Soon, unlock all software with a single tool

Thursday, 01 April 2010, 15:03 IST   |    5 Comments
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Soon, unlock all software with a single tool
Bangalore: Scientists in the U.S. claim to have developed a computer program that would help anyone to edit inaccessible software like Microsoft Word and Apple iTunes, and even add customized features to them. The software would also help the user to move program from computer screens to mobile devices, which do not have a standard operating system, researchers at the University of Washington said. "Microsoft and Apple aren't going to open up all their stuff. But they all create programs that put pixels on the screen. And if we can modify those pixels, then we can change the program's apparent behaviour," said Professor James Fogarty. The UW tool - Prefab, allows people to personalise programs based on their needs, according to the report that appeared online in Physorg.com. Prefab takes advantage of the fact that almost all displays are made from prefabricated blocks of code such as buttons, sliders, check boxes and drop-down menus. The tool looks for those blocks as many as 20 times per second and alters their behaviour. It unlocks previously inaccessible interfaces and allows people to add the same usability tool to all the applications they run on their desktop.

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