Re: [orca-list] State of accessibility in GNOME/Others, from an absentee

[Jason White <jason jasonjgw net>]

Jacob Schmude <j schmude gmail com> wrote:
> Well, it's been a few years since I used Orca and GNOME. I've been happily
> using Mac OS X for several years, but am looking into possible alternatives
> as Apple (both in hardware and in OS X) is slowly drifting in a restrictive
> direction I don't much care for. I've had all the Windows I can stomach at
> home (especially that usability nightmare called Windows 8) and so I'm
> testing various Linux/GNOME combinations in virtual machine environments.

I would probably be running OS X if I weren't a Linux user; the accessibility
is reputedly good (at least for software written by Apple), and it's BSD UNIX
underneath. However, they are, as you point out, very restrictive; it probably
assists them in enforcing an accessibility policy but it's also highly
constraining to users who have needs or desires differing from the norm.

Think of Apple as like a UNIX workstation vendor (DEC, Sun, etc.) of the
1990s: by controlling the hardware and the software you can offer a reliable,
but closed, product.
 
> Questions 1. Are my results typical of the current state of affairs? In
> other words, is GNOME behaving as it should or is there something I've
> missed (perhaps a setting I need to enable)?  

Others have answered this, so I'll just add a reference to this overview of
Gnome-Shell: https://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/CheatSheet
> 2. Are there any other desktop
> environments that I can test, i.e. Cinnamon on LinuxMINT, or Mate? Anyone
> know if these work before I go to the trouble of installing them? I've done
> some playing with XFCE and LXDE and, while they sort of work, they're a bit
> too minimalist for my taste coming from a Windows and Mac background. I've
> got the command-line for minimalism when I need that as I often do (having a
> full UNIX command-line in addition to a nice GUI is one of the things I do
> love about OS X to begin with).  

If you like Emacs, you can use it as your desktop environment with Emacspeak
installed (this also works if you run it within Gnome or another graphical
desktop environment).
> 3. What options are there for decent text
> to speech? I'd like US English, German, and Swedish (US English being
> primary). Espeak does have them all, but listening to Espeak for any period
> of time gives me a raging headache and its German is sub-par. 

The other option to consider is SVOX Pico, which is supported by the latest
Speech Dispatcher.