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- Release Notes for Microsoft(c) Active Accessibility(c) Version 1.2.3
- Text-only
-
- Included below:
- Version 1.2.3 Highlights
- Platform Support
- International Support
- Redistributing Active Accessibility
- Useful Command Line Options
- Active Accessibility in Internet Explorer
- Schedule of Subsequent Releases
- Known Issues
- Obtaining Support
- Reporting Problems
- More Information
-
- Version 1.2.3 Highlights
- With the release of version 1.2.3, Active Accessibility supports all
- 27 Windows languages. The new languages added with 1.2.3 include Greek,
- Icelandic, Slovak, Slovenian, and Turkish.
- The put_accName and put_accValue methods have been deprecated and
- are no longer supported. Active Accessibility clients can use SetWindowText
- and control-specific Windows 32 APIs to achieve the same results.
-
- Version 1.2 Highlights
- Support for Microsoft(c) Windows NT(c) 4.0
- Active Accessibility 1.2 provides limited support for localized versions of
- Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 4 and Service Pack 5. See the Platform Support
- section below for more information.
-
- Redistribution Kit
- With this release, the Redistribution Kit (RDK) installs the localized
- Active Accessibility files on all language versions of Microsoft Windows(c)
- 98, Windows NT 4 SP4, and Windows NT 4 SP5 as well as the English-language
- version of Windows 95. For more information, see the International Support
- section below.
-
- New Features
- See the topic What's New in Active Accessibility 1.2 in the Active
- Accessibility SDK documentation for information about the new features
- provided in this release of the Active Accessibility SDK. The current
- Active Accessibility documentation, which is included with the Software
- Development Kit (SDK), can be found on the Microsoft Accessibility Web
- site located at http://www.microsoft.com/enable/.
-
- Platform Support
- This release of Active Accessibility supports Windows 95, Windows 98,
- Windows NT 4.0 with Service Pack 4 or later, and Windows 2000. The following
- section contains specific notes about the support for each platform:
-
- Windows 95
- * Only English-language versions of Windows 95 are supported. The RDK
- fails if it is executed on non-English language versions of Windows 95.
-
- Windows NT 4.0
- * Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 4 (SP4) or later is required. The RDK fails
- if SP4 (or later) is not already installed.
- * Windows NT 4.0 SP6 and later provides full support for Active Accessibility
- when the desktop update in Internet Explorer 4.01 SP2 is installed. After this
- update has been installed, the user is free to upgrade to later versions of
- Internet Explorer.
- * Support on Windows NT 4.0 SP4 and SP5 is limited and designed primarily
- to let client utilities work properly with applications that are native
- Active Accessibility servers. Examples include Microsoft(c) Office(c) 97,
- Microsoft Office 2000, Microsoft(c) Visual Studio(c) 6, and Internet
- Explorer 4.01 (or later). Additionally, Active Accessibility exposes
- information about common controls such as list views and tree views
- (provided in comctl32.dll). However, support for Active Accessibility
- in other system objects is limited:
- * Very few WinEvents are fired for system controls.
- * Most system objects are not supported, including title bars, menus, scroll
- bars, combo boxes, and the switch task window (appears when a user presses
- ALT+TAB). The IAccessible properties for these objects return with an
- appropriate failure code.
- * Only the Intel(c) (x86) architecture is supported. Support for Alpha
- processors may be added in a later release.
- * Active Accessibility 1.2 now takes full advantage of Unicode string
- services in Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000.
-
- Windows 2000
- The RDK for Active Accessibility will fail if run on Windows 2000 because
- Active Accessibility is part of the operating system and therefore cannot
- be updated.
-
- International Support
- This release of Active Accessibility includes the Redistribution Kit (RDK),
- which supports multiple languages and can be installed on international
- versions of Windows 98 and Windows NT 4.0 with SP4 or SP5 as well as the
- English-language version of Windows 95. When executed, the RDK checks the
- version of the operating system and installs the multilingual version of
- oleaccrc.dll to provide all available language versions of Active
- Accessibility. Because of this multilingual DLL, developers who redistribute
- Active Accessibility on localized versions of Windows need only ship this one
- RDK with their application.
