Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Wang Ling]

Is it possible and advantageous to use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs?
I'm just wondering whether it is a practical and meaningful thing to do for Mac Emacsers.

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Adrian Robert]

Wang Ling <an00na <at> gmail.com> writes:

> 
> Is it possible and advantageous to use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs?
> I'm just wondering whether it is a practical and meaningful thing to do for
Mac Emacsers.

Hi,

Overall it's probably a wash at the present time.  Using it would not result in
any immediate user-visible changes by itself and might make supporting Tiger
difficult.  (The framework is there on Tiger, but it's private, and I'm not sure
how mature compared to the CG APIs.)  But on the other hand, it exposes a bit
more of the guts of the Text system than earlier APIs, which should make support
of advanced font backend features easier.  The cost here would be forking this
code to keep GNUstep supported.  (Right now CG (vs. DPS on GNUstep) is only used
at the very lowest level for emacs rendering, so the split code is small.)

-Adrian

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

Adrian Robert <Adrian.B.Robert@gmail.com> wrote:

> Wang Ling <an00na <at> gmail.com> writes:
> 
> > 
> > Is it possible and advantageous to use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs?
> > I'm just wondering whether it is a practical and meaningful thing to do for
> Mac Emacsers.
> 
> Hi,
> 
> Overall it's probably a wash at the present time.  Using it would not result in
> any immediate user-visible changes by itself and might make supporting Tiger
> difficult.  (The framework is there on Tiger, but it's private, and I'm not sure
> how mature compared to the CG APIs.)  But on the other hand, it exposes a bit
> more of the guts of the Text system than earlier APIs, which should make support
> of advanced font backend features easier.  The cost here would be forking this
> code to keep GNUstep supported.  (Right now CG (vs. DPS on GNUstep) is only used
> at the very lowest level for emacs rendering, so the split code is small.)
> 

What about accessibility -- which of these would work better with
Voiceover?


-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

--o4II8k30016520.1274206129/ccs.covici.com--

-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

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         covici@ccs.covici.com

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-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu]

>>>>> On Tue, 18 May 2010 16:28:00 -0400, covici@ccs.covici.com said:

> What about accessibility -- which of these would work better with
> Voiceover?

Could you explain more concretely about what use case is in your mind
when you talk about "accessibility" or "Voiceover"?

				     YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu
				mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu <mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp> wrote:

> >>>>> On Tue, 18 May 2010 16:28:00 -0400, covici@ccs.covici.com said:
> 
> > What about accessibility -- which of these would work better with
> > Voiceover?
> 
> Could you explain more concretely about what use case is in your mind
> when you talk about "accessibility" or "Voiceover"?
> 
Voiceover is the program on the MAC which allows people who can't read
the screen to use the computer, however emacs has never work with this
part of the operating system.  It seems to need to strictly adhere to
the Aple standard -- I don't know the details, but I think its worth
finding out what is required.

-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu]

>>>>> On Tue, 18 May 2010 23:36:16 -0400, covici@ccs.covici.com said:

> YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu <mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp> wrote:
>> >>>>> On Tue, 18 May 2010 16:28:00 -0400, covici@ccs.covici.com
>> said:
>> 
>> > What about accessibility -- which of these would work better with
>> > Voiceover?
>> 
>> Could you explain more concretely about what use case is in your
>> mind when you talk about "accessibility" or "Voiceover"?
>> 
> Voiceover is the program on the MAC which allows people who can't
> read the screen to use the computer, however emacs has never work
> with this part of the operating system.

Could you give us a concrete procedure that you used when you judged
"emacs has never work with this part of the operating system"?

I'm asking it because I don't know how to confirm whether or not
"accessibility" or "Voiceover" gets supported when I add some code
with respect to this area.

> It seems to need to strictly adhere to the Aple standard -- I don't
> know the details, but I think its worth finding out what is
> required.

