Speakup history lesson, was Re: speakup todo?

[Albert Sten-Clanton]

Kirk, thanks for that information.  Take care!

Al 

-----Original Message-----
From: Speakup [mailto:speakup-bounces at braille.uwo.ca] On Behalf Of Kirk
Reiser
Sent: Monday, September 17, 2012 8:51 AM
To: Glenn; Speakup is a screen review system for Linux.
Subject: Speakup history lesson, was Re: speakup todo?

Maybe I will give a small history lesson about speakup.  I never thought I'd
be doing something like this!

Speakup's keymap was originally based on ASAP as a few folks have noticed.
I did it that way because I used ASAP in DOS for many years and Larry and I
were originally going to write speakup together.  He fell asleep and got a
really, really good job as head of research and development for APH.  I OTH,
got frustrated and started reading through Linux kernel code shortly after
Linus released it.  I spent a few years trying to find funding to do the
development of speakup but gave up after group after group wern't interested
because everyone was into Windows.  I decided to finally write speakup
myself, for myself.
A few other folks said they'd be interested in playing with it and so it
goes.

As for a JFW keymap, I wrote one for speakup about a year after I released
the first few versions because some people made the same type of comments as
you have Glen.  It gained a few users but mostly was just ignored.  When we
rewrote how key handling was done, I never bothered with the JAWs keymap
because it just was never really used.

A few people have also pointed out that NVDAs keymap is similar to
speakup's.  This is true Jamie and Nick were both involved in speakup and
bookserve in earlier years.  They have made NVDA a really usable alternative
to the proprietary Windows screen readers and they have kept to their
tradition with our joint projects of open source and freely available.  I'm
very happy for their commitment.

So there you go, speakup had JFW keymaps and nobody used them.  Of course if
someone wants to write new ones, we'll happily include them.
This is open source afterall.

   Kirk

On Sun, 16 Sep 2012, Glenn wrote:

