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hi
Well, I've successfully gotten another blind user to switch over from
windows to fedora, so all is good now. STill want advice from sighted
users for how to get accessibility bugs fixed without causing
headaches, but I'm much better now
Thanks
Kendell clark
Sent from Fedora GNU/Linux
kendell clark wrote:
hi all I'll warn you all now before I start, this is going to be
a
bit of a rant. If you don't have the time to read this, please
skip. Before I rant, I want to make this crystal clear that I am
*not* aiming this at fedora. You guys have been incredibly helpful
and you seem to really care about accessibility. <Beginning of
rant> I am, to put it bluntly, completely exasperated with the
state of linux accessibility, and the amount of work that seems to
be needed just to keep accessibility functional, let alone
surpassing that of other operating systems. I switched to linux
over 3 years ago, and was immediately impressed. Within five
minutes, I'd wiped off windows and replaced it with linux. Orca
immediately came up talking, I could install independently, all the
apps were accessible, etc. I quickly ran into the same wall I've
been trying to tear down these past 3 years though. When an app
fails to be accessible, the fun begins. First, I'm directed to
contact the app developer, usually via mailing list or irc channel,
so I do so. Hi, I'm blind, and I want to use application x.
Unfortunately it has accessibility issues with orca. It won't
"whatever is wrong with the app". Is there anything I can do to
help you fix it? I wait for a response. "go away you blind idiot,
I don't have time to fix accessibility issues. Use windows, it
just works". That's not the response most of the times but it boils
down to this. The response is usually something like "Unfortunately
no one on our team knows about accessibility. Accessibility in
linux is incredibly difficult. Maybe you could try our app in
windows, it'll probably work there." This, to put it bluntly, does
not solve my issue. I'm using linux because I do not want windows,
and being told to go back there just frustrates me. Dejected, I log
off of the irc channel and go to the orca list. Hi. Does anyone
have experience with application X? I'm trying to use it with orca
version "orca version" and it "whatever's wrong with the app.
"Can
anyone help with a workaround, or can I provide any info to help?"
I get a response back from joanie, who's the orca maintainer.
Provide me with a debug file. Ok, fine, I do that. SHe looks at it,
eventually. SHe either fixes it in orca, which she's really good at
by the way or ... "well I can't fix this. It's a bug in such and
such. You'll have to file a bug." Ok, so I go find their bugzilla
page, and file a bug. If it's a framework, such as at-spi, I don't
even bother filing a bug because I don't know enough to gather
debug info at-spi needs, so I'd just be complaining "this doesn't
work" which won't help anyone. My main problem is this. I'm tired
of being overlooked. I do what I'm supposed to in an open source
project to get bugs fixed. I file a bug. I go on mailing lists and
send emails describing issues I'm having. And the only responses I
tend to get are, "No one knows anything, sorry." "accessibility is
complicated, use windows." "We're too understaffed and we'll get
around to it eventually." What am I doing wrong? You sighted
people have no idea how lucky you have it. You can pick up any
product off the shelf and immediately use it. We have to have so
many prerequisites to be in place before we can even think of
using something, most of the time aren't in place, so we can't use
it. Why? Why is accessibility such an uphill battle. Why do I file
bugs, only to have them sit for months, or years before they're
fixed, if they're fixed at all? All I want is to be equal with the
people who don't need a screen reader to use their computer. If I
file a bug, it gets fixed. I don't want special treatment. I just
want accessibility to work, and to keep working. It so often does
not happen. Accessibility gets broken far too easily, no one knows
what broke it, and it stays broken. So many desktops I cannot use.
Kde, xfce, lxde, lxqt, cinnamon. So many applications I cannot use.
