Samuel Thibault <samuel.thiba...@ens-lyon.org> writes: > Shérab, on Tue 17 Nov 2015 15:04:54 +0100, wrote: >> Samuel Thibault (2015/11/17 14:06 +0100): >> > The problem is that these userland-driven terminals don't provide the >> > screen output. Ideally we'd manage to gather the people implementing >> > them, and get to define a common interface to access the screen >> > output. >> >> Isn't AT-SPI good enough for that? Or is it too heavy for instance? > > It is heavy for performance (at *best* thousands of requests > per second), and it is really not suited to getting terminal > information. The AccessibleTerminal interface has never been actually > implemented. > > Generally speaking, the way AT-SPI works seems overkill to me here. The > way it works (insertion/removal notification) really does not suit > terminal screen reading. > > A shared-memory solution looking like /dev/vcsa, but rethought for > unicode etc. would work much better.
This is a very old open problem. I remember we agreed long ago on doing it similar to how Screen already does it (via the patch), but in a "standardized" way, such that the *same* sort of SHM layout could be used for several different userland terminal emulators. It seemed simple enough, but for some reason never got done. I agree that AT-SPI seems like overkill. However, I wonder if we should at least consider D-Bus as an option for doing IPC. When we originally planned to do it via SHM, D-Bus was not around. Is SHM still the best option? I am guessing yes, especially because we want the implementation on the side of the terminal emulator to be as simple as possible, to raise the probability of mainstream acceptance. However, D-Bus has access control, and maybe we could make use of that to minimize potential security risks obviously exposed by such a patch. Iif we find that we want to use D-Bus, we should consider reviving the AccessibleTerminal interface, because AT-SPI, after all, is just sitting on top of D-Bus. The libraries are a convenience, but it is perfectly possible to code a standalone AT-SPI client just by using a D-Bus binding. This is not a plan, just a question. -- CYa, ⡍⠁⠗⠊⠕ _______________________________________________ This message was sent via the BRLTTY mailing list. To post a message, send an e-mail to: BRLTTY@mielke.cc For general information, go to: http://mielke.cc/mailman/listinfo/brltty
