Implement custom non-visual navigation grids

[prushforth]

Currently, we are implementing the ability to announce out the zoom and map location, so as to improve the meaning of pan/zoom for non-visual users.

An idea that occurred to me was to allow a user to specify a "custom grid" that would be announced. This could be part of the user agent settings (polyfillable by the mapml-extension, hopefully). It could even be configurable on a per-domain basis, say.

Such grids might not even be grids, but perhaps landmarks the relative layout of which the user is familiar with, but they could indeed be actual grids, perhaps like military grids that are often seen on national survey maps. Such grids could be accessible as web services or APIs that serve MapML, or even as shapfiles or similar format, perhaps, depending on the browser. Of course, MapML would be preferred.

@shepazu @Malvoz @ahmadayubi wdyt?

[ahmadayubi]

It's an interesting idea. I found this video online : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PEbPYy56XI&t=3s&ab_channel=GoogleMaps

It mainly focuses on navigation and local space, but maybe location could be read out in terms of meters relative to a specific location. That specific location could be what the user agent specifies in settings or could be tied into the users geolocation. Similar to the grid but rather than a grid it's just meters offset by a location.

Just adding onto the idea, I'm not sure if it's fully related.