Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Thomas D. Ward]

Hi. Well, I will preface my message by saying that the gnopernicus team is 
still several weeks away from anything looking like a stable beta release. 
There are many things to do yet.

The gui environment can be broken down into three basic parts. You have 
the X-Windows server. This contains vidio drivers, vidio resolution, and 
is the under lying part of the Windows environment. Then, you have a 
Window 
maniger such as sawfish. Then, you have a desktop, the part you actually 
work with such as Gnome and KDE.

It has been my experience that Gnome and KDE applications can be run with 
either desktop. However, KDE applicationss are not vary accessible because 
they are written in QT which has no screen reader hooks where Gnome 
applications written in gtk+ do or will soon have them.

  To work with Gnopernicus you will need to download the Gnome 2.0.2 
source, build it, and install it. Which is a huge under taking by itself.

Once that is done you will need to check out the Gnome speech server, 
gnopernicus screen reader, and gnome magnifyer, and build, and install 
them.

You will also require either Viavoice rtk rpm, or build and install the 
festival speech system.

Then, you need to change some environment variables here, modify a file 
there, and you might get it talking. As I said you can do things with it, 
but we are not discussing stable and working code yet.

I believe the gnopernicus home page is:

http://www.baum.ro/gnopernicus.html

Hth. 

  

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[ccrawford]

	It really rips me that we spend millions of dollars in government 
to accomplish accessibility with esoteric and stupid projects that do 
little more than create jobs for people who just love to process stuff, 
while hard core progress could have been made with the FUI and access in 
Linux.  Why should we have to do all that installing and compiling to 
simply get x-windows to talk right?  I surely do appreciate the great 
volunteer work that has been done to get the hooks in a development kit, 
but it just drives me up a wall to think that we could have funded good 
work and gotten it done much more quickly.

	You all should know that I am telling folks in the funding world 
that we simply have to pay reall attention to development rather than 
another conference or train the damn trainer program.  If we just bought 
the package and had the access in the box, then how much money would we 
not have to spend on another conference on how come we are not working?

	OK, off the soap box but really; Speakup for example is a great 
contribution to our lives and how come we are not getting the funding it 
needs as well as other products?  That hhas to change and while it may 
take a little time, it will.

-- charlie Crawford.

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Ann Parsons]

Hi all,

Yay, Charlie, thank you!!

Ann P.

-- 
			Ann K. Parsons  
email:  akp@eznet.net 			ICQ Number:  33006854
WEB SITE:  http://home.eznet.net/~akp
"All that is gold does not glitter.  Not all those who wander are lost."  JRRT

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Monty Lilburn]

Hi Thomas,

Thanks for your X-windows/Gnome/Gnopernicus explanation!  It made things
much more clear.  I did manage to find an archive of the Gnome
Accessability list where several threads discussed the trials and
tribulations of installing Gnome and Gnopernicus.  I suppose the question
now is:  Do I have the time it'll likely take to install Gnome and
Gnopernicus given its current state of pre-beta?  It's definitly tempting!

Monty
On Mon, 16 Sep 2002, Thomas D. Ward wrote:

>Hi. Well, I will preface my message by saying that the gnopernicus team is
>still several weeks away from anything looking like a stable beta release.
>There are many things to do yet.
>
>The gui environment can be broken down into three basic parts. You have
>the X-Windows server. This contains vidio drivers, vidio resolution, and
>is the under lying part of the Windows environment. Then, you have a
>Window
>maniger such as sawfish. Then, you have a desktop, the part you actually
>work with such as Gnome and KDE.
>
>It has been my experience that Gnome and KDE applications can be run with
>either desktop. However, KDE applicationss are not vary accessible because
>they are written in QT which has no screen reader hooks where Gnome
>applications written in gtk+ do or will soon have them.
>
>  To work with Gnopernicus you will need to download the Gnome 2.0.2
>source, build it, and install it. Which is a huge under taking by itself.
>
>Once that is done you will need to check out the Gnome speech server,
>gnopernicus screen reader, and gnome magnifyer, and build, and install
>them.
>
>You will also require either Viavoice rtk rpm, or build and install the
>festival speech system.
>
>Then, you need to change some environment variables here, modify a file
>there, and you might get it talking. As I said you can do things with it,
>but we are not discussing stable and working code yet.
>
>I believe the gnopernicus home page is:
>
>http://www.baum.ro/gnopernicus.html
>
>Hth.
>
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>Speakup mailing list
>Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
>http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>

