Date:	Tue, 18 Mar 1997 23:54:05 -0500 (EST)
From:	Ralph Wirthlin <wirthlin AT digital DOT net>
To:	jdashiel AT eagle1 DOT eaglenet DOT com
cc:	opendos AT mail DOT tacoma DOT net
Subject:	[OPENDOS] Re: ADA software
In-Reply-To:	<Pine.NXT.3.95.970318221121.18303C-100000@eagle1>
Message-ID:	<Pine.GSO.3.95.970318231630.2113A-100000@digital.net>
MIME-Version:	1.0

On Tue, 18 Mar 1997 jdashiel AT eagle1 DOT eaglenet DOT com wrote:

> What was Federal standards requires office equipment and by extension
> what's run on office equipment to be accessible or to be capable of being
> rendered accessible.  Computers are office equipment, and software runs on
> computers
> (sometimes).  Beyond that, inaccessible office equipment constitutes 
> discrimination in employment transactions.

     Note that the *employer* is required to make such office equipment
including appopriate software available so long as it doesn't pose an
undue burden on the employer.  I reiterate, there is *nothing* in the ADA
that states software producers *must* produce ADA accessible software.  
Nor have conversations with the DOJ ADA office even hinted that this
requirement exists, quite the contrary, the representative whom I talked
with categorically denied any such requirement on any software program
whether for use in the private or federal arenas.
     Now, I freely admit that both I and the DOJ official could be wrong,
so please produce a citation either from a court ruling or from the Act
itself that clearly shows that a private producer, not an employer, must
make his product line, not the workplace environment, ADA accessible. 


Cheers,


Ralph

P.S. Just to keep this within the scope of this mailing list ... I know
that the source code will be ready when it's ready, but would it be
possible to release the source from one of the smaller utility programs
such as xdir or xcopy as sort of a teaser?  

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