Petra Ritter wrote: > Hello, > > My suggestion is to turn on the accessibility Technology by default > and to have accesskeys to start Gnopernicus or what ever program they > use for persons with motor difficulties. I assuming that the for 'Lesser > visual impairment' there use just another theme to change the > appearance of the Screen. To find a way to do this with a accesskey > should be not a problem. The option "Mmoderate visual impairment'is a > problem anyway because the magnifire option in Gnopernicus don't work > very well. > > On this way eg a blind person can start Ubuntu and when the system is > up and runing start Gnopernicus using a accesskey. > Hi Petra,
That seems like a valid approach, but there are reasons why we didn't do it that way. Ubuntu is a mainstream distro used by hundreds of thousands or (hopefully) millions. The physical CDs from ShipIt certainly get distributed in the millions. Making such a distro for a wide range of user groups involves a long list of compromises. The trick is to look for ways to meet the needs of as many groups as possible without those getting in each others way. That's not just related to AT support. You only have to look at any of our development related mailing lists to see that compromises are happening constantly. In that light, there are two problems with what you are describing. Problems that would affect the bulk of users. 1) Extra computer resource use: Loading the assistive technology modules uses extra resources in the form of CPU cycles, memory, desktop and application startup, etc. You could argue that it's minimal on a modern system, but most people prefer to have a lean setup where they can add what they need. For people with older systems it can make a significant difference. 2) Bugs: The AT stack is much less tested than anything else in our main software repository simply because very few people have traditionally been using it. Obviously this needs to be improved, but ATM it is a reality. If you turn on AT support by default you will cause serious problems and crashes for a large number of people, which the wider community would not and should not accept. I have serious issues with OpenOffice crashing when AT-SPI running for example. That's probably an OpenOffice bug (and I've filed it), but it will sting people just the same. Also remember that accessibility is not only for the visually impaired, but also motoric and others. Our current solutions aims to be generally useful to several groups. So it sounds like the right solution would be to make a separate derivative with these tools enabled by default, an Ubuntu-AT derivative. We've had several debates on that early in the project and I've actually switched sides in that debate several times :) (first being against a derivative, then thinking it was the way forward, and now being strongly against). The advantages of being 'in the main distro' are significant on several levels. * First of all, the CDs get distributed in the millions, where as a derivative would likely be a download-only item available from just a few mirrors. Now if a blind user gets a standard Ubuntu CD at a Linux fair or from a friend it actually has all the AT tools on it. Being on the default CD will reach many more potential users. This will also result in more testing. * The access tools are also installed on every HD-installed Ubuntu system. It just needs to be activated to work. That means that if you walk up to some random computer in a Library with Ubuntu you can use that machine directly without having to locate some system administrator with root access who can install it first. (but yes, the methods of activation are a problem) * A very important, but less obvious factor is developer-mindshare. Ubuntu attracts some brilliant developers, both as volunteers and Canonical employees, who can do some real magic if given the scent of the issue. By being in the main distro we involve these people in a natural way and can work with them to create solutions that are better for everyone. Our next release has 91 feature goals, or 'specifications'. 8 of those are new accessibility targets. See: https://launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/edgy/+specs So that was a long explanation of why we've done it they way we have :) It's also the case that we didn't quite get it working the way we had hoped for in 6.06, but I still feel that it was important to get this ball rolling and establish these features. The good news is that we are working to improve it for 6.10 and that we do listen too feedback :) We also appreciate very much the efforts of early adopters like yourself who are making the effort to test these early and imperfect attempts at getting it right. Feedback from the community is very valuable! Now, finally getting to your point: I agree that the method of activation is not ideal. We need to discuss what is the best way to improve on that. Let me start by explaining how we are planning to improve things for 6.10 and then air some alternative or possibly additional improvements we should consider. * Improved Live CD boot menu. Many people have commented that the boot-press-F5 system is difficult to use for the visually impaired. That's true, so we need to improve it further. We plan to play a sound when the system is ready to take boot options so that the user will know that it's time to press F5. That will take you to a new boot menu with 8 large high-contrast icons that you can select with the arrow keys. Each time you change the selection a unique sound will be played so that you know where you are in the menu. (link: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Accessibility/Specs/LiveCdAccess) * Using Orca. We will move from gnopernicus to Orca on the Live CD. Hopefully this will be a more reliable solution, removing the startup failures we had. The Orca team have also created a keep-alive daemon that brings Orca and related speech architecture back up should it fail for any reason. * The administration system and password problems are being addressed. The AT apps were not playing nicely with the system admin tools, and that is being addressed here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Accessibility/Specs/SudoAdminAtspi * Improving the installer. The above point will allow the installer to work with AT tools and we also need to fix a few rough AT edges on it as well. The next version will also remember the AT settings you used so that when you boot your newly installed system it will start those tools by default. * Better web-based documentation. We have recently set up http://access.ubuntu.com which now contains a basic introduction, but will also have guidance on how to use these tools. You be able to hear the sounds on-line that will be used in the boot menu, with explanations. We have also discussed making audio tutorials, but it would be great to get some help with that :) There are probably other things we should do as well. * The GDM login manager has some access support, which we haven't utilised. This could provide an alternative way of activating the AT features. This would be esp. useful on public systems. * An AT system activation daemon with the functionality you are talking about. One problem is that you have to log out an in again to activate AT-SPI and we cannot leave it running for all users. This seems like a fundamental AT-SPI bug to me that should be addressed. * The Gnome accessibility settings are currently spread in many different places and should be collected together and cleaned up in my opinion. Hopefully we'll see some of these improvements appearing on the Edgy Live CDs in the next few weeks and we would appreciate if the community here could give them a spin and report back. Thanks for your patience so far! Henrik Ubuntu Accessibility Coordinator _______________________________________________ gnome-accessibility-list mailing list gnome-accessibility-list@gnome.org http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-accessibility-list