				     YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu
				mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Chad Brown]

On May 18, 2010, at 8:44 PM, YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu wrote:
> Could you give us a concrete procedure that you used when you judged
> "emacs has never work with this part of the operating system"?
> 
> I'm asking it because I don't know how to confirm whether or not
> "accessibility" or "Voiceover" gets supported when I add some code
> with respect to this area.

In System Preferences, open Universal Access.  VoiceOver can be 
activated from there, or via the key combo Command-Fn-F5.  You can
also go into the VoiceOver Utility from there.  I can verify that Emacs 
doesn't work with VoiceOver, in that VoiceOver can only identify the
application name, title, tool-bar, and scrollbar.  The Universal Access
tool-bar access works partially with the emacs tool-bar -- it can identify
the buttons, but not the labels.  It cannot identify buffer text or functional 
elements inside emacs like customize buttons or modelines.

*Chad

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu]

>>>>> On Tue, 18 May 2010 21:00:15 -0700, Chad Brown <yandros@MIT.EDU> said:

>> I'm asking it because I don't know how to confirm whether or not
>> "accessibility" or "Voiceover" gets supported when I add some code
>> with respect to this area.

> In System Preferences, open Universal Access.  VoiceOver can be
> activated from there, or via the key combo Command-Fn-F5.  You can
> also go into the VoiceOver Utility from there.

So far, so concrete.  But suddenly it became far from concrete below.
Could you describe concrete operations together with expected and
actual behavior as in good bug reports?

> I can verify that Emacs doesn't work with VoiceOver, in that
> VoiceOver can only identify the application name, title, tool-bar,
> and scrollbar.  The Universal Access tool-bar access works partially
> with the emacs tool-bar -- it can identify the buttons, but not the
> labels.  It cannot identify buffer text or functional elements
> inside emacs like customize buttons or modelines.

What do you mean by "identify"?  With what concrete operation one can
check if they are "identified"?

I tried "halfway implemented" experimental accessibility support code
(not in the released one) on top of the Mac port I mentioned in
http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2010-05/msg00226.html

If I activate VoiceOver from the System Preferences as described above
and click the Emacs frame, then the whole content area (i.e., other
than the title bar and the tool bar, but including scroll bars) of the
frame gets bordered in black, and the application name ("Emacs"), the
title bar name, and the buffer text get spoken in this order.  But the
cursor keys do not cause the character under the cursor to be spoken.

If this is heading to the right direction, then Core Text vs. NS Text
system, both of which are used in the Mac port, has basically nothing
to do with accessibility.

				     YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu
				mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu <mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp> wrote:

> >>>>> On Tue, 18 May 2010 21:00:15 -0700, Chad Brown <yandros@MIT.EDU> said:
> 
> >> I'm asking it because I don't know how to confirm whether or not
> >> "accessibility" or "Voiceover" gets supported when I add some code
> >> with respect to this area.
> 
> > In System Preferences, open Universal Access.  VoiceOver can be
> > activated from there, or via the key combo Command-Fn-F5.  You can
> > also go into the VoiceOver Utility from there.
> 
> So far, so concrete.  But suddenly it became far from concrete below.
> Could you describe concrete operations together with expected and
> actual behavior as in good bug reports?
> 
> > I can verify that Emacs doesn't work with VoiceOver, in that
> > VoiceOver can only identify the application name, title, tool-bar,
> > and scrollbar.  The Universal Access tool-bar access works partially
> > with the emacs tool-bar -- it can identify the buttons, but not the
> > labels.  It cannot identify buffer text or functional elements
> > inside emacs like customize buttons or modelines.
> 
> What do you mean by "identify"?  With what concrete operation one can
> check if they are "identified"?
> 
> I tried "halfway implemented" experimental accessibility support code
> (not in the released one) on top of the Mac port I mentioned in
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2010-05/msg00226.html
> 
> If I activate VoiceOver from the System Preferences as described above
> and click the Emacs frame, then the whole content area (i.e., other
> than the title bar and the tool bar, but including scroll bars) of the
> frame gets bordered in black, and the application name ("Emacs"), the
> title bar name, and the buffer text get spoken in this order.  But the
> cursor keys do not cause the character under the cursor to be spoken.
> 
> If this is heading to the right direction, then Core Text vs. NS Text
> system, both of which are used in the Mac port, has basically nothing
> to do with accessibility.
Yep, you are going in the right direction -- menues, prompts, buttons
and all such should be spoken.  Look at the system preferences dialog
and you will get an idea.  Look at textedit and you will get an idea of
what we  would like the cursor to do.

