Introduction and question Linux

Sun Nov 26 00:35:38 UTC 2017

Thanks, it always help an aspiring accessibility specialist to know
more about the disabilities ... ;)

2017-11-25 16:11 UTC−05:00, Linux for blind general discussion
<blinux-list at redhat.com>:
> There's a fourth type of meaning to blind in English.  Blind from birth.
>   No vision could have happened well after birth and this has
> accessibility implications.  People who got no vision later in life have
> memory of vision those blind from birth will never have.  Neither
> pictures or colors mean the same thing to those blind from birth
> compared to those with memory of vision in their past.
>
> On Sat, 25 Nov 2017, Linux for blind general discussion wrote:
>
>> Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2017 09:43:02
>> From: Linux for blind general discussion <blinux-list at redhat.com>
>> To: blinux-list at redhat.com
>> Subject: Re: Introduction and question Linux
>>
>> By the way, blind don't have a double meaning in french like in
>> english, are you impaired (low vision), colorblind or blind (no
>> sight).
>>
>> What accessibility softwares and hardwares do you use ?
>>
>> For email you should be fine with command-line tools, for facebook
>> there's a limited command line tool, pidgin with purple facebook for
>> the chat only and m.facebook.com link in a web browser usually do
>> well, web browsing should be fine but like you know yet it vary from a
>> website to another and we barely can fix that mess, watching videos
>> could be improved by command-line seem akward but mpv or vlc and
>> youtube-dl allow to grab or embed video in your media player, for word
>> and excel I suppose that Libre office have some accessibility but they
>> won't be on par with Microsoft office, I propose to save in open
>> formats since others suites could read them without issues and it will
>> weaken Microsoft Office monopoly in the process and that could be a
>> good thing.
>>
>>
>> Command-line tools should be blazing fast even on old hardware but for
>> a graphical desktop expect that some are a bit heavy and some apps
>> being heavy while Orca using a lot the hardware, it could still have
>> issues.
>>
>> Like said, for now it's not perfect but I know in real life a blind
>> programmer and online I came around the Sonar Linux developper so it
>> is at least usable to some point but both work to fix things up, I
>> will probably help also soon being a major Linux community manager but
>> it's hard to work everything alone while having a busy life and many
>> projects running ...
>>
>> All my wishes, may the source be with you Linarian !!! ;)
>>
>> 2017-11-25 9:26 UTC?05:00, michael caron couturier <spikemcc at gmail.com>:
>>> 1. Is it possible?
>>>
>>> Yes
>>>
>>> 2. Is the accessibility ok?
>>>
>>> Under Windows and Mac but depending of how you use it, it could have
>>> some
>>> gains.
>>>
>>> 3. Is it correct that Ubuntu mate is the best system for us?
>>>
>>> On Linux, there's no best, just the tool fit for you but yes Ubuntu
>>> Mate is told to a bellow the average accessibility for a distribution
>>> not focused on accessibility.
>>>
>>> 4. How do I make a usb stick to reboot my Mac with Linux?
>>>
>>> You could burn the iso or use a tool like Etcher for the live usb but
>>> I can't tell about the accessibility of it, not a mac user, for
>>> booting it, I can't tell the process on Mac hardware.
>>>
>>> 5. When I restart after I am in Linux, does my Mac react normal again
>>> after using Linux?
>>>
>>> Depend, you should be able to test it as a live usb but if you try to
>>> install after, you have load of things to have in mind, like having a
>>> proper backup and the process on Mac hardware is probably a little bit
>>> different.
>>>
>>> 2017-11-25 9:07 UTC?05:00, Linux for blind general discussion
>>> <blinux-list at redhat.com>:
>>>>> I would like to make the switch to Linux.
>>>>>
>>>>> My questions are:
>>>>> 1. Is it possible?
>>>>
>>>> Yes! plenty of people do.  I've run Linux full-time as my desktop for
>>>> about a 15 years, and a mix of Windows & Linux before that.  I've
>>>> recently added some FreeBSD and OpenBSD into the mix for fun.
>>>>
>>>>> 2. Is the accessibility ok?
>>>>
>>>> There are plenty here who seem to think so (grin)
>>>>
>>>>> 3. Is it correct that Ubuntu mate is the best system for us?
>>>>
>>>> There are lots of flavors and it depends on your experience and
>>>> likes.  Fortunately, if (as you describe later) you plan not to
>>>> install but rather just run it off a USB drive, you can try out a
>>>> bunch of flavors and see which suit you.
>>>>
>>>>> 4. How do I make a usb stick to reboot my Mac with Linux?
>>>>
>>>> I'm a command-line guy (there might be a GUI way on the Mac, but I'm
>>>> unfamiliar with it), so you'd find the device-name of your USB drive
>>>> with something like
>>>>
>>>>   gianni at my-mac$ dmesg | tail
>>>>
>>>> and compare the results before and after you insert the USB drive.
>>>> With that device name (maybe something like "disk2").  A quick web
>>>> search suggests you can also use the "diskutil" command:
>>>>
>>>>   gianni at my-mac$ diskutil list
>>>>
>>>> to find it.  If your Mac already mounted it, you'd have to unmount it
>>>> with either
>>>>
>>>>   gianni at my-mac$ umount /dev/disk2
>>>>
>>>> (note, no "n" in "umount") or use `diskutil`
>>>>
>>>>   gianni at my-mac$ diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk2
>>>>
>>>> Alternatively, you might be able to use "Eject" in Finder to unmount
>>>> it.
>>>>
>>>> Once you know the name and that the USB drive isn't attached, you'd
>>>> take the disk-image you downloaded and write it to the drive with the
>>>> "dd" command. You might also need to use `sudo` to gain root
>>>> privileges:
>>>>
>>>>   gianni at my-mac$ sudo dd if=ubuntu_mate.img of=/dev/disk2 bs=1M
>>>>
>>>> Sudo should prompt you for your Mac password which you can then type.
>>>> The "if" is short for "input file" and "of" is short for "output file"
>>>> and the "bs" is for "block size" (which speeds things up if you
>>>> read/write a megabyte at a time instead of reading/writing a single
>>>> byte at a time; you can increase this to 2-4MB if you want, but I
>>>> find that 1MB at a time is sufficient).
>>>>
>>>> I'm not sure of the magical Open Firmware command to boot a Mac from
>>>> a USB drive.  Another quick web-search suggests holding down the
>>>> Option key when you hear the boot-chime and releasing it once the
>>>> boot-manager comes up.  I'm not sure how accessible the boot manager
>>>> is, so you may or may not need some sighted assistance there.  It
>>>> should be (at least visually) apparent which boot device is which,
>>>> letting you choose the USB drive instead of your internal hard-drive.
>>>>
>>>>> 5. When I restart after I am in Linux, does my Mac react normal
>>>>> again after using Linux?
>>>>
>>>> Yep, as long as you didn't perform an install, it should be fine.
>>>>
>>>> Another alternative would be using something like Virtual Box to kick
>>>> the tires within the safe confines of a virtual machine where you
>>>> won't impact your host Mac.
>>>>
>>>> -tim
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> If you run purely off the USB drive, it should reboot fine.
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>> Blinux-list at redhat.com
>>>> https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Micha?l Caron Couturier
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Micha?l Caron Couturier
>>
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-- 
Michaël Caron Couturier