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> I don't currently have time to pursue it further myself. I work for a non-profit where we tackle accessibility issues related to the web, documents, and tech

by avtar 10y ago

> I don't currently have time to pursue it further myself. I work for a non-profit where we tackle accessibility issues related to the web, documents, and tech in general. We have a few Vagrant boxes that we use for development and testing, one of them is a Fedora box (GNOME 3 though) that comes with Orca configured [1] so that it doesn't prompt you for setup options. Chrome and Firefox are installed as well. If you have Vagrant and VirtualBox installed you can make use of it like so: vagrant init inclusivedesign/fedora24 && vagrant up The box is ~2 GB. This is the repository for the box in question: * https://github.com/idi-ops/packer-fedora https://github.com/idi-ops/packer-fedora * https://atlas.hashicorp.com/inclusivedesign/boxes/fedora24 https://atlas.hashicorp.com/inclusivedesign/boxes/fedora24 We track Fedora releases and update boxes fairly regularly so there should be a Fedora 25 one with Orca once there's an official release upstream. I hope it can be of use to anyone here. If you have any questions we hang out in #fluid-work on Freenode. [1] https://github.com/gpii-ops/ansible-gpii-framework/blob/master/tasks/configure.yml https://github.com/gpii-ops/ansible-gpii-framework/blob/mast...

blinddev 10y ago
This is really cool, thanks for sharing. Will try it out.
richardbrevig 10y ago
> I work for a non-profit where we tackle accessibility issues related to the web, documents, and tech in general. What's the non-profit? Expose UX [1] is preparing an episode focused on accessibility for Global Accessibility Awareness Day: startups will get judged by UX judges based on the accessibility of their products. Would love to connect with your org. [1] http://ExposeUX.com http://ExposeUX.com
- avtar 10y ago
  It's the Inclusive Design Research Centre at OCAD University. My email is in my profile, feel free to reach out :) http://inclusivedesign.ca/research/ocadu/ http://inclusivedesign.ca/research/ocadu/
jareds 10y ago
Do you think Fedora is a usable option as a totally blind person? I'm a totally blind software developer and looked at Linux several years ago. It didn't "just work" and since I already have Jaws for my job which requires Windows I never bothered trying to use the Linux GUI for an extended length of time. I'll have to look at this.
- ndarilek 10y ago
  I'm blind and prefer Fedora because it tracks GNOME more closely, and GNOME seems to reliably get accessibility right whereas Ubuntu/Unity doesn't. So admittedly my development workflow isn't super high-tech. I do lots of JavaScript, some Rust, and a few others. All my languages have reliable command line tooling, which of course works well under Linux. Some blind folks advised me to try Windows because it was supposed to make me more productive. I tried it for about a year and a half. I've used Linux since Slackware96, and whenever something failed under Windows I was stuck googling error codes and tracking down system logs. I can launch a Linux system upgrade from the command line. If it fails, it fails for an obvious/searchable reason, and prints its failure cause in the terminal. I don't have to track down logs in non-standard locations, google odd hex codes, etc. Under Windows, the best I could find for accessible JS/Rust dev was Notepad++. That's just an enhanced text editor. At that rate I might as well use Gedit/Vim under Linux for development, which I do and it works well. If you're developing heavily in Windows specific tech, then Linux wouldn't be a good fit. But as a technical user I'm quite happy with Linux generally, and Fedora specifically. About the only accessible Windows things I miss are audio games and Netflix, and my VM satisfies most of those. There are corner cases where Orca/Firefox act up, but under Windows there were lots of cases where I fought the OS, so there's just no perfect solution. I'd take a stronger foundation over slightly less accessibility any day.
  - jareds 10y ago
    Do you know if Eclipse works for Java programming with Orca? That's what I use for my job so could not use Linux as my primary OS if it does not work.
  - camlorn38 10y ago
steveax 10y ago
Very nice resource, thanks for putting this together and sharing it.

by avtar 10y ago

blinddev 10y ago

This is really cool, thanks for sharing. Will try it out.

richardbrevig 10y ago

> I work for a non-profit where we tackle accessibility issues related to the web, documents, and tech in general. What's the non-profit? Expose UX [1] is preparing an episode focused on accessibility for Global Accessibility Awareness Day: startups will get judged by UX judges based on the accessibility of their products. Would love to connect with your org. [1] http://ExposeUX.com http://ExposeUX.com

avtar 10y ago
It's the Inclusive Design Research Centre at OCAD University. My email is in my profile, feel free to reach out :) http://inclusivedesign.ca/research/ocadu/ http://inclusivedesign.ca/research/ocadu/

jareds 10y ago

Do you think Fedora is a usable option as a totally blind person? I'm a totally blind software developer and looked at Linux several years ago. It didn't "just work" and since I already have Jaws for my job which requires Windows I never bothered trying to use the Linux GUI for an extended length of time. I'll have to look at this.

ndarilek 10y ago
I'm blind and prefer Fedora because it tracks GNOME more closely, and GNOME seems to reliably get accessibility right whereas Ubuntu/Unity doesn't. So admittedly my development workflow isn't super high-tech. I do lots of JavaScript, some Rust, and a few others. All my languages have reliable command line tooling, which of course works well under Linux. Some blind folks advised me to try Windows because it was supposed to make me more productive. I tried it for about a year and a half. I've used Linux since Slackware96, and whenever something failed under Windows I was stuck googling error codes and tracking down system logs. I can launch a Linux system upgrade from the command line. If it fails, it fails for an obvious/searchable reason, and prints its failure cause in the terminal. I don't have to track down logs in non-standard locations, google odd hex codes, etc. Under Windows, the best I could find for accessible JS/Rust dev was Notepad++. That's just an enhanced text editor. At that rate I might as well use Gedit/Vim under Linux for development, which I do and it works well. If you're developing heavily in Windows specific tech, then Linux wouldn't be a good fit. But as a technical user I'm quite happy with Linux generally, and Fedora specifically. About the only accessible Windows things I miss are audio games and Netflix, and my VM satisfies most of those. There are corner cases where Orca/Firefox act up, but under Windows there were lots of cases where I fought the OS, so there's just no perfect solution. I'd take a stronger foundation over slightly less accessibility any day.
- jareds 10y ago
  Do you know if Eclipse works for Java programming with Orca? That's what I use for my job so could not use Linux as my primary OS if it does not work.
- camlorn38 10y ago

steveax 10y ago

Very nice resource, thanks for putting this together and sharing it.