-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Jason Rumney]

On 20/05/2010 10:59, covici@ccs.covici.com wrote:
>> If I activate VoiceOver from the System Preferences as described above
>> and click the Emacs frame, then the whole content area (i.e., other
>> than the title bar and the tool bar, but including scroll bars) of the
>> frame gets bordered in black, and the application name ("Emacs"), the
>> title bar name, and the buffer text get spoken in this order.  But the
>> cursor keys do not cause the character under the cursor to be spoken.
>>
>> If this is heading to the right direction, then Core Text vs. NS Text
>> system, both of which are used in the Mac port, has basically nothing
>> to do with accessibility.
>>      
> Yep, you are going in the right direction -- menues, prompts, buttons
> and all such should be spoken.  Look at the system preferences dialog
> and you will get an idea.  Look at textedit and you will get an idea of
> what we  would like the cursor to do.
>    

Is this because Emacs draws its own cursor?

On Windows, accessibility functions were made to work by introducing the 
variable `w32-use-visible-system-caret' and its associated code in 
w32fns.c/w32term.c.  When the user sets that variable to non-nil, the 
Windows caret is used, which allows Accessibility tools to track the 
cursor position and read text at the cursor, at the expense of losing 
user customization of the visual look of the text cursor.

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

Jason Rumney <jasonr@gnu.org> wrote:

> On 20/05/2010 10:59, covici@ccs.covici.com wrote:
> >> If I activate VoiceOver from the System Preferences as described above
> >> and click the Emacs frame, then the whole content area (i.e., other
> >> than the title bar and the tool bar, but including scroll bars) of the
> >> frame gets bordered in black, and the application name ("Emacs"), the
> >> title bar name, and the buffer text get spoken in this order.  But the
> >> cursor keys do not cause the character under the cursor to be spoken.
> >>
> >> If this is heading to the right direction, then Core Text vs. NS Text
> >> system, both of which are used in the Mac port, has basically nothing
> >> to do with accessibility.
> >>      
> > Yep, you are going in the right direction -- menues, prompts, buttons
> > and all such should be spoken.  Look at the system preferences dialog
> > and you will get an idea.  Look at textedit and you will get an idea of
> > what we  would like the cursor to do.
> >    
> 
> Is this because Emacs draws its own cursor?
> 
> On Windows, accessibility functions were made to work by introducing
> the variable `w32-use-visible-system-caret' and its associated code in
> w32fns.c/w32term.c.  When the user sets that variable to non-nil, the
> Windows caret is used, which allows Accessibility tools to track the
> cursor position and read text at the cursor, at the expense of losing
> user customization of the visual look of the text cursor.
> 

On the mac, the accessibility framework is more restrictive -- its up to
the application to conform to Apple's specifications.  I don't think
that changing the shape of the cursor would do the trick, the
accessibility framework needs to be informed about everything, when the
cursor moves and many other things, the details of which I do not know,
but as an example, Microsoft Word is complete inaccessible on the mac,
Microsoft won't conform and Apple says heck with you -- in other words.

-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Adrian Robert]

 <covici <at> ccs.covici.com> writes:

> Microsoft Word is complete inaccessible on the mac,
> Microsoft won't conform and Apple says heck with you -- in other words.

