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news/2008/03/kafs-released

======Open A11y Releases Keyboard Access Functional Specification (KAFS) and Generic Test Assertions for Keyboard Access (KAFS GTA) For Community Review

March 17, 2008


About **KAFS** and **KAFS GTA**

Persons unable to use a keyboard and mouse sometimes use alternative input devices. However, many users can be accommodated programatically through software that causes a standard keyboard to behave differently. Many of these features and behaviors have long been available in The X Keyboard specification (XKB). The Open A11y Workgroup at the Linux Foundation has identified those features and functional behaviors important to accessibility and developed standards to insure their availability and proper functionality on Linux – and other – platforms.

Individuals with mobility impairments will benefit by having such features built-in and available through standard activation strategies, such as tapping the Shift key five times to activate StickyKeys. The routines provided by the API will also benefit assistive technologies such as on screen keyboard and screen reader applications.