Gisbert Loff Vice President, SAP User Experience

Präsentation zum Thema: "Gisbert Loff Vice President, SAP User Experience"—  Präsentation transkript:

1 Adding additional Accessibility capabilities to installed Software AFTER shipment
Gisbert Loff Vice President, SAP User Experience Los Angeles, March 2008

2 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center (ACC) References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 2

3 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center (ACC) References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 3

4 Preface: Software Product Lifecycle
Q&A about time Q: How long can it take between initial specification and final shipment of software? A: 2 – 5 years Q: How long does a customer want to use an enterprise software installation? A: As long as possible, that is about 8 years according to our experience In the meantime … legislation around accessibility changes New UI technologies on the market (e.g. AJAX-based Web programming technologies) New interfaces for linking assistive technology to user interfaces are developed New assistive technologies are developed, new operating systems, …

5 Preface: Software Product Lifecycle / 2
Our (SAP) world Many SAP customers still use „SAP R/3 Enterprise 4.7“ or earlier versions Portions of that software have been developed at a time when accessibility was not as much in focus as it is today and assistive technology was not available in a way that we have it today

6 The „master“ questions
How can we upgrade accessibility features of installed software ? without performing a formal / major upgrade to the customers installation, without formal modification of the installation, (this would put a burden on subsequent formal upgrades) selectively, fast, at minimum overall cost ?

7 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI Programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 7

8 About UI programming SAP‘s UI architecture provides a generic „technical“ solution for many accessibility features A screen „model“ created by application developers is interpreted and displayed via a „generic“ viewing engine (e.g. SAP GUI, SAP NetWeaver Business Client) The viewing engine connects with assistive technologies at high level The screen model is forwarded to the screen reader The screen reader does not have to rely on assumptions, heuristics, interpretations (like it is the case with many web applications) The viewing engine can (always) be upgraded separately more frequent and less disruptive than backend/database upgrade most likely due to fast changing PC environment e.g. operating system upgrade W2K => XP => Vista)

9 Linking JAWS/Virgo with SAP GUI Step by Step
The generic viewing engine exposes its UI model via standard technology (e.g. COM, UI Automation) Step 2 The model is adjusted / transformed to the needs of a specific screenreader product, e.g. Virgo from Baum, via „Glue Code“ so the screen reader can interpret it in the right way Getting the „Glue Code“ Screen Reader extensions for SAP GUI are available free of charge

10 Linking JAWS/Virgo with SAP GUI
SAP GUI Object Model Screen reader Script Plugin “Glue” Code

11 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI Programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 11

12 Closing the gap – What IS the gap?
The UI model represents the accessibility knowledge and tool abilities at time of development some years ago … when different accessibility legislation was in place with different development tools in place (today‘s development environment addresses many requirements automatically) Huge number of screens (models) makes analysis / repair not an easy task If the model is not sufficiently specified for today’s accessibility requirements by the application programmer at time of development the model can be fixed by modification of code or … the model can be fixed by adding supplemental accessibility information from the outside

13 Closing the gap – Idea for relief
Identify accessibility violations for selected screens that are used by a user with specific needs Typically, for any given single user the number of screens he/she uses is extremely small compared to the overall number of screens Change / enrich the model and store screen-specific supplemental accessibility information on the user‘s PC or in a centralized location to be used by multiple users Disclaimer: The method described here is meant to be a temporary solution for a selected number of ‘typical’ accessibility flaws if the customer cannot / does not want to upgrade the software.

