Re: [gdm-list] What's the Status of Audio in GDM?

[Janina Sajka <janina rednote net>]

Hi, Chuck:

Chuck Anderson writes:
> I've done some testing of accessibility support on GDM, specifically 
> the screen reader and audio output, on Fedora 9.
> 
> On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 10:13:06AM -0400, Janina Sajka wrote:
> > What is the plan for SoundOnLogin=true ? Is it coming back? Should I
> > just be patient?
> 
> I don't know about that option, however I do have sound working on my 
> GDM login screen.  Orca starts up automatically.
> 
> > And, what's the thought on providing audio device support at this stage?
> > Under the default pulseaudio, configuration the audio device isn't
> > available until after the login succeeds.
> 
> I didn't do anything special to enable audio device support or 
> pulseaudio on GDM.  It just worked for me by default after installing.  


Yes, I can see how that would be so. Unfortunately, in many real world
situations, users are likely to have sound happening before the boot
gets to GDM. They may have Speakup, the kernel based console screen
reader, starting automatically, for instance. And, even if Speakup isn't
set to start automatically--there's not much point when TTS is software
and not hardware based--it's likely to be started after boot because
somethings just run very well in the console and it's quicker/easier to
do Ctrl-Alt-F1 and/or Ctrl-Alt-F2 etc., than to have multiple Terminal
sessions open and Alt-TAB among them. Besides, in some regards, Speakup
is cleaner and quicker than Orca.

I don't see the above scenario going away anytime, no matter how good
Orca gets. Sometimes, a cli is the right tool for the job, especially as
users grow into power users. I suspect this is true for
everyone--disability or not. So, I imagine any power user will use both
gui and cli. My argument is that the screen reader user will want
multiple cli prompts, chosen to do certain tasks on certain consoles,
and hot key switching is the fastest way to access tasks.

So, the default install condition will certainly play sound from GDM, if
nothing else has asked for sound beforehand. But, in a running
environment, this may not cover all the necessary use cases.

> All I had to do was click on the accessibility icon in the lower left 
> corner of the login screen to turn on "Hear text aloud".  If there was 
> a shortcut-key for this option would that be adequate?


I wouldn't call it adequate. How about necessary but insufficient? Let
me explain--I'm trying to be complete here ...

Assuming sound at GDM start is reliably present--the above concerns
resolved--adding a hot key to turn on "hear text aloud" would certainly
fill the requirement of the screen reader user who uses text to speech.
That hot key should be Ctrl-S, as previously spec'd by Gnome A11y.

Is there also the opportunity to launch braille via Orca? That should be
Ctrl-B, and magnification should be Ctrl-M.

If these become universal, we will go a long way to meeting needs. There
are still the alternative input needs as discussed earlier this
week--but those certainly need more consideration.

> 
> > Lastly, let me note that there's a security dimension here that can only
> > be solved by clearing up a11y login. Without appropriate At support,
> > it's not all that hard to get out of sync with the GDM dialog and put
> > one's password where the login ID belongs.
> 
> The new GDM greeter by default lists all the local users on the 
> system, and you select the user's name from the list to log in as that 
> user.  Then you type the password.  So there won't usually be a need 
> to type your login ID, unless this is the first time you are logging 
> into a system with remote users (NIS, LDAP, etc.) in which case your 
> user name might not be in the list yet.  In that case, you have to 
> click "Other..." and then type the login ID.
> 
> I did notice that the text that Orca is reading is less than helpful.  
> First of all, it says nothing at all when the login window is ready to 
> be used.  It doesn't start reading until I click something on the 
> login widget.  Second, after clicking my user's full name in the list, 
> it says "Password:" and sometimes it reads each key of my password as 
> I type it instead of saying "star".  I can't reproduce this problem 
> all the time, however.  I think there are some race conditions between 
> when GDM starts up pulseaudio and Orca, because I have heard the 
> "Welcome to Orca" occasionally when the login window is ready.
> 
You've got it. You're on top of the issues. Thank you.

> Finally, I noticed that after logging in, Orca says "Welcome to Orca" 
> but then the process is killed or dies for some reason, and the rest 
> of my session no longer has the screen reader enabled, even though I 
> have it enabled in my session preferences.  Logging out doesn't fix it 
> either, and either Orca or pulseaudio (not sure which) no longer runs 
> on the GDM screen.  Rebooting seems to fix things.


Ah, I'd forgotten about this bug! Perhaps I can reproduce this by
killing Orca's autostart in my Gnome. I will try this and report.

Janina

> 
> So it seems that the support for accessibility, including audio and 
> the screen reader on the login screen exists, it is just that there 
> are many bugs that need to be ironed out.
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-- 

Janina Sajka,	Phone:	+1.202.595.7777;	sip:janina a11y org
Partner, Capital Accessibility LLC	http://CapitalAccessibility.Com

Marketing the Owasys 22C talking screenless cell phone in the U.S. and Canada
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Chair, Open Accessibility	janina a11y org	
Linux Foundation		http://a11y.org