Martin, you made my day with your story about the 6800-base microcomputer. I used a microcomputer for the first time circa 1978 (not sure an Olivetti Programma 101 with external magnetic cards to store programs and data that I used previously would be considered a computer nowadays).
This machine was equipped with a keyboard, a screen, two 8 inches floppy disks readers an a 10 MB hard disk. It had an Inter 8080 inside with 64 KB of RAM. People seeing it on my desk thought it was kind of a terminal and often asked: "but where is the computer". You are not alone, my friend <smile>. I agree that nobody should have to choose between a text interface and a graphical one (and between Braille and speech). As an aside mpv is perfectly able to displays videos in a console, but I digress. Oh, and about OCR I highly recommend the Lios software, which associated to Tesseract (or Cuneiform) can manage scanning and recognizing, recognize images also in a pdf file or taken by the computer's camera, speak the recognized text with espeak-ng and store an audio recording in wav of mp3 format, relying on speech-dispatcher and any of the associated speech synthesizers. Cheers, Didier On 31/12/2021 00:02, Martin McCormick wrote: > I've been following this sometimes-difficult discussion intently > as it goes to the heart of what computer users who happen to be > blind deal with on a daily basis especially when things go wrong. > How much insult can your working environment take before you > simply can't rescue what's there without either blowing the whole > thing away for a fresh install, getting somebody sighted to watch > the screen at 3:00 on a Sunday morning while you poke around, > trying to get the system to boot again. > > We've got the same darn problem today that I first > encountered the first time I ever laid hands on a microcomputer > which was in 1977 or so. > > I got to go to a presentation by the University of > Houston, Clear Lake City which was given at Oklahoma State > University. I was a graduate student then and one of my > advisors got me a ticket to attend. > > My knowledge then was severely limited to say the least > and I even remember asking the professor who gave the > demonstration whether this 6800-base microcomputer was actually > connected to a big main-frame on campus or if it was the whole > thing. > > He was very nice about it all and said it was the whole > computer, not connected to anything else. > > The box probably had only a few KB of ram in it, 8 big > toggle switches across the front of it and probably a pair of > 7-segment LED readouts for the display. > > No! It wasn't accessible but it could have been made > that way if someone connected an extra device to the > seven-segment display drivers. > > It's the same darn problem we have now only in it's > nascent form. If only we could just read what those LED readouts > said. > > Of course, I knew nothing about computers at that moment > except that you could get them to play music, run machines and > even talk if they were powerful enough and programmed by people > who were smart at their jobs. > > In 1965 or so, I heard a radio program in which a Bell > Labs computer had been programmed to sing "A Bicycle Built for Two" > > in a male voice that sounded unearthly but was understandable. > > In High school, a teacher played that same Bell Labs > computer singing "A Bicycle Built for two" with a musical > accompaniment of electronic notes along with the voice. > > I wondered at the time how does one do that? > > So basically, electronic computers that can talk and or > print Braille have been around in industrial systems for over > sixty years and the problem is still that they have tremendous > potential but it doesn't come by accident. Somebody has to > deliberately decide to solve a specific problem and whether that > solution fits in such a way as to solve other problems, is almost > an accident if it does. > > We still have this fixation on a visual readout as being > the sole way to peek inside the operation of the system and > absolutely 0 alternative methods to do so or to put it another > way, there is no Plan B and it's an utter shock when you raise > the issue. Imagine, as a small child, being told that the stove > is hot but giving your hand a third-degree burn every day because > one insists on touching the stove even though the outcome is > quite predictable. We would call that mental illness anywhere > else because most of us don't like being burned so tend to > remember how we got that way and we figure out to, dare I say it?, > learn to use the mitt to pickup the hot pan and not have to go to > the emergency room every day for the same reason. > > One day, we may have a video evaluation device that > connects where a monitor does, reads the screen via OCR plus > looks for a cursor blinking away somewhere on the screen and > gives us the functional equivalent of a screen reader or > talking/Braille monitor but until that day happens, it's a > chicken-and-egg situation. > > We need the computer running for the screen reader to > work and we need a running computer to produce speech or Braille, period. > > This problem will persist in almost it's original form as > long as Speech/Braille is an afterthought and the full system > must be running for this afterthought to actually work. > > I have tasted what life could be like with such an > interface when I bought a device that takes VGA output and turns > it in to web cam video and feeds it in to a USB port on a > computer equipped with the appropriate driver. > > I used Tesseract which is an open-source OCR application > developed by several blue-chip companies and was able to read the > output of a few PC's that have VGA ports on them. I got > letter-perfect text and could almost have used this setup as a > screen reader except for the fact that the video constantly > changes and the