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Last Post:
Oct 15, 2009 7:11 AM
by: ww36193
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Nolan Darilek
nolan@thewordnerd.info
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[accessibility-discuss] Newbie accessibility questions
Posted:
Oct 14, 2009 3:11 PM
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Hi, all. I'm checking out OpenSolaris, partially because of the good
things I've read about it, but also partially because I'm getting
somewhat frustrated with a number of Linux integration issues and how
they affect accessibility. I have a bunch of assorted questions, some of
which are more general to OpenSolaris and may not be completely on
topic, but I like to think that they're at least somewhat accessibility
related. :)
One of my big current frustrations is at the loss of accessibility I
sometimes experience when upgrading my Linux distribution. I'll upgrade
from one version to another, for instance, and suddenly the audio
subsystem has changed and I'm back in the shell trying to fix things so
I can do what I consider to be basic tasks. I don't so much mind having
to fix things. I do, however, detest losing all local accessibility in
"upgrades." I read that ZFS can help with this by letting me roll back
changes, but what's the user facing interface for this? Do I have to
reboot and select an item in an inaccessible boot menu, do I type a
command, what? And, if an upgrade breaks accessibility, can I store the
upgraded system's state, revert to an accessible system, then
periodically restore the upgrade and try resolving accessibility issues
while still keeping my old accessible system? I'm reading up on all of
this, I'm just wondering about the accessibility implications.
Also, what level of accessibility testing is done? It seems like certain
Linux distributions seriously break accessibility in their alphas and
betas, and while I understand what alpha and beta means, it seems like
many folks who don't need accessibility have fairly good luck using
them. It's one thing if your system mostly works sans an app or two that
suddenly crashes or acts up. It's another when, day to day, whether or
not the installation media is accessible or the resulting install/update
will speak is in flux.
Anyhow, as I've written, I'm reading up on all of this and attempting to
boot the live CD/install, but I'm having issues. Specifically, I
download the 2009.06 ISO and follow these instructions:
http://opensolaris.org/os/project/indiana/status/accessibility/AccessibleLiveCd/
but I encounter several issues. First, note that I don't seem to have an
enabled PC speaker and won't have anyone available to help dive into the
BIOS anytime soon, so I don't have the audible queues.
First I boot and see what appears to be a screen with a blue background.
I press down arrow 6-7 times, probably more since the menu doesn't wrap,
then press enter. Because I have no beeps, I press enter every minute or
two for the first few minutes...
..of what turns out to be a process that takes over a half hour. I hear
the drive spin, my speakers thump. I'm pretty sure I hear the laser, so
it isn't just spinning idly, but it takes forever. This is a fairly new
computer--as in, I've only had it for a week or so. Dual core Athlon
something-or-other, 3G of RAM, basically not the type of system I'd
expect to spend half an hour booting.
Eventually I hear the speakers thump again, the screen goes graphical
and I hear what sounds like a beep through my speakers. I can repeat the
beep if I press escape or enter. I wondered if perhaps this might be
speech getting chopped off, so I did things that would cause speech
after a short delay (I.e., insert-space to pull up the Orca preferences
dialog) but this does nothing. Alt-f2 doesn't appear to open a run
dialog, and typing in "gnome-terminal" after doing so doesn't open a
window. I press enter a few more times, thinking that maybe I'm still at
a boot prompt, but no luck.
Thoughts on what may be happening here?
Thanks.
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accessibility-discuss mailing list
accessibility-discuss at opensolaris dot org
http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/accessibility-discuss
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Posts:
118
From:
Registered:
4/3/06
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Re: [accessibility-discuss] Newbie accessibility questions
Posted:
Oct 15, 2009 7:11 AM
in response to: Nolan Darilek
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Hi Nolan:
> "upgrades." I read that ZFS can help with this by letting me roll back
> changes, but what's the user facing interface for this? Do I have to
> reboot and select an item in an inaccessible boot menu, do I type a
> command, what?
What I do is create a new boot environment. This new boot environment
shows up in my GRUB list and I can then choose it when rebooting. The
command for creating a new boot environment is "beadm", and what I do is
something like:
pfexec beadm create before-update
The string "before-update" can be whatever you want. When you do this,
beadm will create a new boot environment and "before-update" will be
available in your GRUB menu when you reboot. If you want to get tricky,
I believe you can edit /rpool/boot/grub/menu.lst to reorder the items in
the GRUB menu.
After doing the beadm command, you can then do an upgrade in the boot
environment that's currently active (i.e., the thing you booted into).
There are other more sophisticated ways of doing an upgrade, such as
creating a new environment and forcing the upgrade to upgrade to the new
environment without touching your current boot environment. It can be
useful, but the commands are cumbersome.
> And, if an upgrade breaks accessibility, can I store the
> upgraded system's state, revert to an accessible system, then
> periodically restore the upgrade and try resolving accessibility issues
> while still keeping my old accessible system? I'm reading up on all of
> this, I'm just wondering about the accessibility implications.
Yep. ZFS is absolutely awesome and gives you great confidence when it
comes to doing potentially destructive things to your machine.
> Also, what level of accessibility testing is done? It seems like certain
> Linux distributions seriously break accessibility in their alphas and
> betas, and while I understand what alpha and beta means, it seems like
> many folks who don't need accessibility have fairly good luck using
> them. It's one thing if your system mostly works sans an app or two that
> suddenly crashes or acts up. It's another when, day to day, whether or
> not the installation media is accessible or the resulting install/update
> will speak is in flux.
We try to be somewhat diligent about a11y testing with OpenSolaris.
Development periods are development periods, however, so there can be
instability during a development phase. The stable releases, however,
should have accessibility integrated well. OpenSolaris 2009.06 should
operate well.
Note that the current development releases have some issues and I hope
we resolve them by build 125, which is due out soon.
> but I encounter several issues. First, note that I don't seem to have an
> enabled PC speaker and won't have anyone available to help dive into the
> BIOS anytime soon, so I don't have the audible queues.
Darn.
> First I boot and see what appears to be a screen with a blue background.
> I press down arrow 6-7 times, probably more since the menu doesn't wrap,
> then press enter. Because I have no beeps, I press enter every minute or
> two for the first few minutes...
This is most likely the GRUB prompt. It sounds like you are doing the
right thing. After a few minutes (depending upon the speed of your
machine and your CD ROM), the background should go black. This is the
first prompt. You can just press return. Wait a few seconds for the
next prompt to appear and then press return.
> ..of what turns out to be a process that takes over a half hour. I hear
> the drive spin, my speakers thump. I'm pretty sure I hear the laser, so
> it isn't just spinning idly, but it takes forever. This is a fairly new
> computer--as in, I've only had it for a week or so. Dual core Athlon
> something-or-other, 3G of RAM, basically not the type of system I'd
> expect to spend half an hour booting.
Very odd. It shouldn't take a 1/2 hour.
> Eventually I hear the speakers thump again, the screen goes graphical
> and I hear what sounds like a beep through my speakers. I can repeat the
> beep if I press escape or enter. I wondered if perhaps this might be
> speech getting chopped off, so I did things that would cause speech
> after a short delay (I.e., insert-space to pull up the Orca preferences
> dialog) but this does nothing. Alt-f2 doesn't appear to open a run
> dialog, and typing in "gnome-terminal" after doing so doesn't open a
> window. I press enter a few more times, thinking that maybe I'm still at
> a boot prompt, but no luck.
>
> Thoughts on what may be happening here?
Which version have you downloaded?
Will
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accessibility-discuss mailing list
accessibility-discuss at opensolaris dot org
http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/accessibility-discuss
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