How is Apple saying "heck with you" here?  Because they don't rewrite their OS's
accessibility support in some way so MS's app conforms without any effort on
their part?  Their answer for USERS would probably be "use iWork", whereas MS's
would be "get a Windows machine".  ;)

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Jason Rumney]

Adrian Robert <Adrian.B.Robert@gmail.com> writes:

>  <covici <at> ccs.covici.com> writes:
>
>> Microsoft Word is complete inaccessible on the mac,
>> Microsoft won't conform and Apple says heck with you -- in other words.
>
> How is Apple saying "heck with you" here?

Because any system that requires special effort on the part of
developers to make applications accessible will not get many accessible
applications made for it.

Other systems' accessible applications may be inferior in some way due
to the fact they don't have these special APIs, but since no effort is
required by the application developers, the sheer volume of accessible
applications outweighs that.

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Adrian Robert]

On May 22, 2010, at 10:05 AM, Jason Rumney wrote:

> Adrian Robert <Adrian.B.Robert@gmail.com> writes:
> 
>> <covici <at> ccs.covici.com> writes:
>> 
>>> Microsoft Word is complete inaccessible on the mac,
>>> Microsoft won't conform and Apple says heck with you -- in other words.
>> 
>> How is Apple saying "heck with you" here?
> 
> Because any system that requires special effort on the part of
> developers to make applications accessible will not get many accessible
> applications made for it.
> 
> Other systems' accessible applications may be inferior in some way due
> to the fact they don't have these special APIs, but since no effort is
> required by the application developers, the sheer volume of accessible
> applications outweighs that.

So you're saying they did what ended up being an inferior job of producing accessibility APIs.. I still don't see how that is the same as saying "the heck with you".  Maybe Apple feels its more difficult API results in a better experience for end users, and that it's better to have a few good apps then many less good ones.  Or maybe it doesn't, but it was just too difficult for them to implement something as clean as the Windows approach given the framework environment they were starting from.  I don't know the technical details here but I suspect both accessibility approaches were retrofits.

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Jan Djärv]

Adrian Robert skrev 2010-05-22 10.21:
>

> So you're saying they did what ended up being an inferior job of producing
> accessibility APIs.. I still don't see how that is the same as saying "the
> heck with you".  Maybe Apple feels its more difficult API results in a
> better experience for end users, and that it's better to have a few good
> apps then many less good ones.  Or maybe it doesn't, but it was just too
> difficult for them to implement something as clean as the Windows approach
> given the framework environment they were starting from.  I don't know the
> technical details here but I suspect both accessibility approaches were
> retrofits.
>

Gnome/Gtk+ also has a separate accessibility-API.

	Jan D.

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

Jan Djärv <jan.h.d@swipnet.se> wrote:

> 
> 
> Adrian Robert skrev 2010-05-22 10.21:
> >
> 
> > So you're saying they did what ended up being an inferior job of producing
> > accessibility APIs.. I still don't see how that is the same as saying "the
> > heck with you".  Maybe Apple feels its more difficult API results in a
> > better experience for end users, and that it's better to have a few good
> > apps then many less good ones.  Or maybe it doesn't, but it was just too
> > difficult for them to implement something as clean as the Windows approach
> > given the framework environment they were starting from.  I don't know the
> > technical details here but I suspect both accessibility approaches were
> > retrofits.
> >
> 
> Gnome/Gtk+ also has a separate accessibility-API.

And emacs is not accessible in that environment either.


-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

Adrian Robert <Adrian.B.Robert@gmail.com> wrote:

>  <covici <at> ccs.covici.com> writes:
> 
> > Microsoft Word is complete inaccessible on the mac,
> > Microsoft won't conform and Apple says heck with you -- in other words.
> 
> How is Apple saying "heck with you" here?  Because they don't rewrite their OS's
> accessibility support in some way so MS's app conforms without any effort on
> their part?  Their answer for USERS would probably be "use iWork", whereas MS's
> would be "get a Windows machine".  ;)

Well, apple could use theDOM in word, but they make no concessions, and
so the apps need to conform.  I hope emacs can be made accessible.

