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Re: [orca-list] orca questions

On Fri, 23 May 2008, Michael Whapples wrote:



Now to explain further about various terms in Linux. Some of this you
might have already found out, but might be interesting.

Linux is the operating system. It manages things like your computer's
hardware, etc, and basically allows the parts inside the metal box be
Yes, 'linux' actually refers to the kernel, (currently 2.6.x). The kernel contains drivers and lots of code to make the system work. 
I think the shell is bash...


used. A distribution, its a bit of an odd idea if you are purely used to
windows, is Linux bundled up with various applications, and also
different distributions may have been compiled so as to be optimised for
particular hardware or tasks. The correct distribution is decided by
what you want to do with the system, how you want to interact with the
system and what type of computer you will be running it on. There are
some distributions, ubuntu, debian, and some other main ones are
designed as general purpose distributions, so could be used for a wide
range of tasks. Some others are much more specific and could be unsuited
for tasks other than those they were built for.
Yes, they can come with different software, different package managers etc. Also, different distros may include their own kernel patches, but I'm not sure. 



The most basic user interface (I say basic as in how it appears, not in
what can be done) is the command line, most distributions (I think all)
All, linux/unix is based on the command line and the gui (xwindows) or x11 is built on top of that. Unlike windows which is a gui and a little command line built on that, which makes no sense. 
The command line is just as or more powerful than any gui admin tool.


have text consoles available where you can work from the command line (a
bit like DOS, but I would say better). The command line features are


Yes, features like grep, tail, cat, ls etc are very good.
Also aptitude or apt is very nice, and there is lots of command line software. 


provided by the shell, which there are a few of, bash is the most
common, but there is zsh, csh, etc. Each of these shells have there
advantages, and it might come down to personal preference as to which
one to use.


I can't comment on this one.



While the text console is very much at the heart of Linux (some,
including me, say that it is where the power of Linux lies), is not the


indeed


only user interface. There is a graphical user interface as well (you've
found it already, otherwise how else are you using orca). As I
understand it, various services for graphical user interfaces are
provided by the X server, and specific interfaces are built upon that.
GNOME is one of the graphical user interfaces for Linux, in fact  its a


graphical desktop


bit more really than just the user interface, it provides a whole bundle
of graphical applications for using your system. These graphical user
interfaces (such as gnome) are normally referred to as the desktop.
There are other desktops available such as KDE (KDE you might hear of a
bit, its another of the major desktops for Linux).


But not accessible.
since its qt.



Now to what GTK is. Its a graphical user interface toolkit. This
basically means that it is a toolkit providing applications an easy way
to produce graphical user interfaces which fit in with a common style.
One feature of GTK is that it provides a way that accessibility
information can be made available from applications to tools such as
orca. GTK is the toolkit used by applications written for the gnome
desktop. There are other graphical user interface toolkits, another main
one is QT, which is used by the KDE desktop.


Yes, at-spi works well with it and qt isn't accessible.
Also you are right, it is used for writing graphical apps.
eg. apps that can run under x11.



I said that GTK provides a way for accessibility information to be made
available to orca, it doesn't do it directly, it provides it to at-spi.
At-spi is the accessibility framework used in Linux, and is separated
from GTK because it then can be used by other applications not using
GTK, eg. java applications have information revealed through at-spi when
the java access bridge is installed.



Yes, but I can't really comment.
All I know which I have said a bit is that qt isn't supported by at-spi, so isn't accessible with speech. 
Hopefully that will change in the future since there are a lot of qt apps.



I think that covers the basics. I also hope I got this right, there may
be some small subtle difference as I have done this all from memory
without looking up exact definitions.



Most of it looks good to me.

Cheers,
Daniel.
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