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I recommend using a tiling window manager - they allow you to organize windows logically, rather than spatially. I have also written some plugins for using Vim

I recommend using a tiling window manager - they allow you to organize windows logically, rather than spatially. I have also written some plugins for using Vim (text editing) and Weechat (IRC chat) with speech synthesis: https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/dotfiles/tree/master/lib/vim/vimspeak.vim https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/dotfiles/tree/master/lib/vim/vim... https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/dotfiles/tree/master/.weechat/python/talkative.py https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/dotfiles/tree/master/.weechat/py... And I have a script for Sway (a tiling window manager) which also gives you audible cues: https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/dotfiles/tree/master/bin/swaytalk https://git.sr.ht/~sircmpwn/dotfiles/tree/master/bin/swaytal... All of this is somewhat incomplete, but it's a good starting point if you want to get used to them and work on improvements while you're still sighted. Good luck, and let me know if I can be of service.

hatsunearu 7y ago
Are you sighted?
- ddevault 7y ago
  Not perfectly, and not for long. I wear glasses, but they only do so much, and my vision worsens every year. I use some light assistive technologies on the daily - higher contrast, large fonts, zooming in on things. To test the tools I linked to, I spend the occasional workday with all of my monitors turned off, relying on these tools to get work done. I also have a braille reader that I occasionally pull out. I have a different philosophy and approach to using computers than most, and that affects my views on accessibility. Stapling a screenreader onto a graphical application, for example, to me seems like the wrong approach. Text-based applications are much more accessible, and these are my bread and butter. To this end, my work on accessibility involves making more information available as text, organized logically rather than spatially, and making it easier to access and manipulate that information with vision impairments (and other sorts of impairments, too).
  - gopaz 7y ago
    I would love to read more about this in your blog! Sway is my daily driver and I love it!
  - matt_the_bass 7y ago
    It seems like this level of organization would be beneficial to the sighted community as well. Is this a value that you use to market to customers?
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - ddevault 7y ago
      Yes.
  - mwcampbell 7y ago
    On the days that you turn your monitor off, how do you do email? Do you also have a speech synthesis plugin for your aerc email client? Or do you use it with a generic screen reader for terminals? If the latter, which screen reader? I've found that, counter-intuitively, a fully accessible GUI program with a good GUI screen reader is easier to use than a screen-oriented terminal program with a screen reader. The trouble with the latter is that the user has to understand visual concepts like highlighting, the meaning of special characters, etc. Of course, an application or plugin that's tailor-made for doing a particular task with speech output is better than either of those other choices -- as long as you don't have to use an application that's overall inferior (e.g. using the Emacs/W3 web browser with Emacspeak as opposed to a mainstream browser).
    - ddevault 7y ago
      >On the days that you turn your monitor off, how do you do email? Poorly. I want to improve aerc in this respect. For the time being, I use a mix of my braille reader (brltty) and piping emails into vipe so I can use my vim plugin to read them.
bear8642 7y ago
Rob Pike's Acme editor is another powerful tiling editor you can check out.
- ddevault 7y ago
  As a huge fan of Plan 9, I would strongly recommend against acme for visually impaired users. It's highly mouse-driven, requiring a spacial understanding of the interface and the ability to see where the mouse is and coordinate its movement to execute commands.
  - bear8642 7y ago
    Good point - didn't think that through enough before recommending. Just thought of as nice tiling editor.
  - zenhack 7y ago
    Thoughts on Sam? It seems to me like it might be a much better fit, esp. given the ed-like command only mode. (And I always liked it better than acme anyway...)
dicknuckle 7y ago
As a side note, weechat runs beautifully in Docker. I access it with Glowingbear but though a terminal it would also be trivial.

hatsunearu 7y ago

Are you sighted?

ddevault 7y ago
Not perfectly, and not for long. I wear glasses, but they only do so much, and my vision worsens every year. I use some light assistive technologies on the daily - higher contrast, large fonts, zooming in on things. To test the tools I linked to, I spend the occasional workday with all of my monitors turned off, relying on these tools to get work done. I also have a braille reader that I occasionally pull out. I have a different philosophy and approach to using computers than most, and that affects my views on accessibility. Stapling a screenreader onto a graphical application, for example, to me seems like the wrong approach. Text-based applications are much more accessible, and these are my bread and butter. To this end, my work on accessibility involves making more information available as text, organized logically rather than spatially, and making it easier to access and manipulate that information with vision impairments (and other sorts of impairments, too).
- gopaz 7y ago
  I would love to read more about this in your blog! Sway is my daily driver and I love it!
- matt_the_bass 7y ago
  It seems like this level of organization would be beneficial to the sighted community as well. Is this a value that you use to market to customers?
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - ddevault 7y ago
    Yes.
- mwcampbell 7y ago
  On the days that you turn your monitor off, how do you do email? Do you also have a speech synthesis plugin for your aerc email client? Or do you use it with a generic screen reader for terminals? If the latter, which screen reader? I've found that, counter-intuitively, a fully accessible GUI program with a good GUI screen reader is easier to use than a screen-oriented terminal program with a screen reader. The trouble with the latter is that the user has to understand visual concepts like highlighting, the meaning of special characters, etc. Of course, an application or plugin that's tailor-made for doing a particular task with speech output is better than either of those other choices -- as long as you don't have to use an application that's overall inferior (e.g. using the Emacs/W3 web browser with Emacspeak as opposed to a mainstream browser).
  - ddevault 7y ago
    >On the days that you turn your monitor off, how do you do email? Poorly. I want to improve aerc in this respect. For the time being, I use a mix of my braille reader (brltty) and piping emails into vipe so I can use my vim plugin to read them.

bear8642 7y ago

Rob Pike's Acme editor is another powerful tiling editor you can check out.

ddevault 7y ago
As a huge fan of Plan 9, I would strongly recommend against acme for visually impaired users. It's highly mouse-driven, requiring a spacial understanding of the interface and the ability to see where the mouse is and coordinate its movement to execute commands.
- bear8642 7y ago
  Good point - didn't think that through enough before recommending. Just thought of as nice tiling editor.
- zenhack 7y ago
  Thoughts on Sam? It seems to me like it might be a much better fit, esp. given the ed-like command only mode. (And I always liked it better than acme anyway...)

dicknuckle 7y ago

As a side note, weechat runs beautifully in Docker. I access it with Glowingbear but though a terminal it would also be trivial.