[orca-list] [Fwd: Re: Proposal: Nuke the forced terminal-based setup]

[Joanmarie Diggs <jdiggs igalia com>]

Forwarding a private-message. I'd ask people to send all feedback to the
list. Even if you think my idea is really bad. I want to have a
consensus one way or the other.

--joanie

-------- Forwarded Message --------
From: Jonathan Nadeau <j nadeau charter net>
To: Joanmarie Diggs <jdiggs igalia com>
Subject: Re: [orca-list] Proposal: Nuke the forced terminal-based setup
Date: Thu, 09 Feb 2012 18:30:06 -0500

All of these points make sense. I would say it would be fine to drop 
this code. Also if this means more work can be done for Orca to work on 
other desktops this is a great move. Thanks for all of your work on Orca.

On 02/09/2012 05:58 PM, Joanmarie Diggs wrote:
> Hey guys.
>
> I have a new proposal for you. As the subject indicates, I am thinking
> that the forced terminal-based setup needs to go. Here's why:
>
> 1. If Orca is started via GNOME's built-in universal access tools,
>     the autostart file we were provided (and are expected by GNOME to
>     use) prevents the terminal setup from ever kicking in. So in this
>     case forced setup is useless as a result of going unused.
>
> 2. If Orca is stopped via GNOME's built-in universal access tools
>     and then launched manually, terminal setup kicks in -- which is
>     not desirable. For one thing, accessibility support for the desktop
>     session is still enabled functionally. But the gsettings key says it
>     is no longer enabled. So we don't actually *need* to enter setup.
>     Furthermore, if you go through with it, the setup stomps on your
>     existing settings. So in this case, it's at best silly and at worst
>     causes you to lose preferences.
>
> 3. If you always start Orca manually and you are in an instance where
>     accessibility support is really not enabled, forced setup simplifies
>     things for you. However, it assumes that you have gsettings -- that
>     won't be the case for pure KDE and pure XFCE environments. And for
>     that matter for any other pure, GNOME-free environments. The
>     gsettings thing we can deal with via using dbus instead (which is
>     what I'm working on now for some other stuff in Orca), but:
>
> 4. If Orca determines accessibility support is not enabled and does the
>     forced setup, it does it by launching (or attempting to launch)
>     gnome-terminal -- which won't be installed in pure non-gnome
>     environments. So I suppose we could try to figure out from the
>     environment what the native terminal is, but.... This really should
>     be a one time thing -- and ultimately a no-time thing because:
>
> 5. At the last Accessibility hackfest, we discussed and made a high
>     priority getting accessibility enabled by default. As things continue
>     to get more performant and more reliable, we can do this. We're
>     aiming for GNOME 3.6. With accessibility support always enabled,
>     forced setup will never, ever be invoked. And lastly:
>
> 6. For the one time it is truly needed, you can always use 'orca -t'
>     in a console.
>
> So.... Personally I think this code is more trouble than it is worth.
> What are your thoughts on this matter? Discussion and +1/-1 are highly
> encouraged.
>
> Thanks in advance!
> --joanie
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> orca-list mailing list
> orca-list gnome org
> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/orca-list
> Visit http://live.gnome.org/Orca for more information on Orca.
> The manual is at http://library.gnome.org/users/gnome-access-guide/nightly/ats-2.html
> The FAQ is at http://live.gnome.org/Orca/FrequentlyAskedQuestions
> Log bugs and feature requests at http://bugzilla.gnome.org
> Find out how to help at http://live.gnome.org/Orca/HowCanIHelp