> I have tried to get folks to switch to Linux, but it is difficult, as 
> people like what is familiar to them.
> The situation on the other list, the Orca list I think, was that I am 
> on digest on that list, and I did not reply to the thread subject, I'm 
> not sure how to do that from digest mode, which on that instance, was 
> regarding key bindings in Orca, but I wrote a new thread with a 
> similar subject line, and some folks thought it had nothing to do with
that subject on that list.
> But yes, I am trying to get the Linux community to wake up to this need.
> In fact, in Windows, the program Window Eyes finally smartened up and 
> used JFW key bindings.
> It may be easy for someone who knows how to make new key bindings, but 
> not for a new user.
> If it is really fairly easy to make a new set of key bindings, then 
> why doesn't someone just do it, and make it an option for new users, 
> like Window Eyes did?
> Glenn
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jason Miller" <hobbgoblin79 at gmail.com>
> To: "Glenn" <glennervin at gmail.com>; "Speakup is a screen review system 
> for Linux." <speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
> Sent: Sunday, September 16, 2012 5:13 PM
> Subject: Re: speakup todo?
>
>
> Hello.
>
> Let me start by this first. You've been on several lists, bitching and 
> complaining about everyone switching to JFW keybindings. The first 
> time I saw it, you went to the wrong list to complain about something 
> not sharing bindings with JFW that wasn't even the right list. I said 
> it there, adn I'll say it here again. If not having JFW bindings was 
> going to be a killer for the blind, then things like Orca, Speakup, 
> Emacs, Voice Over, along with *coughs* Window Eyes, and NVDA on 
> Windows wouldn't exist. To put your argument to a rest, if what you 
> said were true, then why are so many people switching away from jaws, 
> just speaking alone of windows, and going to NVDA or Window Eyes, let 
> alone those that are migrating to other *nix based systems? I don't 
> know what kind of personal crusade you are on, but from what I've 
> seen, this is nothing more than you trying to troll.
>
> Secondly, like I said, he's been on several lists complaining about no 
> one in the linux world using the JFW based keybindings. This 
> conversation could go on forever, but it would be just feeding a troll.
> If everyone here has noticed, he's hijacked Tyler's thread, just to 
> stir up trouble. He seems to do that elsewhere on other Linux 
> accessibility lists, and when someone points out a valid argument, he 
> seems to get frustrated, and go away.
>
> *shrugs* if you've really taught computers to the blind, then you 
> would understand that they are willing to learn what works. Not 
> everyone needs the windows world, and not everyone wants to stay in 
> that ecosystem. You don't go to every list, start complaining about 
> how things should be like windows, and JAWS, otherwise like I've told 
> you before, only JAWS would exist, and there would be no other 
> accessibility programs out there. Basically it comes down to this, and 
> this is why I am not too sure about what you say about teaching those 
> with vision impairments how to use technology. You teach someone who 
> doesn't know different techniques, teach them different systems that 
> would fit their needs, and you let them decide. You don't force a 
> single way onto them, and go everywhere else that isn't of that way to
stir up trouble.
>
> Anyway, end of my rant towards this guy.
>
> On 09/16/2012 05:51 PM, Glenn wrote:
>> Actually, it is this attitude among the sighted, that keeps most 
>> technology from being made accessible to the Blind.
>> Wow.
>> Glenn
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Alonzo Cuellar"<mariachiac at gmail.com>
>> To: "Glenn"<glennervin at gmail.com>; "Speakup is a screen review system 
>> for Linux."<speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
>> Sent: Sunday, September 16, 2012 4:38 PM
>> Subject: Re: speakup todo?
>>
>>
>> I think the key bindings are fine. There is no trouble with them at all.
>> Always be able to expand your mind set. Even if little progress is made.
>> After all, you get more advantages from learning the way other screen 
>> readers work.
>> I can see where the option might be useful, but if you don't learn it 
>> full force and always stay trapped in the way jaws works, then you'll 
>> never expand your horizons.
>> people come to linux expecting it to be something like windows. Its 
>> not and it probably never will be similar to windows. Its made for 
>> you to explore, etc.
>> I was forced in using linux due to an accident I had with my computer.
>> That
>> was fine by me though. Ever since then I prefer the unix variances 
>> weather is be linux or mac.
>> I'm no programmer by any means, but I do enjoy working with other 
>> operating systems.
>> The argument that only techies spend the time to learn new keyboard 
>> commands is always widely used. I consider that as an excuse. 
>> Everyone can learn how to use a device weather it be a phone or 
>> computer. Maybe the person may have difficulty and may not excel 
>> where in mastering it, but thats ok. You can apply this to any 
>> situation.
>> If we were to stop learning? Then we would never excel and stay 
>> trapped in the mind frame that this or that is to hard.
>> Learn while you still can. Once you get older it gets harder to learn 
>> and thats where it might be a problem.
>>
>> Alonzo
>>
>>
>> On Sep 16, 2012, at 3:59 PM, Glenn<glennervin at cableone.net>  wrote:
>>
>>> That is the kind of thinking that will keep Linux in the shadows.
>>> I teach people how to use screenreaders, and people have a hard 
>>> enough time switching from the mouse to all these keyboard commands.
>>> When people begrudgingly learn JFW keyboard mappings to some degree, 
>>> do you think they will willing go out to learn different key 
>>> mappings?
>>> Only the techie types do that.
>>> Glenn
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: "Littlefield, Tyler"<tyler at tysdomain.com>
>>> To: "Glenn"<glennervin at gmail.com>; "Speakup is a screen review 
>>> system for Linux."<speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
>>> Sent: Sunday, September 16, 2012 3:39 PM
>>> Subject: Re: speakup todo?
>>>
>>>
>>> I'm not really to worried about JFW key mappings honestly. First 
>>> it's sort of weird, but mainly if they can't get used to using 
>>> different keys, they're never going to live on Linux, at least not in
the cli.
>>> On 9/16/2012 2:34 PM, Glenn wrote:
>>>> The big one for SpeakUp would be for it to have the option to 
>>>> switch to JFW key mappings.
>>>> This will allow many people to switch to Linux easily.
>>>> Microsoft did this with MS Word, allowing people to use Word 
>>>> Perfect key mappings.
>>>> I think this is the only way Linux will ever become any more 
>>>> popular to screenreader users.
>>>> Glenn
>>>>
>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>> From: "Littlefield, Tyler"<tyler at tysdomain.com>
>>>> To: "Speakup is a screen review system for Linux."
>>>> <speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
>>>> Sent: Sunday, September 16, 2012 1:17 PM
>>>> Subject: speakup todo?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Hello all:
>>>> I'm trying to transfer, and applying for scholarships and all that 
>>>> I'd like to be able to make some contributions to projects that I can
note.
>>>> I'm interested in learning more about kernel programming, and I 
>>>> figured I'd start by working on something I use almost daily. I'm 
>>>> curious then if there's some sort of todo or improvements speakup could
have to it.
>>>> I'd also be curious if someone has thought about moving it to 
>>>> userspace--as far as I know, the only thing that we really need the 
>>>> kernel for would be hardware speech (and since serial ports are 
>>>> dying out that could be a dead point), and accessing the console 
>>>> directly. How easy would it be then, to have speakup run in 
>>>> userspace, but access a smaller cut-down version of itself in the 
>>>> kernel to provide the access to the console we need?
>>>> We could use sequence files and access the console through /proc. 
>>>> It could return a file of 2-byte chars, which I believe is how it 
>>>> works now--one byte is the color, and the other byte is the ascii 
>>>> value. The sequence file would just iterate over the console's 
>>>> lines. I'm also curious how we'd handle something like key presses 
>>>> like caps+u to move up a line etc.
>>>>
>>>> If I'm way off here, I'd still like to help out if possible; is 
>>>> there a todo list around, or stuff people would like to see done? 
>>>> If there are people willing to answer questions from time to time 
>>>> in terms of the kernel programming, since that's something I've not 
>>>> done before, I'm game to start coding.
>>>>
>>>> Another question is then, how do people catch panics? Since I'm not 
>>>> quite cool enough to write code that just works, I'm sure I'll be 
>>>> dealing with panics, but I can't see them on the console and 
>>>> usually it's when speakup goes boom anyway.
>>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Take care,
>>> Ty
>>> http://tds-solutions.net
>>> The aspen project: a barebones light-weight mud engine:
>>> http://code.google.com/p/aspenmud
>>> He that will not reason is a bigot; he that cannot reason is a fool; 
>>> he that dares not reason is a slave.
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> 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
>> _______________________________________________
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>> 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
>
>
> --
> Jason Miller
> Vinux PR Coordinator
>
> _______________________________________________
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> Speakup at braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>
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>

--
Kirk Reiser				The Computer Braille Facility
e-mail: kirk at braille.uwo.ca		University of Western Ontario
phone: (519) 661-3061
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