AJAX techniques have helped Web developers create live applications within Web browsers. The AxsJAX framework helps inject accessibility features into these applications so that users of adaptive technologies such as screen readers and self-voicing browsers experience the same level of interactivity that is now taken for granted by users of Web 2.0 applications. For more details, please read the AxsJAX FAQ.
AxsJAX injects accessibility enhancements as defined by W3C ARIA. The prerequisites for experiencing its benefits include:
- A modern Web browser like Firefox 2.0 or later that supports W3C ARIA.
- Adaptive technologies that respond correctly to the accessibility enhancements introduced by W3C ARIA.
- In particular, many of the enhancements injected by AxsJAX depend on support for live regions a feature that enables adaptive technologies like screen readers and self-voicing browsers deal correctly with asynchronous updates to portions of a Web page.
The AxsJAX framework can inject accessibility enhancements into existing Web 2.0 applications using any of several standard Web techniques:
- As a bookmarklet --- small snippets of JavaScript that are used to create smart bookmarks.
- Using Greasemonkey --- a powerful browser extension that allows end-users to customize the look and feel of Web sites via custom scripts.
- Using Fire Vox --- Fire Vox, an open source talking browser extension for Firefox, automatically injects the AxsJAX scripts if the "Use site specific enhancements" option is turned on.
For a information on getting started writing your own AxsJAX scripts, please see our tutorial.
There is also a video tutorial available here.
We are also giving away Google-AxsJAX shirts for anyone who contributes good scripts to the project.