Why I can't recommend Arch or Gentoo

[Kyle]

First of all, if you had taken the time to have a look at the blog for
TalkingArch
https://blog.talkingarch.tk/
you would have seen the post where I specifically mentioned that an
older CD-sized image was still available, and how to request it. I
still don't know how Arch itself will handle being larger than 700MB,
which will likely happen by the end of the year, but I'm guessing they
will have similar requirements, possibly with no way to request a CD
copy. I do keep July's iso around, which is the last one under 700MB.
To be quite honest with you, I have only had one complaint about the
iso being larger than 700MB, and it comes from you, and is a complaint
about the image being too big for a CD instead of the expected request
for a smaller image. I have mentioned the size increases in several
places since April or May of this year, and have even tried to get
input from users, and all the input I have gotten until now indicated
that I should just go ahead and build the larger images, because no one
uses CD's that can't write to a flash drive or DVD instead. My
comaintainer did mention keeping around a smaller copy while it works,
so I have done this, providing a way to request this smaller copy if
needed. Although it hasn't yet been a month, I have absolutely 0
requests for a CD-sized copy of TalkingArch until you cited this as a
reason why you can't recommend it, which I must see as a baseless
complaint rather than a serious request for an image of a smaller size.

Regarding the sound problem on your specific card, I can probably fix
this if I have a little more information about the problem. On my
system, the emu10k1 driver works perfectly, and there is no problem
with the volume. So the problem appears to be specific to your card
rather than the driver itself. Given this, I will be unable to test
your device without your participation, and since you have as much as
said that you are not interested in Arch at all, I will be unable to
help you fix your specific problem, not due to a lack of interest on my
part, but due to your unwillingness to help test any fixes I may be
able to make, and my inability to test such fixes on my own.

Regarding brltty, I have no braille equipment, nor do I have any serial
speech synthesizer, so I am unable to test this either. My comaintainer
is able to work with braille, and I believe external speech as well, so
he may be able to help you, but then again, you have only complained
about the way we handle TalkingArch on a public list, and how much
better you feel Debian and Ubuntu are, rather than reporting a problem
in an attempt to get it fixed, so there's again probably little we can
do.

Regarding blind specific distros, I have just as much of a problem with
them as you, but TalkingArch is *only* the talking live image, and is
not a blind specific distro. Once you install TalkingArch, what you
actually end up with is Arch Linux, just as you would have had you
installed it from the Arch iso at https://archlinux.org/. This is
completely intentional, as we wanted it to be just as close to Arch
Linux in form and function as possible, and the installation process
should give you the real thing, not some sort of a blind specific
install, unless you perform the extra installation steps to get a
talking system. That said, I find it rather odd that you complain about
what we didn't fix soon enough for you in TalkingArch, and how bad you
think blind specific distros are, but then you turn right around and
say that you'll be making a talking Debian live CD that is essentially
TalkingArch for Debian with a single developer, specifically you,
because you think you can somehow do it better. Well, I guess that
means that we can't expect any participation from you at all, either in
making fixes or testing them. I do, however, wish you the best of luck
in your endeavor. Debian is indeed a good distro to work with, and I'm
sure it will serve you well.

Regarding TalkingArch not starting with a working graphical
environment, TalkingArch is not the only talking image available that
is based at least partially on Arch Linux. Sonar is based on Manjaro,
which is an Arch-based distro, and it does start with a talking
graphical environment, either MATE or GNOME, your choice. It has a very
similar rolling release model to Arch, but addes unstable, testing and
stable branches somewhat similar to Debian, but kept up-to-date with
the latest software. Perhaps this would be better for those who need a
talking graphical desktop.

Finally, I do wish to apologize for any e-mail I may have missed at the
TalkingArch support address. I do know that I missed some, and wasn't
able to answer some others in a timely manner. At this point, I believe
I'm the only one handling the support e-mail, so if your question went
unanswered, it was not due to a lack of interest in fixing a problem,
but possibly either an oversite on my part or a question for which I
was unable to find an answer. Perhaps the IRC channel would have solved
your problem more quickly, as there are more people who can help you.
#talkingarch at irc.netwirc.tk is always open, and you can even request
a CD image there. The entire aim of this channel is to be as fun and
friendly as possible, and to help you in any way we can. That said,
biters will be bitten back, as we do have an uncensored channel.
Therefore, if you want a fun and friendly place to hang out and to
discuss TalkingArch or anything else, feel free to drop in, but do be
friendly yourself in order to keep the temperature from rising too
high.
Sent from my something or other