Chrome/chromium, applications written for x, rather than using a
gui toolkit like gtk or qt, applications that use something other
than gtk or qt for their toolkit. I've used alternative platforms,
like windows, It *is* not perfect. It has it's own issues. But the
desktop, most of it at least, works, and works well. No unlabeled
controlls, no duplicate controlls, etc. Applications are another
story altogether. Gnome has trouble even keeping their own login
manager accessible, to say nothing of other dm's, kdm, lightdm,
etc. What am I doing wrong? I want linux to be a no brainer for
blind people all over the world to use. Most of them are downright
spoiled and hostile to having to put forth any kind of effort, so
that cannot happen until and unless accessibility is taken as
seriously as user interface design and marketing. Please help me
understand. Am I so insignificant that developers just can't be
bothered helping a blind person use their app, when they can be
lazy and a thousand, a million sighted people can, so what's the
point for a few blind people? Is that it? I cannot even turn to
blind agencies to help me, as distasteful as that sounds to me,
because the vast majority of them seem to have been bought off by
microsoft or apple. I'm so tired of the "use windows, it just
works. Linux'll never get anywhere." or the , "Just use mac, it's
all I need, and it's completely accessible." from other blind
people when I try to get interest in fixing linux accessibility
issues. I'm a nice person, up to a point. I'm willing to work with
developers who are willing to fix their accessibility issues. But
I'm not as patient as I once was. Too many times I've been promised
accessibility fixes, only to get nothing. The excuses don't matter
if you don't keep your word. It comes to a point when I just want
to log onto an irc channel and yell, "ok, there's yet another
accessible issue. Someone get on this immediately and fix it or
I'll ..." I don't, because that's going to get me nowhere, as well
as banned. But I'm tired of running in circles. It's not our
problem, go bug these people, it's their toolkit that's keeping
orca from reading the app. It's so complex I have only the vaguest
understanding of how the tools fit together in order for orca to
read my screen. <end of rant> Ok, that felt good. I've talked long
enough, so I'll end this. Please don't ban me, like I said in the
beginning this is not fedora's fault. You people have shown that
you care about accessibility, and I've seen proof in your tools.
They're all accessible. This rant is *not* directed at you. But
linux accessibility needs a kick in the pants. It needs a big
company with lots of money behind it, rather than a handful of
developers fixing the issues, in their spair time. I don't know how
many blind linux users their are but reguardless of the number,
they deserve the same experience a sighted user gets when they turn
on their computer. I will do whatever it takes to fix this, if it
takes dedicating the rest of my life to this. I don't have much
money to spair, but I can probably donate some, if money is needed.
I picked fedora because it's backed by redhat, and because the
community is caring and helpful. I need help. What do you long time
and sighted linux users think can be done about this? I'm tired of
the disinterest from developers, the assumption that surely there's
another app that I can use, so they don't have to bother fixing
accessibility issues. Surely I can switch to another platform,
usually windows, because linux isn't cut out for what I want to use
it for. That's clearly false, time and time again with effort it
can quickly surpass other platforms. But so often that effort isn't
even started. Or started and abandoned. Google won't even make
chrome accessible using pre existing accessibility frameworks.
At-spi on linux, something else on windows I forget the name.
Instead they develop their own, completely nonstandard and possibly
closed source implementation, and expect you to use that if you
want to use their browser. Duplication of effort is not the answer.
I personally think, and I could be completely wrong, but I think
there needs to be an accessibility standard framework that
applications adhere to. This is already here, in terms of at-spi2.
This needs to be baked into the display server itself, so that
applications either cannot, or cannot easily render their
applications inaccessible. Otherwise we're going to have the same
situation we're struggling with today. Accessibility problem, file
bug, wait. It may or may not get fixed. This *needs* to get fixed
and stay fixed. I want to help that happen, not whine and complain.
I realize I've just done that, but this will be the only email of
this kind you'll get from me. I just had to get it out there for
people who have moer experience with linux than I do to chew on.
Please don't ban me, I want to help fedora, and by extension all
linux distros get better in terms of accessibility. Thanks for
reading Kendell clark Sent from fedora GNU/Linux version 21
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