[WEB4LIB] Re: Java and e-resource vendors

[Richard L. Goerwitz III]

Thomas Dowling wrote:

> And fourth, Java has not solved its accessibility issues, while libraries
> have become increasingly aware of their responsibilities to users in this
> area.  If you have to provide a non-Java version of your service anyway, the
> incentive to develop the Java version in the first place is greatly
> diminished.

Your commentary is very much appreciated.

Your point about Java accessibility furnishes a segue into another
unrelated, but still important, accessibility issue:  Internation-
alization and the e-resource and OPAC vendors.

As resources move into electronic form, and in particular onto the
web, it's becoming increasingly difficult to use them with resources
written in non-western languages like Arabic, the "CKJ" languages,
Thai, Ethiopic, Hebrew, etc. (still less things like Egyptian hiero-
glyphs, Mesopotamian/Ugaritic/Hittite/Elamite cuneiform signs, etc.).

A few years ago I had thought Java would help rid us of this problem.
We'd just throw up client-side Java applets as multilingual display
engines and the problem would be solved - so I supposed.

With the collapse of the Java applet bubble, though, a solution to
the problem of internationalizing all our web interfaces has become
that much more difficult and intractable.

Does anyone know of any common efforts on the part of either OPAC
or e-resource (journal, full-text, etc.) vendors to develop any
standards or common solutions?  Anyone know of any whitepapers or
literature put out by the OPAC vendors on future internationaliza-
tion plans for their systems?

-- 

Richard Goerwitz                               richard at Goerwitz.COM
tel: 401 438 8978