talking terminals

[cbrannon1979@earthlink.net]

I was reading all the discussion about talking terminals yesterday.  The
way I see it, they have a very big disadvantage to a screenreader for a
blind person with a hardware synthesizer.  You need sighted help to install
Linux with a talking terminal.  And IMNSHO, a sighted person reading a screen
for me is a very poor substitute for speech output, especially if you're
like me, and don't
know anyone in your area who uses Linux.  I installed Zipspeak with absolutely
zero sighted assistance.  And as far as I can tell, kernels built with
Speakup can do this for full distributions, as well.  This would make
Linux the only operating system that can be installed by someone who is blind
without sighted help.  Maybe I could install DOS on my own, if I'd done it
enough, but I wouldn't have the computer actually talking to me while I was
installing.  And, with Speakup you get speech from bootup to power
down.  Only thing that
won't talk to you now is the BIOS, and there's supposedly a board you can get
that'll send the BIOS messages out the serial port.    Compare this setup to
Win-95, where speech isn't necessarily constant, even if you're booted and the 
screenreader's active.  (JFW crashes so easy its sick.)
But getting back to the topic of talking terminals. Anyone remember the
old Apple II computer from the seventies?  That's what I started out
on; and I seem to remember that the synthesizer for those was only about
$150, or so.  Question is, if a blind person doesn't have a hardware
synth, would it be possible to use an Apple II as a terminal under
Linux?  You can still find them, once in a while, and like I said, the
synth was cheap, even new.  I seem to remember them having a serial port,
so I'd think they could be usable as talking terminals, for someone with
limited funds who doesn't have, and can't afford a hardware synthesizer.
Later.