- This release supports a subset of the languages supported by Windows;
- however, work is underway to complete this support for all languages
- supported by Windows. The localization of Active Accessibility is being
- completed in stages, and this is the second (of three) point releases.
- Each point release expands the set of languages that Active Accessibility
- supports. For a complete list of the languages supported by a particular
- version of this RDK, see the "Special Build Description" in the file
- properties dialog under the Version tab.
-
- This release supports the following languages:
- Arabic, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German,
- Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian,
- Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish.
-
- Installing Run-Time Components
- This Redistribution Kit (RDK) performs version checking, installs core
- system files, and updates the system registry. During this process, the
- following files may be added or replaced, but only if the target machine
- has an older version than is included in msaardk.exe.
- asycfilt.dll
- comctl32.dll
- gdi.exe
- gdi32.exe
- oleacc.dll
- oleaccrc.dll
- oleaut32.dll
- olepro32.dll
- stdole2.tlb
- user.exe
- user32.dll
- When msaardk.exe executes, it creates a backup folder named MSAABAK in the
- Windows System (or System32) folder. This folder will contain backup copies
- of core system files that may have been replaced during the installation.
- If there is a problem restarting Windows after installation, these files
- can be used to restore the original configuration. To restore the
- configuration, start MS-DOS and copy these files from MSAABAK to the Windows
- System (or System32) folder.
- While msaardk.exe is copying files, it determines whether any of the files
- being updated are in use. If any files are in use, Windows must be restarted
- to complete the installation. In this case, the installation will present a
- dialog box prompting the user to restart the machine. To override this
- behavior, see the section titled "Useful Command Line Options" in these
- release notes.
- Because other applications may update the files in the Windows System and
- System32 folders, the files in MSAABAK should not be copied to the Windows
- System (or System32) folder after new software has been installed or Windows
- has been updated to a new version. Doing so could make the system unstable.
-
- Redistributing Active Accessibility
- The Active Accessibility Redistribution Kit (RDK) contains all of the core
- components and dynamic-link libraries (DLLs) needed to incorporate Active
- Accessibility technology into your application or accessibility tool. The
- RDK is a self-installing file called msaardk.exe, which ensures that the
- core components are installed correctly.
- If your product is a client application (such as a screen reader utility) that
- uses Active Accessibility information from other applications, and you want
- to use this functionality on Windows 95 (English), Windows 98, or Windows
- NT 4.0 Service Pack 4 (or later), you must include the msaardk.exe file
- with your product and install it at the same time as your product installation.
-
- Please note that you are not allowed to redistribute the Active Accessibility
- components individually. The Active Accessibility license agreement allows
- Active Accessibility to be distributed only through the file msaardk.exe.
- Carefully review the license agreement before redistributing msaardk.exe.
-
- For more information, see the topic About the Redistribution Kit in the Active
- Accessibility SDK documentation.
-
- Useful Command Line Options
- When launching the RDK from the command line or from within your own
- installation program, there are several command-line switches that can be
- used to alter its behavior:
-
- Switch :
- /Q
-
- Description :
- Quiet Mode. Bypasses all prompts (except the System Reboot prompt), error
- messages, and file extraction animation.
-
- Switch :
- /Q:A
-
- Description :
- Assumes user is admin and does no checking for admin rights, disk space,
- etc. No prompts and no errors.
-
- Switch :
- /N:V
-
- Description :
- Skips the Internet Explorer version check
-
- Switch :
- /R:A
-
- Description :
- Always restart and prompt user with restart choice.
