On Fri, 17 May 2019 at 14:14:25 -0500, Tim Chase wrote: > (sorry, out of thread; copying from the marc.info post so > References/In-Reply-To aren't set) > > > I am looking to understand / enhance the OpenBSD experience for > > blind users. > > While not blind, I occasionally attempt to do some screenless testing > with accessibility-tech on OpenBSD, FreeBSD, and Linux. I also hang > out in the blinux mailing list for blind Linux users, so am > interested in making the BSDs more accessible. > > > Do we have any blind users reading misc that can offer any insight > > into their usecases / pain points / work flows / wants? > > I am sure OpenBSD is lacking on this front, so use cases in *nix > > would also be helpful. > > From some recent experiences: > > - using a serial port or SSH has proven the best/most-reliable. For > some the machine would be attached to an external serial-driven > synth or Braille device. For others, it's a serial program on > another machine that is accessible, or accessing via SSH from that > other machine. However, as powerful as the CLI is, it doesn't grant > access to GUI tools like a real browser. > > - yasr isn't available as a package (it's my go-to console > screen-reader) but can be installed from source. It does have a > sample config file but needs a bunch of work to get set up, > including getting speech-dispatcher to listen via an inet socket > rather than a unix socket, then pointing yasr at speech-dispatcher, > and making sure that it is configured properly. Also, > speech-dispatcher times out after 5-seconds with no connection, so > you have to know to start yasr within that window of time. > > - attempting to `pip install fenrir-screenreader` fails because it > uses some linux-specific headers > > Getting Orca set up is a bit of a bear. Doable, but it already > assumes you have access to the system. But roughly involves > installing Gnome (plus configuring GDM which is mostly following the > docs, but it's certainly not out-of-the-box easy), Orca, eflite, > etc. While GDM comes up with options to turn on text-to-speech, you > have to know the Alt+Super+S shortcut to enable, and you have to know > how to *use* Orca to navigate it. All of that All of that is pretty > difficult to do if you're blind and on your own. > > Additionally, latency in Orca is pretty horrible on my test machine > here, even under light usage (in this context, running Gnome and the > Orca settings panel; no extra programs or non-default OBSD services > running). It's not a powerhouse machine (3GB of RAM, dual-core 2GHZ) > but it's also not unreasonable specs for an older machine. > > So in the end, using ssh/serial from a remote machine or using yasr + > speech-dispatcher locally was the most usable solution I've been able > to get working. It would be nice to get Orca working usably so I > could test with a GUI browser. > > As for things that could be improved, a couple ideas: > > - adding yasr to the package repos > > - perhaps some meta-package or a tutorial on getting > speech-dispatcher + yasr + flite/festival/espeak/whatever working > together > > - tweak Gnome or whatever launches Orca so that it comes up with a > tutorial mode and/or settings on first-run. > > I'd be glad to test other configurations if needed.
This is great info! Thank you! I have added a WIP port for yasr here: https://github.com/jasperla/openbsd-wip/tree/master/sysutils/yasr Using this + speech-dispatcher + espeak + edbrowse (recently imported) I can browse sites pretty well with no visual feedback! I will look into the other projects you mentioned! Thanks again! > > -tkc > (@gumnos) > > -- PGP: 0x1F81112D62A9ADCE / 3586 3350 BFEA C101 DB1A 4AF0 1F81 112D 62A9 ADCE
