Re: debian vs redhat

Re: debian vs redhat

[Jim Stevenson Ph.D]

Someone asserted that debian is easier for the blind to get working with 
speech. Is this true, and why?

I have ask this before, with no response, and I really need the answer 
before I devote a lot of work time going up the wrong path.

Thanks.

Re: debian vs redhat

[James R. Van Zandt]

"Jim Stevenson Ph.D" <jims@eos.arc.nasa.gov> writes:
>Someone asserted that debian is easier for the blind to get working with 
>speech. Is this true, and why?

Installation: Slackware installation is the best documented.  I
have not found a way to install Debian without sighted assistance.  I
don't know about Red Hat.

Administration: Red Hat and Debian have much more capable package
managers than Slackware.  In particular, they keep account of package
dependencies.  They will not let you install a package unless you also
install the correct versions of all the other things that package
needs.  There are more Red Hat users than Debian users, which means
more people to answer your questions.  

Bugs: Debian has an open bug tracking system.  Every package has a
maintainer responsible for handling bug reports.  You can look up all
the currently open bug reports, and you get notified when a bug report
is closed (usually when a new version is uploaded which fixes the
bug).  Red Hat also has a bug tracking system, but it is closed.

Age: I think that in general, Debian is more up to date than Red Hat,
and Red Hat is more up to date than Slackware.  I maintain several of
the access packages on all three distributions.  I usually run Debian,
so I release those packages first.  This will not matter as much to
you, once you are able to download the sources and compile them for
yourself.

However, I am sighted, so there are no doubt other issues I am not
aware of.  

                                    - Jim Van Zandt

Re: debian vs redhat

[G John Lapeyre]

	I am sighted too and noticed, when helping a low vision friend,
that I don't know details what is needed in software.  Perhaps some people
could draw up a wishlist or some guidelines.  I am a debian developer too
.  We could include this in developers' literature so that they can be
aware of some of the issues or even get interested in specific access
projects. 


On Mon, 19 Jan 1998, James R. Van Zandt wrote:

> 
> "Jim Stevenson Ph.D" <jims@eos.arc.nasa.gov> writes:
> >Someone asserted that debian is easier for the blind to get working with 
> >speech. Is this true, and why?
> 
> However, I am sighted, so there are no doubt other issues I am not
> aware of.  
> 
>                                     - Jim Van Zandt
> 

G John Lapeyre <lapeyre@physics.arizona.edu>
Tucson,AZ     http://www.physics.arizona.edu/~lapeyre

Re: debian vs redhat

[Bryan Smart]

At 08:02 PM 1/19/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Installation: Slackware installation is the best documented.  I
>have not found a way to install Debian without sighted assistance.  I
>don't know about Red Hat.

Redhat's Installer disk is graphical, and doesn't seem to be operable by
blind users.  Redhat 5 does support an automated install procedure (can't
remember what it is called right now).  This procedure takes all of the
installation info from a file, and it is very similar to the related
install methods for Windows 3.1 and Windows 95.  This method only works for
installs from the Redhat CD or over NFS.  You can not install from an MsDOS
partition with this method (although I don't know why not).

Someone should seriously bug Redhat for a terminal based installation.

>However, I am sighted, so there are no doubt other issues I am not
>aware of.  

Jim, I had no idea you were sighted.  When you speak of Emacspeak, however,
you do so as if you were a user.  This is strange to me.

Best,
Bryan

--
Bryan R. Smart
E-Mail: bsmart@pobox.com

Slackware installation

[Jason Castonguay]

Hi there, everyone.  I hope I'm not about to repeat a question that has
been asked many times before <g>, but is there a way I can install
Slackware without sighted assistance?  In other messages on this list, I
heard a little about a "terminal-based installation."  This sounds
interesting.

Well, thanks in advance for anything you can provide.