-
- Switch :
- /R:N
-
- Description :
- Never restart. This overrides any INF settings in your installation program
-
- Switch :
- /R:I
-
- Description :
- Restart if needed (that is, if any system files need to be updated) and prompt
- user with restart choice. This is the default for Active Accessibility
-
- Switch :
- /R:IS
-
- Description :
- Restart if needed but do silently, without prompting the user
-
- Switch :
- /R:AS
-
- Description :
- Always restart, silently, without prompting the user
-
- Active Accessibility Support in Internet Explorer
- The content and structure of HTML documents rendered using Microsoft Internet
- Explorer are available using Active Accessibility. The following list
- explains the level of support available with the various versions of
- Internet Explorer:
- * Internet Explorer 3.x provides Active Accessibility support for HTML
- documents.
- * Internet Explorer 4.0 does not have Active Accessibility support for
- HTML documents.
- * Internet Explorer 4.01 provides Active Accessibility support for HTML
- documents. This support requires both Active Accessibility version 1.2
- (or later) and Internet Explorer 4.01 Service Pack 2 (or later).
- * Internet Explorer 5 improves the support for HTML documents, provides
- better performance than Internet Explorer 4.01, and is available now. This
- version also requires Active Accessibility version 1.2 (or later).
-
- More information on Internet Explorer can be found at
- http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/.
-
- Known Issues
- The following are known issues with Active Accessibility 1.2.2. The status
- of each issue is indicated where known.
-
- General Issues
- * Active Accessibility fails if two different copies of oleacc.dll are
- loaded. If a client application loads a copy of oleacc.dll from the local
- folder, then attempts to communicate with an application, the application
- performs a LoadLibrary on oleacc.dll that is in the Windows System folder.
- The two copies of oleacc.dll cannot communicate with each other. The file
- oleacc.dll should only be in the Windows System (or System32) folder.
- Active Accessibility Software Developers Kit
- Following is a list of known problems with the SDK:
- * Multiple copies of the Accessible Event Watcher tool should not be run
- at the same time because they generate events while logging each other's
- events. This results in an infinite loop.
- * The debug version of Inspect Objects does not observe the buffer size
- in GetObjectProperty. This might result in a GPF when GetObjectProperty
- formats and returns an error string that is longer than 64 bytes.
- * The winuser.h included with the SDK may be different from the one included
- in Microsoft(c) Visual C++(c). If errors occur when compiling your code,
- manually copy the missing definition into your private copy of winuser.h.
- * The Magnifier utility causes an Access Violation when run on Windows NT
- 4.0 SP 4 and SP 5. This problem has been fixed in Windows NT 4.0 SP 6 and
- Windows 2000.
-
- System and Common Controls
- Calling accSelect to "select" a page tab is not equivalent to clicking the
- tab. Because selection is only relevant to list boxes, tree controls, and
- other controls with selectable items or regions, accSelect is not supported
- for page tabs. In general, the results of accSelect are inconsistent across
- controls.
- Some owner-drawn controls do not return names and values. The data for these
- controls is kept inside of the application using the control and not the
- control itself. The Windows Explorer combo box on the toolbar is an example
- of this.
- Progress bars (window class name "msctls_progress") do not expose information
- in the accName property unless a static text control is used as a label.
- In Windows 95, owner-drawn menu items, such as the list of file types in the
- File(c) New context menu, do not display their Name or KeyboardShortcut
- properties. This is true also of the Favorites menu in Microsoft Internet
- Explorer 3.0. This is fixed in Windows 98 and Internet Explorer 4.0.
- * In Windows 98 header controls (window class name "SysHeader32"), the
- accName property returns random characters if the header is labeled by
- graphic instead of text (such as in Microsoft(c) Outlook Express(c)).
- This problem has been fixed in Windows 2000.
- * The buttons on a toolbar (window class name "ToolbarWindow32") do not
- support the accName property.
- * Rich edit controls (used in text editors such as WordPad ) do not trigger
- the event EVENT_OBJECT_VALUECHANGE.
