the direction of speakup

Thu May 2 20:18:42 EDT 2013

Hi,

I hope I'm not out of topic, but I have read since the beginning of the thread
technical considerations about speakup directions, in particular related to
the drivers. As non-dev user, I wonder if it would be possible to improve some
features of speakup. Typically, from my latest tests, I thought that it'd be
an improvement to backup, to save the regions of the screen we define, the
windows defined on a screen to be silent, verbose, etc. Moreover, these kind
of settings could be defined per-application. For example, how can speakup
handle the reading of text browsers, for example, such as links? So far, in
my memory, it only read the status line.

That's the directions I wanted to suggest, without knowing if they are
realistic.

Regards,

JPM

On jeudi 02 mai 2013 à 01:26:36 (-0700), Tony Baechler wrote:
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> This kind of approach described below won't work.  Back in the early days
> of Window-Eyes and Windows 3.1 support, GW Micro did exactly what you're
> describing.  Specifically, they designed the screen reader interface and
> hired a development firm to code it.  It was very slow, crashed often and
> generally didn't work very well.  I know from experience, still having the
> 3.5 inch disks for 1.0 and 1.1 before they did the complete rewrite
> themselves.  WE 2.0 was a much better product and they learned their
> lessons.  No, the Speakup and kernel communities should try to work
> together somehow.
> 
> William suggested loading the user space daemon in an initramfs.  Well,
> that's fine, but what if there is a kernel panic before the initramfs is
> loaded?  I've had that situation before.  Also, what if a script in the
> initramfs errors out and causes the next process (such as the Speakup
> daemon) not to load?  I've had that happen before as well.  I was really
> glad that I had Speakup at my Busybox shell so I could fix my boot
> problems at the initramfs level.
> 
> On 5/1/2013 2:40 PM, Scott D. Henning wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > 
> > I have been inactive here while studying cisco networking. I noted the 
> > subject line and wanted to "listen" in. You bring up good points. ISA
> > is gone today and support seems unneeded. Serial support seems as vital
> > as monitor support for sighted users. When I reflect on how to bring
> > useful code out for blind users, I imagine having users design the
> > interface; detail the needs and then pass it off to a skilled
> > programmer who could write it in their sleep. I realize this is counter
> > to what you suggested here, but it makes sense to utilize the skills
> > programmers have. They do not realize how the code they write affects a
> > blind users understanding of what is presented on the screen. If they
> > did, the code would come easily.
> > 
> > I wonder if at times this is not a technical issue, but an ethical one.
> > Do kernal writers know about the community of blind users? How hard
> > would it really be for one of them to add this function? Intercept the
> > text output to the screen and shove it out a port? I have often thought
> > that if the design was known, what would it cost to have it written?
> > 
> > this is a good thread. I am worried that speakup will wither if not
> > kept at the fore of development. The world does not use text anymore
> > and it is an invisible issue to most.
> > 
> > Who would we work with to add speakup to a kernal, if your question to
> > place it in user space comes back negative. That is it wont run early
> > enough to voice all screen output and it must be in kernal.
> > 
> > Thanks for bringing this up. Now I go back to the networking
> > books...smile.
> > 
> > Scott
> > 
> 
> - -- 
> Have a good day,
> Tony Baechler
> tony at baechler.net
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