Locked out using Linux/Opera

[Daniel McNamara]

As someone who teaches at CIT I know how much a pain the arse Banner is.
Trust me if we had a choice in the matter none of us would have ever gone
with it. As to do with violating the Australian laws it actually doesn't.
There are other provided ways to get your Banner information rather than the
web page. The Australian regulations regarding web sites state that they
must be accessible by a majority of browsers. That gives places like CIT who
has been stuck with a third party proprietary "we-can't -change-it"
solutions the freedom to work with it and not take the full blame.

A majority of CIT has no choice in using this software. Neither do they have
the option of replacing it with a more all browser friendly as that would
mean implementation of a new system, re-training all staff in the new
system, and allowing the students to get used to the new system. Considering
Banner has only be implemented for a short time the prospect of changing
again would not be taken well by the CIT management.

I can appreciate your anger about not being able to access Banner but as far
as management is concerned you are in the minority and changing the system
to accommodate you would cost money. Unfortunately accounts rule the world
now and anything that even looks like it would cost money is inst going to
get far.

You can take your complaints and suggestions to CIT technical ( mostly
outsourced to Intact) but I have the feeling that the response will be "so
use a different browser". If you can get a big enough petition together
about it and generate enough bad press about the issue then you may be able
to sway management. If you really want to fix the site you'll need to design
a fully functional database system that can do all Banner can do and provide
it for an extremely low price.

Feel free to ignore and denounce these comments if you want.

Cheers

Daniel

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Hawkins" <matthew at topic.com.au>
To: <linux at lists.samba.org>
Sent: Friday, February 08, 2002 11:53 AM
Subject: Re: Locked out using Linux/Opera


> On Fri, 08 Feb 2002, Peter Watson wrote:
> > I am a student at CIT in my last year. I was "surprised" to discover
that I am now no longer able to access my academic records.
> > This is apparently (according to their IT person) because the software
used to (ahem) implement their "BANNER" is only aware of M$ and IE or
nutscrape.
> > I have chosen to go open source this year and CHOOSE Linux and Opera as
my OS/Browser.
> > Needless to say I"ll take issue to IT dollar dispensers at CIT...
> > Comments?
>
> This violates the Australian law governing accessibility.  Kindly
> volunteer to fix their site - they'll benefit from you and many others
> not class-action suing them and you'll benefit from the experience in
> producing a production-quality web service.
>
> --
> Matt
>