[Ham-Computers] Attn Duane: linux and screen readers

[Duane Fischer, W8DBF]

Jeff, 	
	
Thank you for taking the time to provide the information. It is appreciated.	
	
The software that I use is designed to allow the user a 100% interactive
interface with the computer display, not just read what is on a CRT. People do
not understand how complex it is to emulate the activity of a mechanical mouse
in a way that a person who can not see the CRT can use and understand. The
software must allow the user to move the pointer to any X/Y position, have the
position described in terms a blind person can relate to (remember most of the
blind were born that way, so they have absolutely no sense of spatial
orientation like a sighted person is used to.) Be able to say the character in
alphabetic terms and phonetic terms, give its color, read the character to its
left and to its right and above it and below it, track it as the screen scrolls,
know when to speak and when not to speak, if it is a graphic icon and if so,
what the text title is and if no title be able to add one to the screen, and on
and on. Jeff it is incredibly complex. Causing the text on a screen or an entire
document to be spoken is easy. It is this total user interface that makes the
difference. Developing the first one for Windows took five years!	
	
The absolute best screen reading software for Windows will probably never be as
good as what we had for DOS was.	
	
You can read about JFW Jeff, possibly download a trial version to experiment
with on your computer, from the Freedom Scientific web site.	
	
Again, thank you very much!

----------
From: jeff <jeffv at op.net>
To: Computers (or other) used for amateur radio, communications,  or 
experimenting <ham-computers at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: [Ham-Computers] Attn Duane: linux and screen readers
Date: Saturday, July 23, 2005 8:21 PM

On Sat, 2005-07-23 at 19:40 -0400, Duane Fischer, W8DBF wrote:
> The 'ONLY' way anyone is going to write a screen reading program for Linux is
if
> the sales of the product will be substantial to assure that the people who
> invested years of R/D, will make a profit.

most software for linux is open-source.  The majority of it is free.  I
just did a search - here are some links:

http://www.linux-speakup.org/

http://www.netserv.net.au/doonbank/speech.html#speech

http://www.alvabraille.com/Support/open_standard3.asp


http://mielke.cc/blind.html
software of interest to the blind

http://www.suse.com/en/whitepapers/blinux/
linux for the visually-impaired


I don't know if you're aware of any of the above, but it might be worth
a try.  It won't cost much, if anything.





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