Re: Screen Readers and Operating Systems (was Re: accessible banking:)

On Wed, Feb 02, 2005 at 10:10:18AM -0500, david poehlman wrote:
 
> I got your point, but there is agrowing need for moving away from windows, 
> and mac osx x11 could achieve this.  Right now, if I am needing a new mac, I 
> cannot run os9.2 on it if I understand things correctly and therefore, 
> cannot run any screen reader with the regular apps.

I'm pretty sure the current version of OS X has a screenreader
included, although not a particularly good one, and the next release
is supposed to include a much improved one.

Gnopernicus is the only X11 screen reader I've heard of, but when I
tried it about 6 months ago it was very immature and prone to crashing
- and that was on a Gnome/Linux desktop. While it might be possible to
get it working on OS X, it won't be easy - and finding suitable
applications for it is likely to be difficult, as is installing
them. Frankly, I don't see much point in going for OS X if you aren't
going to use the non-X11 applications. A Linux desktop (possibly on
PPC hardware, possibly on x86 hardware) would likely be a more
accessible choice, while still moving away from a Windows desktop.

My first real encounter with Linux was with one of the SuSE 6.x series
- and that included support for Braille output devices to the extent
that the installer would detect if you had one attached and let you
install the entire operating system without being able to see. I don't
know if Gnopernicus is mature enough for general use yet, but its
certainly worth keeping an eye on. I'm sure it will run better under a
Gnome desktop then on OS X - where its impossible (AFAIK) to avoid the
native desktop to some degree or another.

... or you could just wait for Tiger :)

-- 
David Dorward                                      http://dorward.me.uk

Received on Wednesday, 2 February 2005 15:53:59 UTC