Because not everyone is able to read a computer screen as easily as you and I, accessibility is one of the most important aspect that the internet and web apps should keep in mind at all times.
That's why I feel this Google Reader improvement is so important, allowing it to reach a much broader audience.
Google Reader is now ARIA enabled!
Spoken output support in Google Reader is implemented using Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA), an evolving standard for enhancing the accessibility of Web-2.0 applications. WAI-ARIA is supported at present by Firefox --- with future support forthcoming in other browsers. ARIA support in Google Reader has been tested in the following environments:
- Fire Vox The self-voicing extension to Firefox
- Firefox 3 with JFW 8.0 and Window-Eyes 5.5
- Portable Firefox 3 with both JFW 8.0 and Window-Eyes 5.5
Note that Firefox 3 is still in Beta and that ARIA support like the underlying standard is still in development. ARIA support in Google Reader is designed to help end-users experience the benefits of a powerful Web-2.0 application, while giving browser implementors and adaptive technology vendors a real-world application on which to test their implementations.
Activating ARIA Support In Google Reader
When you first open Google Reader using a screenreader, you will hear an invisible link labeled click hear for ARIA enhanced Google Reader. Follow this link to activate ARIA support. You can bookmark the resulting page for future use.
Once on the ARIA-enabled Google Reader, press ? to hear a list of available keyboard commands. Power users note: most of these keyboard commands are available in the default version of Google Reader.
[Google Reader]
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