[Athen] Microsoft Word versus Open Office

[Berkowitz, Daniel J]

Kes,
 
I can inform you with absolute conviction that the development team at the Open Office Foundation is absolutely committed to making their software as accessible as possible. I know a few of these folks personally and know of outside people working on solutions to problems they may not have even know existed. 
 
They are also completely open to feedback and in the year or so we have been using Oo for DAISY Production process have actually incorporated several fixes and improvements we have recommended. You may not that in less than a year Oo has moved from version 2.0 to version 2.2.1. Just try and get Microsoft to discover, test, implement, and support that many improvements in such a short period of time. 
 
I know of your skills and your commitment as well and know that the Open Office Foundation would welcome you into their fold. 
 
Cheers --- Dann
 
 
 
========================= 
Daniel Berkowitz - Assistant Director 
Boston University Office of Disability Services 
19 Deerfield Street, 2nd floor 
Boston, MA 02215 
  
(617) 353-3658 (office) 
(617) 353-9646 (fax) 
djbrky at bu.edu <mailto:djbrky at bu.edu>  (eMail) 
www.bu.edu/disability <https://xmsweb.bu.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.bu.edu/disability>  

________________________________

From: athen-bounces at athenpro.org on behalf of Kestrell
Sent: Wed 9/12/2007 3:34 PM
To: Access Technologists in Higher Education Network
Subject: Re: [Athen] Microsoft Word versus Open Office



Dan,

Yes, I do find the accessibility of open source applications something of a
hot button especially as open source so often comes with the promise of
increased usability, improved memory resource allocation, and other
usability features which, I feel, are all that more important to assistive
technology users. Add to this assuarances I have received from developers of
OO that it is accessible, despite my finding it not so, and I get a bit
disgruntled wondering if the OO folks are as concerned with accessibility as
they claim.

The irony of tools which promise increased accessibility turning out to be
not very accessible to assistive tech users continues to make me feel I have
a humor impairment.

Kes

----- Original Message -----
From: "Crabb, Nolan" <Crabb.15 at osu.edu>
To: "Access Technologists in Higher Education Network" <athen at athenpro.org>
Sent: Wednesday, September 12, 2007 2:23 PM
Subject: Re: [Athen] Microsoft Word versus Open Office



> I've been fascinated with open Office for years, but I think Robert's

> definitely onto something here:  It's screen reader access, particularly

> for Writer, isn't exactly stellar.  At one time, it was absolutely out

> of reach.  I've never had Word crash on 200 or 300 page books, but maybe

> it's the graphics.  A lot of the stuff I use isn't very graphics

> intensive.

>

> Regards,

> Nolan

>

>

>

> Nolan Crabb

> Director of Assistive Technology

> The Ohio State University

> 2054 Drake Center, 1849 Cannon Dr., Columbus, OH 43210

>

> Ph. (614) 735-8688

> E-mail:  crabb.15 at osu.edu

>

>

>

> _______________________________________________

> Athen mailing list

> Athen at athenpro.org

> http://athenpro.org/mailman/listinfo/athen_athenpro.org



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