Demonstrating the power of Linux for blind people.

[Janina Sajka]

Sure. It's real simple. As of today, and probably for some time to come,
Gnome just isn't ready.

If that isn't clear, let me try it this way:

Gnome ain't ready, no way, no how.
Can't splain it to you no better.

Sean McMahon writes:
> Sinse we're on the subject of gui linux, any opinions on how gnome compares to
> using emacspeak with an appropriate windo manager?
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Janina Sajka" <janina at rednote.net>
> To: "Speakup is a screen review system for Linux." <speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
> Sent: Monday, July 25, 2005 12:58 PM
> Subject: Re: Demonstrating the power of Linux for blind people.
> 
> 
> > Hi, Amy:
> >
> > Answers in line below ...
> >
> > Ghoston, Ameenah writes:
> > > 1. I want to set up a Linux box with speakup
> > > Gnome, and KDE.
> >
> > The "everything" choice in the Speakup Modified Fedora will give you
> > that without additional knowledge or effort on your part.
> >
> > As an aside to the other debate that flamed over the weekend, this could
> > not be said of minimalist installation strategies. In other words, I
> > stand behind my assertion that there are advantages and disadvantes
> > either way--full blown or minimalist.
> >
> > Unfortunately, the issue is fairly moot as regards Gnome and KDE. You
> > are not likely to find much value there yet for the blind user, though
> > your results for low-vision will prove a bit better.
> >
> >
> > >
> > >
> > > 2. I have other projects to manage, so I don't want to spend a significant
> amount of time screwing with package depencies and what not.
> > >
> > The major Linux distributions generally now do an excellent job of
> > managing dependencies for you. The tool of choice on Fedora is called
> > yum. On Debian it's apt, for example.
> >
> > Once configured, yum works splendidly and can even set to run nightly
> > without user intervention.
> >
> > Please note that yum also supports package security through GPG keys.
> >
> > > 3. I am dealing with the gambit of blind computer users and so, I want a
> setup that would work for your average user.
> > I find this a most fascinating question.
> >
> > Who is an "average" user? More pertinant, what assumptions does this
> > "average" user bring to computing? I could go on at some length about
> > this subject, but will keep it brief.
> >
> > I believe their is no such thing as a generalized computing environment
> > that can be used without some education and training. Even something as
> > simple as the plain old touch tone phone requires training. Else, how
> > does one know that you must first hear a dialtone before pressing the
> > digits of a phone number successively? My mother can do that, but the
> > concept of a cell phone is very much beyond her as are answering
> > machines and voice mail in general. Is she average? Probably for her age
> > group, post 90 years of age, she is.
> >
> > To bring this home to "average" computing tasks, I would warrant
> > something as straight forward and simple as reading and responding to
> > email is far simpler on Linux than on Windows--but that requires that
> > someone knowledgable has set up the computer and email application
> > appropriately.
> >
> > Would it be "average" to set up a user account that does not boot into a
> > shell, but rather provides a brief menu of choices like:
> >
> > Email
> > Web
> > Internet Radio
> >
> > Ten years ago, many of us used dial up accounts with various isps that
> > provided exactly that.
> >
> > To finish up my view on this subject, the blind person's computer
> > interface cannot be graphical by definition, even when using a gui. If a
> > gui environment provides advantages, and I believe there are
> > demonstrable instances of advantage, these flow not from the graphical
> > nature of the gui, but from it's object oriented nature.
> >
> > An example of how this fails on the console is the background of text in
> > the cat or chain web browsers when dealing with a pop up or a drop down
> > dialog box. On the other hand, drop down dialogs are trivial to control
> > on Linux where they are not so trivial, imho, on gui platforms. Just an
> > example of the good and not so good in one place.
> >
> > Janina
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Speakup mailing list
> > Speakup at braille.uwo.ca
> > http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup at braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

-- 

Janina Sajka				Phone: +1.202.494.7040
Partner, Capital Accessibility LLC	http://www.CapitalAccessibility.Com
Bringing the Owasys 22C screenless cell phone to the U.S. and Canada. Go to http://www.ScreenlessPhone.Com to learn more.

Chair, Accessibility Workgroup		Free Standards Group (FSG)
janina at freestandards.org		http://a11y.org