- * Top-level menu bar items (such as "File") do not indicate the state
- STATE_SYSTEM_HOTTRACKED when the mouse is moved over them and the
- associated drop-down menu is not displayed. After the menu item is
- clicked to drop down the menu, the state changes and includes
- STATE_SYSTEM_HOTTRACKED. This behavior happens only to standard menus
- with the window class name "#32768" under Windows 98 and Windows 2000.
- Menus provided by the ToolbarWindow32 window class in the Common Control
- library indicate the state STATE_SYSTEM_HOTTRACKED.
- * The child elements of Trackbar or slider controls (window class name
- "msctls_trackbar32") expose incorrect coordinates in the accLocation
- property. To workaround this problem, query the control directly using
- TBM_GETCHANNELRECT and other specific Trackbar control messages.
- * List view controls, such as those in Windows Explorer, do not report
- the state STATE_SYSTEM_HOTTRACKED when the single-click feature is selected
- in Folder Options settings. This behavior occurs in version 4.70 and greater
- of the Common Controls library and affects Windows 98, Windows 2000, and
- Windows 95 with the Windows Desktop Update feature of Internet Explorer 4.0
- installed. To determine the hot-tracked state of the control, send the
- LVM_GETEXTENDEDLISTVIEWSTYLE message and test the LVS_EX_TRACKSELECT bit.
- * Group boxes report the state STATE_SYSTEM_FOCUSABLE. Since group boxes
- cannot receive the keyboard focus, this state is incorrect.
- * Tree view controls may cause a fault while an out-of-context hook function
- processes an event for one of its items. The fault can occur if a tree view
- item is removed before the event handler returns.
- * There is no direct way to determine if a menu has an associated submenu.
- For more information, see the Knowledge Base article Q195253.
- Application Compatibility
- The following is a list of known application compatibility issues:
- General
- * Lotus 1-2-3 release 5 uses list boxes that are incompatible with Active
- Accessibility. Calling accName on a list box item always returns the first
- item in the list.
- * While Accessible Event Watcher is running, Microsoft Bookshelf(c) 96 page
- faults when canceling taking a note. This problem has been fixed in later
- versions of Bookshelf.
- * Microsoft Clipart Gallery that shipped with Microsoft Publisher 97 will
- "Assert in undialog.cpp, line 1396" when the accState property is retrieved
- for the list box. The recommended workaround is to upgrade to the newer
- version of Clipart Gallery that ships with Microsoft Publisher 98.
- * In Windows 95 and Windows 98, Solitaire does not paint properly when
- Accessible Event Watcher is running. This problem has been fixed in Windows
- 2000.
-
- Microsoft Windows Operating System Shell and Accessories
- * When you start an Active Accessibility client as a service, and it installs
- an in-context hook before Windows Explorer starts, the Copy and Paste
- operations do not work in Windows Explorer. Other problems might also exist.
- For more information, see the Knowledge Base Article Q191658.
- * Empty submenus on the Start menu or the Favorites menu report a COM error
- code.
- * The object hierarchy of the system tray (which can be examined using
- Accessible Explorer) includes the Start button but not the Start menu.
- This is because the Start menu is not a child of the Start button.
- * The Internet Explorer 4.01 shell and the Windows 98 shell have a different
- Start menu implementation than Windows 95. While the Start button does send
- EVENT_OBJECT_STATECHANGE and sets the accState property to "Focused" when it
- receives focus, it does not send an EVENT_OBJECT_FOCUS event.
- * In Windows 95, the right side of the taskbar (where the clock and "taskbar
- icons" are displayed) is not exposed with Active Accessibility. This has been
- fixed in Windows 2000.
- * ToolTip information is not exposed by Active Accessibility for Windows 98
- desktop items. In Windows 98 and Internet Explorer 4.0 with Windows Desktop
- Update installed, some icons have additional ToolTip information that is not
- exposed by Active Accessibility.
