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Re: [orca-list] Using Linux for everyday computing tasks and employment

On Fri, 2010-01-15 at 17:42 +0000, James & Nash wrote:

Hi Mallory,

Thank you for your impressions.

Did you see the others from the mailing list?  In case you thought mine
was the only one.

 The biggest problem I have with Linux is that UNIX insists on having directory and filenames that seem to 
make no sense except to a computer scientist or to people who have been using it for a long time. Where do 
you start? smiley.

To me, the UNIX filesystem setup makes more sense than the Windows one,
esp the way the spaces in Windows file and folder names stop me from
easily going through the filesystem by typing (if I used Windows more
I'd know how to get around that... quotes didn't seem to work). However
one thing that can trip you up is how every distro of Linux (and others
like BSD, etc) has different filestructures and place things in
different places.  Installing (er, setting up) Apache on my laptop threw
me for some loops because Debian Does it Different. Luckily we have
packaging systems : )
The UNIX filesystem is also the same style as used in HTTP (unix, and
mostly Linux, runs the web) and I only see Windows users putting the
backslash in URLs instead of the front slash : )

 However, i have no problem with the command line interface, and I am slowly learning how to use it. As a 
totally blind computer user, I was brought up with GUIs and use Mac for my daily needs, but the day may 
come when I move ot Linux for everything.

As a sighted user who started out with GUIs, I find that I use the GUI
for when I don't know another way, and use the command line when I need
to do something faster or with permissions.  I've been weaning myself
off gEdit and using VI more lately, knowing if I can do everything in VI
I can be a bazillion times faster and with more cowbell.  Were I to go
totally blind I would likely use the command line for just about
everything, because it's linear and powerful, except maybe web browsing
because I'm used to that. I'd also stop using Evolution as I'm still
feeling that one out and would go straight to something like mutt or one
of the other text-based mail systems.  Actually I may do that anyway.

 But for now, I am happy to explore the possibilities that Linux offers, and if things improve then who 
knows. Still, it is both useful and interesting to play around with different platforms and gain more and 
more experience.

Plenty of people interested in computers got interested in UNIX. You
will like UNIX better once you have a grasp of it.  I actually got
started back in school with a textbook (!) and a VT100 terminal and went
from there. You can use Linux as a hobby until you've got it, but I
think once you step over, you won't go back.  BTW Macs are running on
Unix nowadays with OSX... if you hunt around you can find the terminal.


Thank you again
Best
James 
On 15 Jan 2010, at 16:50, Mallory van Achterberg wrote:


I use Linux for work, but I would be able to do my work with a Windows
machine (and I need to have a Windows machine for browser testing
anyway).  I think the impression that Linux is a hobby OS comes from the
initial lack of user-friendliness (UNIX is not known for point-and-click
soccer-mom ease) that a GUI brings to the non-CS-major masses.  It's
true that Windows was what made a personal computer more on par with a
toaster or a washing machine as far as it being a home appliance that
the family uses without necessarily needing to know how it works (we
don't have to be mechanics to drive the car either).  With the types of
mouse-friendly distros that have been coming out in the last few years,
especially Ubuntu, Linux has been made more accessible to the non-geeks
(like me) and generally on-par with Windows as far as soccer-mom
usability (but with the power of UNIX close at hand when you need it).

Orca I cannot comment much on as I'm so used to JAWS and learning
something new is something I do slowly.  I type much slower with orca if
I want to hear the letters, and I haven't played much with its settings.
Orca's competition is probably more NVDA, but ultimately the goal would
be to have the screen reader not be a factor for someone choosing an
OS.  
As Krishnakant mentioned, the free both as in beer and speech makes
Linux a huge attraction in developing nations, which also happen to
usually have a higher number of blind and low-vision computer users.
Linux is certainly up to the job.  Orca, if it isn't, should be quite
soon, with all the active development going on.  It took Freedom
Scientific years to get where they are, plus they had to reverse
engineer everything (they did not get cooperation from Microsoft).
Orca developers are free to talk with other Linux devs.  Development can
only get better.

Our insurance company is actually slowly moving things over to Linux.
The computers used by the ones using the software are on Windows, but
the main servers have been switched to Linux and a colleague who uses
Fedora at home switched to Linux on his work PC and another colleague
added a dual-boot Ubuntu on his Windows machine.  It's spreading.  

-Mallory

On Thu, 2010-01-14 at 14:48 +0000, James & Nash wrote:

Hi list, 

I'm just curious, but how many of you use Orca and your favoured Linux distro for everyday use and also 
for employment purposes?

The reason I am asking is because for me I think that Linux would be more of a hobby than a serious 
computing platform at least for the moment.
Thanks 
TC
James 
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