Re: [orca-list] Important: Web accessibility survey for screen reader users

[Alex Midence <alex midence gmail com>]

Their devotion to Windows is due to a series of factors.  Here's my educated guess:

1.  Windows was the first GUI-based software that had a set of viable, production-ready screen readers 
consistently for nearly a full decade before anyone else came along with something on another platform.  
There was Slimware Window Bridge, Screenpower windows, Jaws and Window Eyes all competing head to head with 
each other from about 1995 until about 1998 when W.E and JFW pretty much elbowed everyone else away.  
2.  Apple, though it had Outspoken or Outspeak (I forget the name), didn't do as good a job with their screen 
reader and it stopped working after a while until they came up with VoiceOver about 8 or 9 years ago.  
3.  Around the same time Apple was coming up with Voiceover, there existed two solutions for Linux, 
Gnopernicus and Orca.  Not sure what happened to Gnopernicus but Orca took center stage and has done quite 
nicely though, for a while there, you had to really know what you were doing to use Linux.  You couldn't just 
have any old computer user and sit them down in front of a Linux machine and tell them to start working like 
you could and still can for Windows.  Lastly, the accessibility stack hadn't come as far as it has in the 
last 2 or 3  years.  

Simply put, windows accessibility has been around longer and in use by a group of folks who are leery of 
change since they can't be sure they will be as productive as they can be in windows and therefore get very 
hesitant to try Linux out.  Where Linux will have the greatest number of users IMHO is where windows is 
difficult to get without breaking the law and people are coming to it as their first OS.  With everyone else, 
it has a lot of catching up to do.  


Alex M


-----Original Message-----
From: orca-list [mailto:orca-list-bounces gnome org] On Behalf Of kendell clark
Sent: Monday, July 27, 2015 2:39 PM
To: B. Henry; _mallory; orca-list gnome org
Subject: Re: [orca-list] Important: Web accessibility survey for screen reader users

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hi
This is partially true. It all comes down to the perception, accurate or not, that if you're blind you must 
use windows. How this got started I don't know, but in my experience linux can do most things as well as, and 
in some cases better than windows in terms of accessibility. Orca does a very good job at what it does and 
I'm continually frustrated that the blind community in particular is among the most stubborn and ungreatful 
of linux converts, often switching back after a few days because they "think" they need windows for 
something, and trying to convince them otherwise is like talking to an apple fan. I've honestly gotten to 
where I no longer bother with them directly,  I just focus on making linux better, putting as many open 
source tools into sonar that I can to support as much hardware as possible, especially apple devices, where 
the perception is that linux can't handle those devices, when in reality it can do most things with it, 
though not in a pretty gui interface. Note that when I speak of "blind people" I'm talking about the avid 
windows fans, not blind people that use linux in combination with windows, but rather those who will simply 
not acknowledge that linux is an option.
Thanks
Kendell clark


B. Henry wrote:
> In my  experience, and talking online contacts here as I've never 
> traveled farther south than Guadamala, nor been west of Ontario in 
> Ca., Linux is not markedly more popular  in developing countries, at 
> least amoung blind users than in the U.S., and where it would gai 
> would be in apple market share, not taking away from windows.
> PPL mostly buy beg, borrow, or steal pirated windows and pirated jaws. 
> Chromvox is used on four platforms, and with chromebooks having at 
> least the market share of linux, (not talking servers of course, and 
> not including chromeOS as Linux although of course it is), I would 
> disagree that it's likely that more people use Orca than cromevo. I 
> use cromevox on my Linux boxes as no  GUI browser besides 
> chrome/chromevox give me access to any content that firefox does not. 
> All the other GUI alternatives either work less well in general than 
> firefox, and by a good bit across the board, or at best do not work on 
> some sites that firefox does work on while not working anywhere that 
> firefox does not. This may not be true on every possible webpage, but 
> I've stopped testing any GUI LInux browsers until I hear of something 
> interesting. Last one I tried was midori.
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