why it's not accessible.
>
> I have seen tons of things that weren't really
> accessible but if you looked at what files were on there you
> could read them by using some other tool other than the
> inaccessible applications provided for that purpose.
>
> I've have also seen tons of CD's that really were
> useless unless one just happened to have a handy-dandy OCR
> program just sitting there to accept the image files. I've also
> seen disks that used some sort of proprietary compression
> algorithm so one couldn't get at anything. There are a zillion
> ways to make stuff inaccessible, but if one uses a little
> creativity, it is not all a washout.
>
> I admit that I do not use any Microsoft products or
> Windows screen readers at all on purpose. I use Linux and
> Macintosh and other forms of unix because I think they are more
> suited to tinkering and reverse engineering things.
> Reverse-engineering is not evil regardless of what highly-payed
> folks wearing expensive suits tell you. It depends on why you
> are doing it and what you hope to accomplish.
>
> I get sort of a kick out of mounting a promotional CDROM
> on a Linux box and then essentially taking it apart to see what
> is on that CDROM. After that, I usually put the CDROM in my box
> of plastic bits and later, it will be possibly drilled, sawed or
> otherwise turned in to something useful.
>
> AOL used to bury this part of the world in starter
> CDROM's
>
> My wife bought us an Encyclopedia Britanica CDROM years
> ago and I was really looking forward to using it but I don't
> think I ever teased anything out of it but a few odd articles
> that appeared to be html files while the rest was an opaque
> binary mess that probably generated screen images.
>
> If I can get a piece of technology to work, I call it
> accessible even if I had to work a little harder. It's almost
> like beating the system.
>
> 73 WB5AGZ
>
>
> Butch Bussen writes:
>> I'll believe it when I see it. A dozen years ago I bought their
>> repeater directory on cd and it wasn't usable. I was promised they were
>> working on it, were aware of the problem and it would be fixed in the
>> next release. Last one I looked it still wasn't usable. So, we'll see.
>>
>> 73
>> Butch
>> WA0VJR
>> Node 3148
>> Wallace, ks.
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 21 Mar 2012, Barbara Lombardi wrote:
>>
>> > ARRL is having discussions around accessibility. You should all write
>> to
>> > your Director about it.
>> > Betsey has been in communication with them. 73, Barb
>> > Barb K1EIR
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>>
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