- * The MS-DOS(c) Prompt window has an optional toolbar. On Windows 95 and
- Windows 98 this toolbar is implemented in 16-bit code and cannot be exposed
- by Active Accessibility.
- * The Device Manager in System Control Panel on Windows 95 and Windows 98 is
- implemented using 16-bit code and cannot be exposed by Active Accessibility.
- * Embedded objects in WordPad are not exposed by Active Accessibility.
- * In Windows 98, the graphic on the Run dialog has the name " ".
- * In Windows 95 and Windows 98, when the SPI_SETSCREENREADER flag is set
- (such as when Inspect Objects is running) and text is pasted into a Rich
- Edit control (such as in WordPad), the icons on the Desktop refresh. This
- problem has been fixed in Windows 2000.
- * In WordPad's Insert Object dialog box, the accName property of each item
- in the Object Type list box has an unprintable character and a number (the
- CLSID) appended to the end of the name.
-
- Microsoft(c) Internet Explorer(c)
- * In Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0, 4.01, and 5.0, the role property of
- animated image files is "Graphic" instead of "Animated."
- * Text strings in Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.0 are exposed line-by-line
- (that is, broken up according to the HTML coding and the width of the window).
- In Internet Explorer 4.01 and later, text strings are exposed
- paragraph-by-paragraph.
- * The Address bar drop down box in Internet Explorer 4.01 does not support
- Active Accessibility. This has been fixed in Internet Explorer 5.0.
- * Seven combo boxes are exposed for one combo box in Microsoft Internet
- Explorer 4.01 in the Active Accessibility object tree. This has been fixed
- in Internet Explorer 5.0.
- Microsoft(c) Visual Studio(c) 97 Applications
- * Spy++ (shipped with Microsoft(c) Visual C++(c)) is incompatible with
- Accessible Event Watcher and other programs that set WinEvent hook functions.
- * Microsoft Visual Studio 97 has menus and toolbars that appear similar to
- the menus and toolbars present in Office 97. However, Visual Studio 97 has
- not implemented Active Accessibility in those menus. To work around this
- issue, select the "Use screen reader compatible menus" in the Options/Workspace
- dialog. Microsoft Visual Studio(c) 6.0 uses Active Accessibility-compatible
- Command Bar menus and toolbars.
-
- Microsoft Office Applications
- * The Inspect Objects utility might freeze while trying to navigate Office
- 97 menus. This occurs if a menu is not open, and Inspect Objects has to
- navigate all the off-screen children of a menu.
- * The navigational relationship between parent and child objects in Office
- 97 menus is not reciprocal.
- * Navigating to an unavailable Command Bar button in an Office 97 application
- will return E_FAIL when calling accNavigate with NAVDIR_FIRSTCHILD/LASTCHILD.
- * Office 97 and Office 2000 applications return redundant entries for the
- Menu bar object.
- * Office 97 controls with the window class name "MSOUNISTAT" will cause a
- fault if sent the WM_GETTEXTLENGTH message from an in-context hook function
- in response to the EVENT_OBJECT_CREATE event. These message-box-like windows
- display text such as "The spelling and grammar check is complete". Because
- these windows are made visible only after they are fully initialized, clients
- can workaround this problem by not sending this message to invisible windows.
- This problem has been resolved in Office 2000.
- * In Office 97, a call to accDoDefaultAction that opens a modal dialog box
- will not return until after the dialog closes. This problem has been fixed
- in Office 2000.
- * The Page Setup dialog in Microsoft Access 97 does not expose its controls
- properly. This problem has been fixed in Access 2000.
- * With Microsoft(c) Access(c) 2.0 and the Accessible Event Watcher running,
- General Protection Faults may occur when closing a Cue Card window. This
- problem is found only in Access 2.0 and was fixed in later versions.
- * Access 95 causes an Invalid Page Fault when form controls in the Design
- view are queried by Active Accessibility. This problem has been fixed in
- Access 2000.
