Re: [orca-list] update on the antergos problems

[Didier Spaier <didier slint fr>]

Hello,

[quoted lines from Kendell Clark]:
> I’m sorry, I should’ve been clearer. I didn’t mean to accuse debian
> guys of making a mistake, but rather that speech-dispatcher’s pulse
> audio code itself needs reworking, and that the debian guys who are 
> maintaining speech dispatcher might want to, when they have time of
> course, take a look.

Well, Samuel Thibault (in CC) is one of the current maintainers of the
Debian packagee for speech dispatcher and moreover the new upstream
maintainer of speech-dispatcher cf.: https://devel.freebsoft.org/speechd

However I assume that he would expect you to file a bug in:
https://github.com/brailcom/speechd/issues

But he would certainly need more precise information, as the issue could
as well be due to orca, pulse or a specific configuration setting.  

[quoted lines from Kendell Clark]:
> I don’t remember the details, but luke said several times that speech
> dispatcher’s pulse audio code needed a lot of work, something about
> speech dispatcher using a simple API and pulse audio having a … a … oh
> what was it, more complex one but that speech dispatcher wasn’t using
> it? Something like that.

These statements are too vague to be useful. The code of the pulseaudio
backend for the spd_audio library is in /src/audio/pulse.c and if
something need to be changed here someone has to state why. Anyway I
assume that if Luke had possible enhancements in mind he spoke about
them with Samuel before leaving the project. 

[quoted lines from Kendell Clark]:
> I can try alsa or even better, libao. I’m hesitant to use speech
> dispatcher’s alsa backend because it’s even worse than it’s pulse
> backend. Especially with espeak. It hangs nearly constantly, and
> that’s with espeak, not espeak ng. I’m not even sure it would work
> with espeak ng. Also, I believe luke ripped it out. The only supported
> backends are now pulse or libao. I will try libao though.

I am sorry but I have to correct some of your statements.
First, the alsa backend works perfectly: I am using it right now with
espeak-ng.

I can also say with certainty that Luke didn't rip anything from the
source tree of speech-dispatcher as I can see these files in the
src/audio directory:
alsa.c
libao.c
nas.c
oss.c
pulse.c

And I see among the files in src/modules directory espeak.c and
espeak-ng.c (otherwise how could I use espeak-ng?)

Caveat: I am speaking about the upstream files, I didn't check how
Debian or Antergos packaged them, especially if they removed some
backends or modules. Anyway I don't see any issue with
speech-dispatcher proper.


[quoted lines from Kendell Clark]:
> Again, I’m not absolutely certain speech dispatcher is at fault. I am
> fairly certain, since when I lose speech, orca starts but doesn’t 
> speak, orca’s preferences open, progress bars beep, etc but there’s no
> speech. Fiddling with pulse audio will restore speech, for a little
> bit.

Could you tell which kind of fiddling exactly, please? Knowing that could
help investigate

[quoted lines from Kendell Clark]:
> I really wish in times like this orca would rely on espeak ng directly
> instead of going through speech dispatcher.
Well, I will let Joanie answer to such a request if she wants to ;)


[quoted lines from Kendell Clark]:
> I understand the logic both for and against sd, but at least have a
> backup so if problems like this come up you’re not left with no
> speech. Just think what would happen if a new user were hit with this.
> They’d probably conclude that Linux is buggy and doesn’t work well,
> run back to what they were using and … well you get the idea. I’m not
> trying to start a debate either, only pointing out that this isn’t a
> problem a new user would be able to solve. I’m able to  limit the
> damage it does, but I can’t fix it.
Again, I still don't know what the problem really is, and am still not
convinced that a change in speech dispatcher, let alone dropping it, is
necessary.

If you want to be sure that orca + speech-dispatcher + epseak-ng can
work, just try Slint. To do that, just type:
wget https://sourceforge.net/projects/slint/files/14.2.1/slint64-14.2.1.1.iso
More information in:
http://slint.fr/wiki/en/installation
See also:
http://slackware.uk/slint/x86_64/slint-14.2.1/doc/ACCESSIBILITY

Greetings

Didier Spaier