Strategic Accessibility Investments Make Windows Vista a Stronger Platform for AT Innovation

REDMOND, Wash. — Mar. 1, 2007 — I have been at Microsoft for 11 years and in the accessibility group since 2000. For Windows Vista, I managed the accessibility development team—from the design phase and initial planning, through implementation and launch. Windows Vista is the most accessible operating system Microsoft has ever developed, and we designed it that way from the start. We started with a very ambitious vision of what Windows Vista could do for people with disabilities and kept that vision in mind through the five years we worked on the product. Windows Vista represents a major step forward toward making technology that is accessible to everyone.

Making Windows Easier to Use

One of the accessibility improvements in Windows Vista, the new Ease of Access Center, benefits the majority of us who want to adjust our computers to make them easier to see, hear, and use. In previous version of Windows, it was often difficult for people to find accessibility settings that they needed because the settings were scattered around Windows. Our intention for Windows Vista was to bring all the accessibility settings to one place. The new Ease of Access Center makes it much easier to discover accessibility settings and tools in Windows Vista because they are in one centralized location. And, Ease of Access Center was designed to offer personalized recommendations for accessibility tools and settings tailored to your individual needs.

Platform for Innovation

One of the main goals for Windows Vista was to make it easier for assistive technology (AT) companies to create innovative AT products—such as screen readers and screen magnifiers—for Windows. We wanted to enable them to focus more on creating new features in their products, rather than keeping up with ever-changing and complex user interfaces. Microsoft UI Automation is the new accessibility framework for Microsoft Windows that goes way beyond Microsoft Active Accessibility, its predecessor. UI Automation enables AT companies to access and expose much richer information to their users. We hope that UI Automation will spark innovation for assistive technology companies, and that our customers will benefit from new and exciting products.

Improved Magnification

Another improvement we made in Windows Vista is with magnification. When you use Magnifier in Windows Vista, you may notice that magnification is crisp and images and text do not stretch and have jagged edges. That's because of significant work we did to provide platform support for magnification in Windows. And, all screen magnifiers can take advantage of this improved support. In previous versions of Windows, people using screen magnifiers would sometimes have problems with their computers crashing because magnification wasn't well supported in the platform. We fixed this in Windows Vista. Now, it is much easier for AT companies to develop screen magnification products with high quality magnification but without the stability problems. Having this capability in the core of Windows enables a big improvement in the quality of magnified screen images and the readability of scaled text for people with low vision.

Future Vision Is Ambitious

When you work in technology, you are always continuing to innovate. That's what is exciting and compelling about my job—more is always possible and the culture at Microsoft thrives on innovation.

We made strategic investments in Windows Vista by building technology into Windows Vista that AT developers can rely on to create inventive AT products in the future. Both UI Automation and the new magnification enhancements allow AT companies to be more innovative. I look forward to seeing the advancements others make on this new version of the Windows platform and the new ground we will break in the future.

I'm proud of the work we did in Windows Vista. But there is always room for improvement. I find feedback from customers and AT companies really valuable. So now that Windows Vista has shipped, we're hoping to hear ideas and feedback from customers about what we could do next.

One of the things I enjoy about working at Microsoft, and especially about working on accessibility solutions, is that I can really see how the work I do helps people use computers. Knowing that what I do makes it easier for people everywhere to use computers, is gratifying.