-- 

  --------------------------------------------------------------

                         SUBMERGED IN THE 6o4 AREA CODE

A proud user of the LINUX Operating System!
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Thomas Ward]

Hi, Charley. I'd like to make some drastic corrections on some comments you
made.


Charley said:
  "Why should we have to do all that installing and compiling to
simply get x-windows to talk right?"

My reply:
 Cause, Gnome 2.0, and gnopernicus is under development, and is not to be
used by the general public at this time.
It is not ready for people like you to use, and it is assumed the developers
will be working with it.
That is the reason it is not built, and out there for just anyone to install
and use.

Charley said:
"but it just drives me up a wall to think that we could have funded good
work and gotten it done much more quickly."

my reply:
 Like how? I mean many people are putting time and money into the Gnome 2.0
project which goes beyond Linux and will give access to Unix platforms as
well as Linux.
Without the speech hooks no screen reader could ever hope to read Gnome
applications or the desktop.
Do you think the people on the speakup list are rushing forward to do all
that work for Gnome?

Charley said:
 "If we just bought
the package and had the access in the box, then how much money would we
not have to spend on another conference on how come we are not working?"

My reply:
Well, once Gnome 2.0 and gnopernicus is complete and ready for general usage
every Linux operating system has the choice to include it in there box
distribution. Some like Red Hat, Mandrake, and Suse have already made plans
to do just that as soon as gnopernicus is released to them to be included in
their distributions.
It also is not tied to a hardware ssynth which brings down cost for the end
user, cross platform portibility, and works in a gui environment similar to
MS Windows which in many respects is easier to train former Windows users
in.

Sumerry:
I think you should get all your facts strait before getting on the list, and
ranting and raving about things you don't know what your talking about.
Find out the goals of a group, their plans, and do some research before
crucifying a group for doing pore work when you haven't done zilch to
research it.

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Steve Holmes]

Good remarks, Tom.  I think the only way one could "pick up the
package for a fee and drop it in and play" would be to buy from a
corperate giant like Microsoft.  Sounds an awful lot like windows
don't it.  I find the free modle to be much more refreshing.  Yes, it
takes more work to get up and running, there may be more delays as the
developers are often not compensated but once it is "out there," more
people will jump in and then the maintenance pace picks up and far
exceeds the commercial model.

Look at DOS screen readers.  Look how long they were around and their
respective growth pattern; then look at Speakup.  How long has that
been around? I think it has come a long ways in a short time.  Yes, it
has a ways to go but look where it is now.  I would be really curious
to see how long it takes Gnopernicus to progress to the level of the
popular windows screen readers today.  I'll bet it will only take a
couple years and the windows products have been around in some form or
another since 1994.