Best regards,


Jason

Re: debian vs redhat

[Jude Dashiell]

Isn't that installation procedure called kick start?
What might be a real useful addition to the kick start installation
would be source code for a program that would compile under dos say
using djgpp or linux.
What the program would do is to put up text-based
help screens describing what are valid answers
for the parameters in the kick start file and then allow the user to
answer those
questions based on the system linux will be installed.  The program
could then
roll the kick start information file and do a creditible install.
If a rebuild of the kernel were needed to support what's on a system
including
stuff like plug & prey, then orders for the rebuild
might also be written into the information file to happen after other
installation was finished.
Now if that kick start file started asking which speech synthesizer if
any you run on this system and to what port is it connected
putting up a list of supported synthesizers and sound cards, there might 
be
alot more independent linux installations happening
successfully too provided the right source code were selected compiled
and
deployed on the system.
The kick start installation might also be told to do its work but
when it was finished beep the speaker to let the user know
work was finished.
The message would come up on the screen to press a key to stop beeping
and
continue.  In the case of speech synthesizer users, a successful
installation
would have the speech synthesizer speaking that message.
The user should be shown what a failure beep sounds like and told
that in the event this happens to look in a text file called
errors.log located in a reasonable place for the
error and description as to why the installation broke.
For that matter, the program that generated the kick start information
file
could probably be written in perl.  perl is available to run on dos and
writing form filling programs with it isn't difficult.
On
Tue,
20 Jan 1998,
Bryan Smart wrote:

> At 08:02 PM 1/19/98 -0500, you wrote:
> >Installation: Slackware installation is the best documented.  I
> >have not found a way to install Debian without sighted assistance.  I
> >don't know about Red Hat.
> 
> Redhat's Installer disk is graphical, and doesn't seem to be operable by
> blind users.  Redhat 5 does support an automated install procedure (can't
> remember what it is called right now).  This procedure takes all of the
> installation info from a file, and it is very similar to the related
> install methods for Windows 3.1 and Windows 95.  This method only works for
> installs from the Redhat CD or over NFS.  You can not install from an MsDOS
> partition with this method (although I don't know why not).
> 
> Someone should seriously bug Redhat for a terminal based installation.
> 
> >However, I am sighted, so there are no doubt other issues I am not
> >aware of.  
> 
> Jim, I had no idea you were sighted.  When you speak of Emacspeak, however,
> you do so as if you were a user.  This is strange to me.
> 
> Best,
> Bryan
> 
> --
> Bryan R. Smart
> E-Mail: bsmart@pobox.com
> 
> ---
> Send your message for blinux-list to blinux-list@redhat.com
> Blinux software archive at ftp://leb.net/pub/blinux
> Blinux web page at http://leb.net/blinux
> To unsubscribe send mail to blinux-list-request@redhat.com
> with subject line: unsubscribe
> 


Jude <dashiell@clark.net>

Re: debian vs redhat

[Travis Siegel]

The linux boot and root disks are in the minix format.  If you have minix
support in your kernel, you can mount the uncompressed files as file
systems, edit values on the disk, recompress the file, and rawrite the
file back to a floppy.  I've used this method to enable the serial ports
on my boot disks for linux, so I can just login via com ports, and do the
install that way.  My guess is that the kickstart docs are talking about
the boot disk.  In that case, it'd be in minix format, and you could
certainly write preconfigured files to it as described above.  Of course,
this assumes there's already a working linux system accessable to the one
fixing to setup their own box. <sigh>

Re: Slackware installation

[Ben Van Poppel]

I've installed Slackware 3.10 through a terminal and it worked quite 
well. I haven't got it installed for speech yet which is a different 
story, but the actual installation bit is a breeze. 

The Emacspeak HowTo gives a step by step guide to getting a terminal on a 
Linux box to speak so you can install it. The Emacspeak HowTo is on the 
Blinux FTP site at ftp.leb.net.

Good luck.

Ben.

Re: Slackware installation

[Bryan Smart]

See http://www.leb.net/blinux.  There is info there which talks about
Slakware Specifically.  I believe that Jim's Emacspeak how-to covers
setting up a Slakware system with speech on a terminal, but am not sure.

Good luck.
Bryan

At 04:23 PM 1/20/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Hi there, everyone.  I hope I'm not about to repeat a question that has
>been asked many times before <g>, but is there a way I can install
>Slackware without sighted assistance?  In other messages on this list, I
>heard a little about a "terminal-based installation."  This sounds
>interesting.
>
>Well, thanks in advance for anything you can provide.
>
>
>Best regards,
>
>
>Jason
>
>---
>Send your message for blinux-list to blinux-list@redhat.com
>Blinux software archive at ftp://leb.net/pub/blinux
>Blinux web page at http://leb.net/blinux
>To unsubscribe send mail to blinux-list-request@redhat.com
>with subject line: unsubscribe
>
>
--
Bryan R. Smart
E-Mail: bsmart@pobox.com

Re: debian vs redhat

[James R. Van Zandt]

Bryan Smart <bsmart@pobox.com> writes:

>Jim, I had no idea you were sighted.  When you speak of Emacspeak,
>however, you do so as if you were a user.  