14 Linking JAWS/Virgo with SAP GUI
SAP GUI Object Model Screen reader Script Plug-In “Glue” Code

15 Linking JAWS/Virgo with SAP GUI / Teaching step
SAP GUI Object Model Screen reader Script Plug-In “Glue” Code Database for supplemental accessibility information „Teacher“ detects missing field-label relationship and stores it in a database Teacher

16 Linking JAWS/Virgo with SAP GUI / Usage of supplemental information
SAP GUI Object Model Screen reader Script Plug-In “Glue” Code Database for supplemental accessibility information From now on, this field-label relationship is available for assistive technology

17 The idea … more generic A sighted user (teacher)
identifies accessibility gaps on a screen / website / part of software that hinders a screen reader to read out content or structure to a blind / visually impaired user stores additional descriptive information (additional information, correction of gap) in a file / database / disk / CD / DVD / network A file (network) / disk / cd / DVD … exchange is used to distribute the descriptive information to blind / visually impaired users A visually impaired / blind user loads that additional information from the file / disk / CD / DVD / network into his/her screen reader The screen reader identifies that there is additional information available for a certain screen / website / part of software and behaves accordingly by reading out the additional information

18 Demo – Step 1 / 1 Start SAP TRACS UI (TRained ACcessibility for SAP GUI)

19 Demo – Step 1 / 2 Select a field that has missing accessibility information (Example: Field without connected label and tooltip)

20 Demo – Step 1 / 3 Select a field that has missing accessibility information (Example: Field without connected label and tooltip)

21 Demo – Step 2 Example: Add Tooltip Information

22 Demo – Step 3 / 1 Example: Assign label to inputfield

23 Demo – Step 3 / 2 Example: Assign label to inputfield

24 Demo – Step 4 Save

25 Demo – Step 5 Content of sample database
Additional Tooltip assigned to the Field Field – Label Relationship assigned to the Field

26 What you need to make it work that way
Identification Every „screen“ needs to be identified in an unique way SAP GUI: ProgramName / ScreenNumber Browser: URL Every field on the screen needs to be identified in an unique way SAP GUI: FieldName Browser: Fieldname (just the same way like one would store a field history) Runtime hook Ability to „hook“ glue code between UI and screen reader understand to object model of the screen on semantic level instead of guessing at pixel level Ability to access a database (or similar storage) when user comes across such a field

27 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI Programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 27

28 Established in Palo Alto 2001, moved to Headquarters in Germany 2003
The SAP User Experience Accessibility Team works for you in Walldorf, Germany & Palo Alto, US Maintains and develops the Accessibility standard at SAP Supports the development teams with guidelines and check tools Supports Accessibility Coordinators in development Supports the Accessibility Testlab in Bangalore Performs technology certifications Established in Palo Alto 2001, moved to Headquarters in Germany 2003

29 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI Programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 29

30 United States Patent Application 20060063138
References United States Patent Application 2007 CSUN Presentation “Accessible Software Architectural Design and Standard” SAP Designguild Accessibility Infrastructure and settings “Developing Accessible Applications with SAP NetWeaver“ (J.Koeble et al, ISBN )

31 Preface – Software Product Lifecycle
Agenda Preface – Software Product Lifecycle UI Programming and interfacing with assistive technology Closing the gap SAP Accessibility Competence Center References About SAP © SAP 2008 / Page 31

32 Summary of SAP Today SAP AG in 2007 revenues: €10.25 billion
More than 43,000 companies run SAP software Providing more than 25 industry solutions 43,861 SAP employees (December, 2007) 12 million users in 120+ countries team with us to… Integrate their business processes Extend their competitive capabilities Get a better return on investment at a lower total cost of ownership Unique partner ecosystem More than 3,850 partners Overall more than 180,000 SAP partner certificates © SAP 2008 / Page 32

33 SAP is Well Positioned for Growth
Trusted business partner for 43,000+ companies – the largest installed base in the enterprise software sector Deep vertical expertise with strategic solutions for more than 25 industries Great innovation power with 12,951 developers Largest ecosystem in the industry system integrators, ISVs, OEMs, resellers, partners One of the top brands globally #34 according to BusinessWeek © SAP 2008 / Page 33

34 SAP's Global R&D Organization
Development Labs Research Centers Bulgaria Canada China Germany Hungary India Israel United States Australia Canada China France Germany Northern Ireland South Africa Switzerland United States © SAP 2008 / Page 34

35 Thank you! © SAP 2007 / Page 35

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