On Wed, Sep 18, 2002 at 05:00:38PM -0400, Thomas Ward wrote:
> Hi, Charley. I'd like to make some drastic corrections on some comments you
> made.
> 
> 
> Charley said:
>   "Why should we have to do all that installing and compiling to
> simply get x-windows to talk right?"
> 
> My reply:
>  Cause, Gnome 2.0, and gnopernicus is under development, and is not to be
> used by the general public at this time.
> It is not ready for people like you to use, and it is assumed the developers
> will be working with it.
> That is the reason it is not built, and out there for just anyone to install
> and use.
> 
> Charley said:
> "but it just drives me up a wall to think that we could have funded good
> work and gotten it done much more quickly."
> 
> my reply:
>  Like how? I mean many people are putting time and money into the Gnome 2.0
> project which goes beyond Linux and will give access to Unix platforms as
> well as Linux.
> Without the speech hooks no screen reader could ever hope to read Gnome
> applications or the desktop.
> Do you think the people on the speakup list are rushing forward to do all
> that work for Gnome?
> 
> Charley said:
>  "If we just bought
> the package and had the access in the box, then how much money would we
> not have to spend on another conference on how come we are not working?"
> 
> My reply:
> Well, once Gnome 2.0 and gnopernicus is complete and ready for general usage
> every Linux operating system has the choice to include it in there box
> distribution. Some like Red Hat, Mandrake, and Suse have already made plans
> to do just that as soon as gnopernicus is released to them to be included in
> their distributions.
> It also is not tied to a hardware ssynth which brings down cost for the end
> user, cross platform portibility, and works in a gui environment similar to
> MS Windows which in many respects is easier to train former Windows users
> in.
> 
> Sumerry:
> I think you should get all your facts strait before getting on the list, and
> ranting and raving about things you don't know what your talking about.
> Find out the goals of a group, their plans, and do some research before
> crucifying a group for doing pore work when you haven't done zilch to
> research it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup

-- 
Please avoid sending me Word or PowerPoint attachments.
   See http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Charles Crawford]

Steve,

	It seems like we are polarizing around either it's evil like Microsoft or 
virtuous like volunteer developed software.  In fact there is an advantage 
to both approaches.  Sure, how can we help but be appreciative of the work 
done to create the code we all want and more importantly need.  Yet, money 
fuels the engines of progress that is in line with the mas of the user base.

	I don't believe that anyone would want to see Linux accessibility become a 
victim of the free market approach that would dismiss the population as too 
small to be worth the investment and yet, if we don't support the effort 
with some resources to speed delivery, then we will always be waiting for 
the next whatever.  You mentioned the DOS screen readers that in fact were 
commercial items related to the larger and mainstream world of DOS.  They 
were based on compitition and we benefited from that.

	Now comes the question of how can we maintain the volunteer and innovative 
values of Linux while increasing it's users and mainstream 
application?  Three important battles are keeping console mode up with 
X-windows apps, getting accessibility to the apps in both interfaces, and 
insuring that blind users can be competitive  in the workplace and 
independent at home.

	If we do not face these questions head on with strategies to resource the 
solutions, then we will slip into oblivion just as the last of the DOS 
(myself included) lovers are doing.  So rather than labeling my writing as 
ranting and deluding ourselves into the belief that this will never go 
away, let's get about the business of making sure folks who do the 
developing are appreciated for their work and properly funded to get it 
done without having to make it a priority beneath the need to make a living.

-- charlie Crawford.

  

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[ccrawford]

I think you misread y message.  Clearly the work of the group is 
appreciated.  The issue is that we could have had all this done with the 
proper investment of money up front and that money has been out there 
being spent on really inane projects that do nothing for us.  Government 
money is a resource wasted on less than fruitful conferences and should be 
applied to projects such as this.  

	My points relate to macro policy issues and so I respectfully 
submit to you that neither was I ranting nor am I one who is prone to talk 
about things I know not of.

-- charlie Crawford.


On Wed, 18 Sep 2002, Thomas Ward wrote:

