As a longtime leader in accessibility, Microsoft will be offering a
cross-platform, royalty-free license for its new accessibility model,
Microsoft Windows User Interface Automation, or UI Automation, to promote
innovation in the assistive technology industry. 

"Microsoft is excited to offer UI Automation to the industry because it
allows application developers to easily expose the rich semantic information
needed by assistive technology products to create effective, interactive
experiences for computer users. UI Automation represents a significant
accessibility innovation for the industry and one that should benefit all
computer users, not only Microsoft customers," explains Rob Sinclair,
director of the Accessible Technology Group at Microsoft. 

Microsoft recognizes the growing demand for accessible technology and is
providing the industry with this new model to advance the state-of-the-art
for products that are essential for computer users with disabilities. A
recent study found that 57% of computer users in the United States are likely
to benefit from the use of accessible technology due to experiencing mild to
severe difficulties or impairments. Currently, 57 million computer users in
the US utilize some form of accessible technology. That number is expected to
rise to 70 million in the US by 2010. 

"Because the majority of computer users benefits from accessible technology,
it is increasingly important for technology leaders like Microsoft to foster
innovation in accessibility through industry-wide collaboration," explains
Sinclair. "We're offering this model to improve collaboration across the
industry and demonstrate Microsoft's commitment to accelerate innovation in
accessibility," further explains Sinclair. 

UI Automation is the successor to Microsoft Active Accessibility and
preserves the investment software companies have already made in that model.
UI Automation builds on the lessons learned from Microsoft Active
Accessibility to offer a complete model for sharing information about
graphical user interface elements, document content, and tables of
information. This work represents more than four years of research and
development by Microsoft's Accessible Technology Group-the team responsible
for developing Windows' accessibility support for the last twelve years. 

Microsoft's implementation of UI Automation will be available for Microsoft
Windows XP and the next version of the Windows desktop operating system
code-named "Longhorn," scheduled to release in calendar year 2006. 

Links:
Microsoft's Commitment to Accessibility
http://www.microsoft.com/enable/microsoft/default.aspx

Findings about Computer Users
http://www.microsoft.com/enable/research/computerusers.aspx

Opportunities and Forecast
http://www.microsoft.com/enable/research/opps.aspx

Questions and Answers about UI Automation
http://www.microsoft.com/enable/at/uiainfo.aspx

For Developers: Accessibility Framework (UI Automation) Details
http://www.microsoft.com/enable/at/uiadeveloper.aspx

 
Contributed By Jamie Prioli