Classic Shell: Forum

Is Classic Start Menu TAA compliant?

What is a TAA?

Trade Agreement Act
Though I don't see how it applies to classic shell being free... (except if he plans to donate maybe?)
Unless giving something away for free, is still considered a trade?

From what I gather, it states that government money should not be used to purchase products from certain countries.. (maybe north korea? russia? some african nations?) basically anywhere without capitalism?


I assume he is worried that using the product on a government owned machine at work or something, may get him in trouble...


Of Course this is all speculation...


EDIT: List of TAA compliant countries
http://gsa.federalschedules.com/resource-center/resources/taa-designated-countries.aspx

Jcee, you are 99% correct. I am a contractor for a government organization. We are looking to migrate over 6K computers to Windows 8.1. In order to provide the best experince for our users, i am suggesting to install the Classic Start Menu on every one of them. In order to do that the software has to be TAA compliant and of course the price has to be right. TAA compliance means that the software has to be made and sold by countries included in the link you provided. reposting (http://gsa.federalschedules.com/resource-center/resources/taa-designated-countries.aspx) So the question is, where was the software made and where is it being sold from.Thank you.Eugene.P.S.
"GSA Schedule Contracts are subject to the Trade Agreements Act (TAA), meaning all products listed on the GSA Schedule Contract be manufactured or "substantially transformed” in a "designated country”. The designated countries are composed of:

• World Trade Organization Government Procurement Agreement Countries;
• Free Trade Agreement Countries;
• Least Developed Countries; and
• Caribbean Basin Countries"

The Classic Shell software was created in the US.

Thank you very much Ivo.

i have one more question. this is in regards to Classic Start Menu only. has it been tested for 508 compliance. In this case i think it would apply only to blind users. Most likely, if you don't know what it is, it was not tested. I do realized i am asking a lot of a free application, but i have to ask these questions in hopes that in the end we will be able to use it.
http://www.section508.gov/section508-laws

Thank you.

From my brief testing(with classic/2 column), anything with a tooltip/comment will be read by narrator when it is selected, or hovered over


with exception to:
items with a sub menu (which could be a problem, with blind users)
search results (which only show the tooltip when hovered, and not when selected via arrow keys)

the start screen button (which I assume could be fixed very easily)

and items without a comment tooltip.. (but thats not something the developer can do, but rather something that you would need to do for all items within the menu)


Im not saying it is/isnt compliant; but with the proper configuration, it is possible for a blind person to navigate the menu with relative ease..

Also I don't think there is anything that classic shell brings to the table, that can't be accessed via alternative means.. (like the start screen for example, which can be configured to a different key/combination)

Thank you very much Jcee.

The classic styles support accessibility features, but the Windows 7 style may not work very well.
It is on my list to rework the entire accessibility system from scratch, but it will require a serious time investment and wont happen till next year probably.

Thank you Ivo. do you expect the changes you described will be in the next major version revision?

It is likely to be in the next major version, as it is at the top of my "major features" list.
However I can't tell you when that will happen. The next actual version will be released within a month, but it will have mostly minor fixes.