> Hi, Charley. I'd like to make some drastic corrections on some comments you
> made.
> 
> 
> Charley said:
>   "Why should we have to do all that installing and compiling to
> simply get x-windows to talk right?"
> 
> My reply:
>  Cause, Gnome 2.0, and gnopernicus is under development, and is not to be
> used by the general public at this time.
> It is not ready for people like you to use, and it is assumed the developers
> will be working with it.
> That is the reason it is not built, and out there for just anyone to install
> and use.
> 
> Charley said:
> "but it just drives me up a wall to think that we could have funded good
> work and gotten it done much more quickly."
> 
> my reply:
>  Like how? I mean many people are putting time and money into the Gnome 2.0
> project which goes beyond Linux and will give access to Unix platforms as
> well as Linux.
> Without the speech hooks no screen reader could ever hope to read Gnome
> applications or the desktop.
> Do you think the people on the speakup list are rushing forward to do all
> that work for Gnome?
> 
> Charley said:
>  "If we just bought
> the package and had the access in the box, then how much money would we
> not have to spend on another conference on how come we are not working?"
> 
> My reply:
> Well, once Gnome 2.0 and gnopernicus is complete and ready for general usage
> every Linux operating system has the choice to include it in there box
> distribution. Some like Red Hat, Mandrake, and Suse have already made plans
> to do just that as soon as gnopernicus is released to them to be included in
> their distributions.
> It also is not tied to a hardware ssynth which brings down cost for the end
> user, cross platform portibility, and works in a gui environment similar to
> MS Windows which in many respects is easier to train former Windows users
> in.
> 
> Sumerry:
> I think you should get all your facts strait before getting on the list, and
> ranting and raving about things you don't know what your talking about.
> Find out the goals of a group, their plans, and do some research before
> crucifying a group for doing pore work when you haven't done zilch to
> research it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@braille.uwo.ca
> http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 

Re: Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Thomas Ward]

Hi, Monty. My recommendation at this point is to wait for the public beta or
the 1.0 release. Unless you are doing documentation, bug tracking, or
development there is no use in going through all that work building and
installing it.
There are many parts still broken or not developed yet, and the gnopernicus
project is moving to a new API with the start of Gnome 2.1 in cvs. Which
means many libraries will be broken, etc, and it is a big hastle.
My recommendation for everyone on the list is just hold on to your hat, and
wait for the final release. That way the bugs will be fixed, the libraries
will be in sink, and distributions such as Red Hat have already said they
will pick up the software and bundle it in there distribution as soon as it
is ready for them to do so.

Gnome, gnopernicus, and X-Windows questions

[Monty Lilburn]

Hello,

Recently I have noticed a lot of discussion in various mailing lists and
web-sites regarding Linux-GUI accessibility; in particular Gnome with
Gnopernicus.  This discussion has prompted me to increase my interest in
the subject and has made me want to take the GUI PLUNGE.  I know we're
still in the early stages of things but it looks like Gnome and
Gnopernicus are to the point where a person could begin to use the
interface some-what and certainly experiment a bit.

Though I have used the Linux commandline (via Slackware) for 5+ years I
have more or less ignored everything to do with X-Windows  (accept for the
occasional library).  It is because of this that I am now finding my
knowledge to be slightly lacking on the whole GUI subject.  So I can start
out on the right track I was wondering if someone could either affirm my
beliefs or right my wrongs!

First:  Am I correct that "X-Windows" is a kind of generic term referring
to the GUI environment and the applications, libraries and other pieces of
the interface?

Second:  If the above is on base, am I correct in that Gnome is simply
just one of several desktop/interface methods which allows a user to
interface with X-windows?  Sort of like how there are several flavours
(distrobutions) of linux?  What I mean is that Slackware, Red-Hat and
Debian are essentially different front-ends or organizational schemes for
Linux the same way that Gnome and KDE do to X-windows?

My third question relates to X-windows libraries and applications.  Are
libraries and applications compatible with all "flavours of desktops?"
Can Gnome applications run under KDE etc?  My observations are that they
will not but I am unclear on the reason for this.

My fourth question relates to the entire installation process.  So far I
haven't been able to find a howto or resource which describes how to get
X-windows, Gnome, and Gnopernicus installed and functional with speech
support.

I would appreciate any responses to my above querries even if it is just a
link pointing me off to a good resource.

thanks
  Monty


-- 

  --------------------------------------------------------------

                         SUBMERGED IN THE 6o4 AREA CODE

A proud user of the LINUX Operating System!
----------------------------------------------------------------------