While I would always support people freely expressing their opinions, I see some problems with the content of this letter. Because you have submitted this to this email list, while I will never write anything insulting or derogatory of anybody here, I do think it is appropriate to express my concerns about what was written in the same place where you have posted your opinions. This is by no means a personal critique, confrontation, or in any way flaming. I do not know the writer and would write the same things if my best friend had written this.
First of all, unless you participated in the developer beta or the public beta, this seems to me to be a little hasty. The OS has been out only since Thursday afternoon so you haven’t had much time to work with it or get help from others. Of course bugs and problems should be pointed out immediately, but it would seem to me that one should work with a new system for a while before coming to the conclusions you have come to in your email to Accessibility. As I recall, you were expressing these views very soon after the upgrade was released. Even if you did participate in one of the betas, I would think that you would hold off on such a strong negative response since you can see from the list traffic that some people - blind and visually impaired people - are adapting to the new OS and even enjoying it. Secondly, what has been written doesn’t appear to be wholly factual and accurate to me. Yes, the sidebar in iTunes is gone but some people are finding their music just fine. You don’t like the change; maybe there are changes I don’t like. But “it isn’t accessible” and “I don’t like it” or “I can’t figure this out” are not synonymous. There have been several posts where people explained how to work with iTunes without the sidebar and while some of this specifically talked about Windows, this is also true on the Mac. The same can be said for spotlight. I am not saying there might not be any limitations or problems but I am searching and finding, within my own computer and outside. Just went to Wikipedia to read about Christopher Columbus for instance. Even the subject line isn’t really descriptive of what is being written. “Voice commands” does not immediately make me think of voiceover or access for blind people in particular. Thirdly, the explanations given do not contain concrete replicable details. You don’t mention what various methods you have tried to employ to find your music in iTunes or to search with spotlight in light of the changes and then described what happens when you try these strategies. There is nothing here for anybody in accessibility to really take hold of and run with except for your citation of the website with the list of bugs. Fourthly, you bring up trust. I would leave the issue of trust to my relationships with close friends and God; I do not trust companies, nor do I distrust them. I evaluate what they are doing related to what I need and use or don’t use the services and products accordingly. Fifthly, the lack of substantial facts and replicable description is accompanied by a great amount of angry accusation and emotionally-based claims that cannot be proven. How do any of us know what those who developed this OS were thinking? How do you know we all got slapped in the face? You certainly are not reflecting my view when you write this though certainly there are probably others who would agree with you. I understand that you feel that the input of those blind people who participated in betas, which were both developer and public betas, was not valued on the same level as reports of other testers about issues other than voiceover, but even if it could be concretely proven that that is actually true, it is my experience that if people will not listen to careful and thorough critiques you will not win their willing attention and cooperation by angry denunciations either. It works as a vent and all of us have done that at times and I would have no right to say it should never be done, but I’m not so sure it works to promote change. You don’t like Yosemite; possibly a lot of people, blind and sighted, don’t like it. On the other hand, a lot of people, blind and sighted, are downloading and installing it and finding it can be successfully used and are liking it for the most part. Of course, we would all like a bug-free environment. We should all express our opinions to each other and Apple and choose other alternatives if what we have is no longer meeting our needs. State your opinions freely and openly; even express your anger and frustration as you see fit. But please don’t confuse your opinions and likes and dislikes with the larger issue of whether the OS is accessible or not for blind people: at least not while some blind people are successfully using and enjoying it. Your opinion of Apple and your judgment as to how usable the OS is for you and your decision as to whether or not you want to try to work with it are not one and the same as the larger issue of whether the OS is accessible for blind people or not. I can know that something is accessible and that others are using it and can decide that I myself don’t like it, don’t want to use it, and can declare that I personally find it lacking, but this does not necessarily mean that it is inaccessible. Usually we can not claim that anything is fully accessible for blind people; there are definitely some products and services that we know are totally inaccessible for us; I would say that Mac OS in general and Yosemite in particular is largely accessible with some caveats and issues. Whether each person likes or dislikes the form that the accessibility takes is a separate discussion, in my opinion is worthy of discussion, but is a very individual matter. -- Cheryl I tried and tried to turn over a new leaf. I got crumpled wads of tear-stained paper thrown in the trash! Then God gave me a new heart and life: His joy for my despairing tears! And now, every day: "This I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." (Lamentations 3:21-23 ESV) > On Oct 19, 2014, at 1:28 AM, Pamela Francis <gypsykitt...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Apple has so much broken this OS. I have no idea why they would think of > releasing it without having paid more attention to what they were doing. > I wrote this to the accessibility email address, even though it may not be > totally their fault, I can't believe they don't have some input into what > goes into their new OS. > > Hello, > I am extremely disappointed with the lack of attention paid to accessibility > in your latest OS10 release. > You overhauled the look of your software, while not thinking of those of us > who have grown to trust you with our accessibility needs. > I know many visually impaired beta testers, most under NDA with you per each > release of both desktop & IOS software. > I realize we are a minority in the big picture of your customer base. > However, if one has paid money to participate in your testers program & is > paid lipservice to what is reported, what good are the testers? Has the > quality control suffered because the upgrades are now free? > Aren't we as a disability community owed a description of what we can expect > in terms we understand? It looks pretty, but acts very much like something > from a crackerjack box. > I can't get to my music in Itunes because the views I have become used to > have disappeared. There is no more sidebar. > In spotlight search, which is supposed to search for references outside my > Mac, I hear either the words button or image in the search results. > How is this useful to me or anyone who would try to use it with no vision? > As I stated earlier, there are those who have been under NDA to attempt to > alert you of the issues before release. Those same people had enough respect > for their contracts to not divulge issues that may concern the rest of us. > However, in return we all got slapped in the face. > There is a site that gathers bugs, along with other content. > In case you are interested go to www.applevis.com <http://www.applevis.com/> > As has been shown, I doubt any of this will be taken to heart. > I can only hope. > My next computer, if I need one will be a Windows machine. They are cheaper, > maybe a little buggy, yet I know what I am getting. > Premium prices should reflect premium quality in every sense of the word. > Pamela Francis > > Pam Francis > > On Oct 18, 2014, at 8:47 PM, Alex Hall <mehg...@icloud.com > <mailto:mehg...@icloud.com>> wrote: > > It's now called Dictation Commands, and is coupled with Dictation. Enable it > in accessibility preferences, and use it by pressing the same command you'd > use to start dictation (press that key once more to stop). The problem is > that VoiceOver is muted during all dictation, which now includes issuing > commands, so even if a command works, you get no spoken feedback. >> On Oct 18, 2014, at 5:55 PM, Faisal <newyorkyank...@gmail.com >> <mailto:newyorkyank...@gmail.com>> wrote: >> >> Hi everyone, >> did they completely do away with voice commands on Yosemite? My key trigger >> no longer works and I couldn’t find it in system preferences. >> Thanks >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "MacVisionaries" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com >> <mailto:macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. >> To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com >> <mailto:macvisionaries@googlegroups.com>. >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries >> <http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries>. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout >> <https://groups.google.com/d/optout>. > > > -- > Have a great day, > Alex Hall > mehg...@icloud.com <mailto:mehg...@icloud.com> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "MacVisionaries" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com > <mailto:macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. > To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com > <mailto:macvisionaries@googlegroups.com>. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries > <http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries>. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout > <https://groups.google.com/d/optout>. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "MacVisionaries" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com > <mailto:macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. > To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com > <mailto:macvisionaries@googlegroups.com>. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries > <http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries>. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout > <https://groups.google.com/d/optout>. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. 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