system would have to continuously stream the video > in order to even begin to function like a screen reader. > > This would truly be a game changer but that may be what > we need to hopefully be talking about something other than > repeating the same discussion which has been going on way too > long. > > Don't misunderstand me. I am not criticizing anybody's > position, here, but am stating what the real problem boils down > to. > > The good news is that it is doable but the bad news is > that it is complex but when it ever gets done, a lot of the same > old stuff we've been talking about when I got in to computeing > back in 1979 and earlier for others of you will hopefully be an > unpleasant memory like walking barefoot five miles to school > up-hill in the snow and somehow walking 5 miles up-hill again > barefoot back home. I get it. They moved the hill during the day > so it was up-hill both ways. > > I like a good snappy console screen reader that responds > quickly and helps me trouble-shoot when things go South but there > is a good argument for a good graphical interface screen reader > too. Nobody should have to choose these days. > > Martin McCormick > > Jeffery Mewtamer <mewta...@gmail.com> writes: >> Sorry if anyone gets this message twice, I got tripped up by the >> default reply to being a choice between the last respondant and >> everyone instead of something sensible like "just the list". >> >> I might have missed some details on account of several people quoting >> huge chunks of the conversation and their short replies getting lost >> in the quote walls(a string of natural 1s upon whoever thought quoting >> the entirety of the last message should be the default when replying >> to e-mail), but some of my thoughts on what has been said: >> >> Jordan, I don't like to call people out by name, but while I feel like >> everyone else in this thread has expressed their opinions in a way >> that is respectful to others, your comments have come across as you >> stating opinions as fact and that anyone who disagrees is an idiot. I >> hope that isn't how you intended your comments to come across and have >> just fallen into the trap of things sounding harsher in text than when >> spoken, but please try to be more respectful to those who prefer a >> different Linux setup from your own. And for the record, I'm a fan of >> Debian as well, and if not for a few things, I'd happily switch to a >> vanilla Debian setup instead of running a highly customized >> derivative. That Debian "just works" for you is great, but it doesn't >> "Just Work" for me and there are others in the same boat. And I don't >> think anyone wants you to go back to Windows, we just don't want to >> feel like we're being insulted for thinking Debian isn't perfect and >> not all other distros are garbage. Again, I hope I just grossly >> misreading your comments, but that's how you've been coming across and >> I don't think I'm alone iin that. >> >> As to the original topic, my only real complaint with Orca is that its >> written in Python and the overhead that introduces, and Yggdrasil >> being written in Rust doesn't really address that since it's trading >> an interpreted language I'm at least somewhat familiar with with one I >> know absolutely nothing about. Honestly, I'd be more interested in a >> project to rewrite Orca in C++ with a goal of improving performance on >> weak hardware, but I understand the reasons that is unlikely to ever >> happen and that I'm unusual for being so young yet finding C++ less >> frustrating to write code in than Python. >> >> Also, isn't Debian 10.1 a very old version at this point? I don't >> always keep the correspondence between version numbers and codenames >> straight, but didn't Debian 11 become stable several months ago at >> this point? And I thought the point releases for Debian 10 were at >> least up to 10.6. Is whoever is having trouble with Debian sure they >> are using the latest stable release? And since Debian 9 is working for >> them, I'm curious if an upgrade breaks things... >> >> As for secure boot... I might be misinformed, but I thought that was >> just a Microsoft ploy to try and prevent people from nuking >> preinstalled Windows they don't want but is nearly impossible to avoid >> without paying extra in favor of installing Linux... Is there any >> downside to disabling Secure Boot and using Legacy Boot if you aren't >> planning a Linux/Windows Dual boot? >> >> As for Slint, while I haven't tried it due to lack of spare hardware I >> can easily setup to experiment with and reluctance to try anything >> that requires me to learn a new package management system, I applaud >> the efforts that have gone into it and wish there was a similar >> project based on Debian(The Adriane component of Knoppix comes close, >> and my system is customized from Adriane Knoppix, but Knoppix has >> priorities aside from just making what its based on more accessible, >> and its nature as a Live Distro makes it subpar as an installed system >> running from hard drive) or if there was an effort to make the scripts >> Slint uses to steamline installation of accessibility tools and easily >> switch between them on the fly could be downloaded and run on a >> variety of distros(imagine if Debian had a "reader-switcher" package >> that recommended all the major console screen readers and then let you >> switch between the installed ones on the fly, and because its in >> Debian, it gets inherited by the umpteen dozen distros derived from >> Debian... Because, as much as I love SBL and wish it was available on >> a wider selection of distros, there is at least one case where I find >> espeakup's "try to read everything as it appears on screen" behavior >> beneficial instead of annoying, and I'm sure there are others who >> spend substantial amounts of time in the console who would enjoy that >> flexibility. >> >> >