I hope you mean that I sound like I know what I am talking about.

As for being sighted, I never saw any need to draw attention to it.
I hope nobody is offended or anything.

                               - Jim Van Zandt

Re: debian vs redhat

[Bryan Smart]

At 06:47 PM 1/20/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Isn't that installation procedure called kick start?

Yes.  I looked it up this afternoon and discovered it is called KickStart.

>What might be a real useful addition to the kick start installation
>would be source code for a program that would compile under dos say
>using djgpp or linux.
>What the program would do is to put up text-based
>help screens describing what are valid answers
>for the parameters in the kick start file and then allow the user to

This is a good idea, but depends on a few things about KickStart that I
haven't been able to determine as of yet.

First, the KickStart docs state that the KS file is read from disk during
this kind of install.  Read from what disk?  The docs don't say anything
about specifying /dev/fd1 or /dev/hda1 as part of the disk name, so I'm
assuming that they mean the actual Redhat boot disk itself.  I didn't think
that disk was using a file system.  Thought it was one of those direct
access this sector and such type loaders (similar to the ones in the days
of Amiga and Apple IIgs OSless demos).  Also, the docs may be talking about
a DOS disk.  The installer might let you swap disks to read the file, but I
haven't had a sighted person around to check this out.

If the RH installer wants the files on the RH install disk, then we might
have a problem getting the DOS KickStart configuration app to save the file
on an EXT2 (or whatever file system it is) floppy.

>If a rebuild of the kernel were needed to support what's on a system
>including
>stuff like plug & prey, then orders for the rebuild
>might also be written into the information file to happen after other
>installation was finished.

Yes, the KS file supports post-install commands.  It is even possible that,
as you suggested below, that an automated procedure could be established
for configuring up the access solution to use.  That would be a big help to
many people who are not yet familiar with Linux, as well as a time saver
for the rest of us.

One problem might be, however, that the KS installation procedure can not
access DOS drives.  We probably could, however, manage to install a script
which could do the setup work once the system had been installed.  I.E.
when you hear the success tone, reboot your system.  Next, when you here
the beep (added a beep to the login prompt), type root and return, followed
by finish (or some similar name of a conclusion script).


--
Bryan R. Smart
E-Mail: bsmart@pobox.com

RE: debian vs redhat

[G John Lapeyre]

	There are some questions appearing about which system is easier to
install and use for blind users.  Please send these questions to the
following two lists. The first is mainly for developers, the second for
users.  Many users on the debian list have experience with both redhat and
debian. I don't know if debian or redhat have developers working on
accessibility, but they may be prompted to consider it in new designs if
they hear noise about it. 

	debian-devel@lists.debian.org
	debian-user@lists.debian.org	


G John Lapeyre <lapeyre@physics.arizona.edu>
Tucson,AZ     http://www.physics.arizona.edu/~lapeyre

RE: debian vs redhat

[Chris Peterson]

I don't know anything about Debian but Slackware has a setup disk that's 
extremely easy to reroute to, and use with, a dos terminal up to the point 
where you've installed emacspeak.

Refer to Jim Vanzandt's emacspeak howto for some information about this.

Chris

On Monday, January 19, 1998 11:02 AM, Jim Stevenson Ph.D 
[SMTP:jims@eos.arc.nasa.gov] wrote:
> Someone asserted that debian is easier for the blind to get working with
>
> speech. Is this true, and why?
>
> I have ask this before, with no response, and I really need the answer
> before I devote a lot of work time going up the wrong path.
>
> Thanks.
>
> ---
> Send your message for blinux-list to blinux-list@redhat.com
> Blinux software archive at ftp://leb.net/pub/blinux
> Blinux web page at http://leb.net/blinux
> To unsubscribe send mail to blinux-list-request@redhat.com
> with subject line: unsubscribe
>