- * Microsoft(c) Excel(c) 95 causes an Invalid Page Fault when the View Zoom
- dialog box is queried by Active Accessibility. This problem has been fixed
- in Excel 2000.
- * Excel 97 dialogs containing controls that must validate data will go into
- an infinite loop or fault when the SPI_SETSCREENREADER flag is set (such as
- when Inspect Objects is running). Affected dialogs are the Edit | Goto
- dialog; the Format | Format Cells dialog in the Font and Number tabs; the
- View | Zoom dialog; the Tools | Goal Seek dialog; and the General tab of
- the Options dialog. This problem has been fixed in Excel 2000.
- * Excel 97 faults when inserting a chart if the SPI_SETSCREENREADER flag
- is set (such as when Inspect Objects is running). This problem has been
- fixed in Excel 2000.
- * Opening Microsoft(c) Word(c) 97 in the maximized state may cause an Invalid
- Page Fault.
- * In MAPI clients such as Outlook 97, Outlook 98, and Exchange Server Client
- 5.0, Active Accessibility initially exposes the unresolved e-mail names
- entered in a message's "To" and "Cc" rich edit controls. However, when the
- MAPI clients resolve the e-mail name, Active Accessibility clears the
- accValue property for the controls and does not expose the resolved e-mail
- name.
- * Multibyte character strings in Office 97 Standard Dialog Manager (SDM)
- dialogs may be truncated when exposed by Active Accessibility. This problem
- has been resolved in Office 2000.
- * Office 97 applications that use SDM controls do not return an accValue
- property for list boxes.
- * SDM dialogs that contain check box controls do not send
- EVENT_OBJECT_STATECHANGE when the state of the check box changes.
- * SDM dialogs send multiple focus events when moving between page tabs.
- Additionally, when you select another page tab and then return to the
- original page, the focus is not restored to the control that originally
- had the focus.
-
- International Support
- * The OLEACCRC.DLL file in Active Accessibility 1.2.2 is a multi-lingual
- resource DLL. However, when the user locale is changed to a different
- language on Windows NT4 and Windows 2000, the language strings exposed
- through Active Accessibility may not dynamically change to the new language.
- This problem is currently being investigated.
- Obtaining Support
- All support for Active Accessibility is provided by Microsoft Developer
- Support, which provides many support offerings, ranging from Support Online
- to working directly with a Support Engineer on the telephone. The fees for
- this support depend on the support offering you choose. Microsoft is
- sponsoring a program to subsidize qualified accessibility aid vendors for
- certain support costs. Please email enable@microsoft.com for more information
- about this subsidy and how to apply.
- If you are not already participating in the Active Accessibility beta
- program, send e-mail to msaabeta@microsoft.com with your full contact
- information, product name and purpose, company name, and phone number.
-
- Active Accessibility Newsgroups
- Microsoft provides a number of Internet newsgroups as a forum for anyone
- to discuss accessibility topics. To participate in these discussions, you
- must have an Internet newsreader, such as Microsoft Internet Mail and News.
- You will also need to adjust the options in your newsreader to use
- msnews.microsoft.com as your news server.
- * General Accessibility Issues (microsoft.public.enable.issues) provides a
- forum for general accessibility discussions about Microsoft products and
- services.
- * Accessibility Development Issues (microsoft.public.enable.developer)
- provides a forum for general development questions dealing with accessibility.
- Reporting Problems
- Contact Microsoft Developer Support to report problems with Active
- Accessibility.
- A bug report should contain the build number of oleacc.dll, the operating
- system it is installed on, and the steps used to reproduce the problem. To
- obtain the version number of a DLL, select the DLL in Windows Explorer,
- press ALT+ENTER, then choose the Version tab. The Product Version displayed
- in this dialog contains the build number and will help us more easily
- reproduce the problem being reported. An example of the product version
- is 4.02.2209.1.
- When reporting a crashing problem that displays a fault dialog, please
- copy the text from the Details section and include it in the bug report.
-
-