-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu <mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp> wrote:


If you have Voiceover on and run the emacs app, you don't get any speech
at all, as far as I know.

More information is available at
http://www.apple.com/accessibility/voiceover .
-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu]

>>>>> On Wed, 19 May 2010 00:44:27 -0400, covici@ccs.covici.com said:

> If you have Voiceover on and run the emacs app, you don't get any
> speech at all, as far as I know.

At least, "Speak selected text when the key is pressed", which can be
customized in the Speech pane in the System Preferences, seems to work
for the NS port (and the Mac port will support it in the next
release).  Actually, any application will work if it can copy the
selected text to the clipboard with "Command-C".  So, you didn't mean
it, right?

> More information is available at
> http://www.apple.com/accessibility/voiceover .

Again, concrete procedure and expected behavior in detail please!!

I think many developers are not so familiar with how accessibility
features would be supposed to work if Emacs supported it.

				     YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu
				mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[covici]

YAMAMOTO Mitsuharu <mituharu@math.s.chiba-u.ac.jp> wrote:

> >>>>> On Wed, 19 May 2010 00:44:27 -0400, covici@ccs.covici.com said:
> 
> > If you have Voiceover on and run the emacs app, you don't get any
> > speech at all, as far as I know.
> 
> At least, "Speak selected text when the key is pressed", which can be
> customized in the Speech pane in the System Preferences, seems to work
> for the NS port (and the Mac port will support it in the next
> release).  Actually, any application will work if it can copy the
> selected text to the clipboard with "Command-C".  So, you didn't mean
> it, right?
> 
> > More information is available at
> > http://www.apple.com/accessibility/voiceover .
> 
> Again, concrete procedure and expected behavior in detail please!!
> 
> I think many developers are not so familiar with how accessibility
> features would be supposed to work if Emacs supported it.

Its hard to give exact procedures, this is why I referred you to those
pages, there is a developer resource there which will tell you what you
need to do to have emacs, or any other application be accessible,
according to Apple's definition.  As an example, the cursor keys would
cause the character under the cursor to be spoken, all buttons,
etc. would b e labelled so when the VO cursor was over them the label
would be spoken, etc. etc.

Menus would also speak and I guess appropriate changes in the echo area
as well.

-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: Use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs

[Adrian Robert]

On May 18, 2010, at 11:28 PM, covici@ccs.covici.com wrote:

> Adrian Robert <Adrian.B.Robert@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> Wang Ling <an00na <at> gmail.com> writes:
>> 
>>> 
>>> Is it possible and advantageous to use Core Text for Cocoa Emacs?
>>> I'm just wondering whether it is a practical and meaningful thing to do for
>> Mac Emacsers.
>> 
>> Hi,
>> 
>> Overall it's probably a wash at the present time.  Using it would not result in
>> any immediate user-visible changes by itself and might make supporting Tiger
>> difficult.  (The framework is there on Tiger, but it's private, and I'm not sure
>> how mature compared to the CG APIs.)  But on the other hand, it exposes a bit
>> more of the guts of the Text system than earlier APIs, which should make support
>> of advanced font backend features easier.  The cost here would be forking this
>> code to keep GNUstep supported.  (Right now CG (vs. DPS on GNUstep) is only used
>> at the very lowest level for emacs rendering, so the split code is small.)
>> 
> 
> What about accessibility -- which of these would work better with
> Voiceover?

I haven't looked at this particular issue, but the main problem no matter which API were used for rendering would be getting the text onto the Cocoa side.  In the Emacs model all high-level control of the text resides in the generic code, so the Cocoa side just sees small pieces as they need to be rendered, not the whole buffer.