Accessibility Hopefully Improved

As I mentioned on Wednesday, I worked on the accessibility issues that were found during the last test. There were three main issues at hand:

A method of disabling the map.
The map provides nothing but unpronounceable spam for a user who is playing using a reader program. I added a new config command, so by typing config map n the map can be disabled.

A method of disabling the prompt.
Like the map, the prompt must get annoying for a player using a screen reader. This was another direct request, and so I did my best to satisfy it. Config prompt n will disable the map.

Provide the information on the map in a verbal form.
This issue wasnt exactly a direct request, it was more or less implied. Previous to today a player with a screen reader had absolutely no information about their surroundings. By enabling the auto survey using config survey y, a player now sees a listing of the 'regions' surrounding them, and the direction they are in. This allows a player to have a better grasp of where they are without the map, and also shows them the players in the area, much like the highlight we have on the map.

The second method of providing this information was using an auto exits config option. This displays the names of the rooms immediately north, south, east, and west. This gives the player even more information about where they directly are.

These features appear to be working correctly, the only thing that remains to be done is testing them with actual an actual screen reader, and see if this provides enough information. Ultimately I think this is worlds better then we were at before, but I think there will always be a few features that will be impossible to convert, and a player with use of a map will likely always have at least a slight natural advantage.

Breaking Free

For the past few weeks I have been reading a pretty new blog about breaking free of the 9 to 5 job and starting your own business. The Author, Brian Armstrong is a young entrepreneur who has had several small successes so far under his belt, and all in his early twenties. Brian has also written a book about the subject, also worth checking out. Personally I'm hoping to collect some inspiration from Brian as I move forward into my own career, and my hope to escape from it and start my own business.

Fixes and Accessibility

I've managed to get items integrated with relatively little work. As a result I can move forward this week with some more new stuff. First on my priority list is fixing the bugs that were found during last week's test. Most of these are minor and quick fixes so hopefully shortly into this coming weekend I will be able to move on into the accessibility issues that were made quite obvious during the test.

The problem that needs to be solved here now is finding a way to represent large amounts of data that is intended to be visual in a way that could be easily consumed by a user using a reader program. I have a few ideas, the simplest of them is implementing an exits display, listing the 'rooms' that surround your current room like most mud's already have as a normal feature. The harder problem is representing the 100 or so rooms that might be within a 5 room radius of the player. Does anyone have any ideas?