Ben I believe indicated in an answer to a VPN question that VPN functionality is accessible on iDevices. He also mentioned Citrix. I am knowledgeable only to a point and thought it might be helpful to clarify and get some clarification regarding accessibility and remote access. A VPN can be, and often is, used as a means of remote access. In fact, I'm sending this message on Microsoft Outlook, which resides on my local computer, but is connected through our VPN to Exchange Server" such that, except for the back end of the computing process, no one really knows I'm not in my office, at my desk, connected by an Ethernet wire. Later this morning, I'll work on a Microsoft Word document and save my edits to a server that is buried in a mountain in Utah, but I'm only hitting "Save." Now, I used to use a technology called Citrix. With Citrix, I too accessed the firm's network, albeit only by frames that were relayed from a central server. Neither Outlook nor Microsoft Word resided on my local machine. The only reason this was accessible was that JAWS or Window-Eyes (and I've used both) resided on the Citrix server and on my local computer. Technically, I think there was a setting where I could have dispensed with having the screen reader loaded locally, but I think that was only Window-Eyes, and that was pretty slow. Now, let's shift to the iOS world. If a VPN works the same way, then the only accessible applications I could use would be those that are running locally on my iPhone, which will not include Microsoft Word or Excel, and as we all know no equivalent to Word exists in the iOS world. I checked, and Citrix does have an iOS application, and it is accessible, to a point. The App itself seemed very accessible, but when it connected, there was nothing but silence. I'm assuming that's because there is no copy of Voiceover loaded on a remote Citrix server. That doubtless is because no such thing exists. It would be utterly awesome if there were some way to connect to native Windows applications running on a server somewhere and have those applications talk through Voiceover. I do not think that exists, and given the extensive lack of adoption of Apple desktop products in the business world, I'm assuming it will never exist. Now, some of the above I know to be true. Some is just assumption. It would be much appreciated if someone could demonstrate that my assumptions are wrong. I can think of no more beneficial App for the blind than something that would make remotely installed business applications run remotely on iDevices. I appreciate products like Recognizer, Money Reader, List Recorder, and like applications, but to really open up employment opportunities, something business-related needs to happen in the Apple world. I've been told that unemployment among the blind population is as high as 40%, which is a shocking number. With so much of business today being shifted to mobile, I fear that is going to get worse, not better, if mobile devices will not give blind persons the same access to business applications that our sighted counterparts have. I'm so grateful I have my Windows-based laptop, which does give me such access, but I can see the day coming when remote access will be on phones and tablets primarily, not laptops. Windows Mobil, as we know, is an accessibility nightmare. I'm not expecting anything from Android, given the accessibility disaster hat is Google (I'm thinking of Google Docs here). So, if there is any hope, it is iOS, and I'm not that hopeful. Love to hear from someone a little more optimistic.
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