An Accessibility spin of Silverblue, with the best experience possible?
discussion.fedoraproject.org
I read this discussion thread but it was closed pretty soon. I read @vpolasek 's post on daily use of Desktop Linux as a blind person and found it really interesting. There was the idea of a spin, which I think fits it. Why should blind people use a sighted Desktop with a screenreader? This makes no sense to me. I am really curious and think this is essential, it should be a very high top priority. Blind people will probably have very different needs, and I am would love to discuss what the b...

Accessibility is a really important field. Everyone should have the right to use a free and friendly Operating System.

But its a pretty nieche topic, and I also think current ways of implementing it are not perfect.

I created a Thread on Fedora Discussion (Link) but Lemmy is way more active so I would love to spread attention to this topic, and collect your ideas.

  • How should a blind Desktop be structured?
  • Are there any big dealbreakers like Wayland, TTS engines, specific applications e.g.?
  • What do you think would be the best base Desktop to build such a setup on?
  • Would you think an immutable, out of the box Distro like “Fedora Silversound”, with everything included, the best tools, presets, easy setup e.g. is a good idea?
  • How privacy-friendly can a usable blind Desktop be?

Also, how would you like to call it? “A Talking Desktop”?

I am excited for your comments!

  • @spingEnglish
    14•1 year ago

    I feel like this would be a question best addressed where the online blind community hangs out (er… I don’t actually know where that is), and there may be plenty of blind users here (?) but I also wouldn’t be surprised to hear there are not. I certainly would tear my hair out if I had to work through comments audibly to try to work out what might be worth reading. But I don’t know and I’m not trying to speak for blind people.

    The one blind developer I knew was heavily into Emacs, which has historically had a speech interface and can operate very well purely text-based, that I think made it a good choice. His ability to be productive was awe inspiring. I don’t know if anything else has taken over, but I expect if I lost my sight it might become my entire environment since I already know it. But I wouldn’t be surprised (and hope) there are more suitable options for less technical users.