accessibility & ubuntu

[Luke Yelavich]

On Sun, Feb 19, 2006 at 06:19:52PM EST, Melissa Draper wrote:
> Greetings,
> 
> A few hours ago in the IRC #ubuntu channel, a vision impaired individual
> asked whether if there was any word-processor type packages that were
> more user-friendly for vision-impaired people than OpenOffice or
> Abiword. This person was directed to consult the development team in the
> #ubuntu-devel channel about possible remedies, and was not taken
> seriously due to a comment he had made earlier in the #ubuntu channel.
> 
> First off, I would like to mention that I am aware of the port of Hoary
> to be accessible approximately a year ago, even before my involvement
> with Ubuntu began (see here). I am also aware that there is an
> accessibility team (see here) - although it does not seem to have much
> of a presence either in the forums or in the freenode IRC network.

You will find that just about all, if not most seasoned contributers and 
developers prefer to use mailing lists, as they tend to be a lot more 
efficient, due to the fact that when one checks their mail, any posts of 
interest are right there in their mail box, which they can reply to 
quickly. As for visibility in the community, there is indeed an IRC 
channel, #ubuntu-accessibility, although it is rather quiet.

The accessibility team is also made up of contributers/developers who 
also help in other areas of Ubuntu, so are unable to devote as much time 
as they would like to the team, which includes helping users with 
problems, etc. As for the forums, I personally would try and frequent 
them as much as I possibly could, if there was a forum dedicated to 
accessibility.

> I am not visually-impaired, but nonetheless believe that this issue is
> something that should be taken seriously. Vision impairment is something
> that will strike many of us eventually, and it is unfortunate that some
> people aquire this problem earlier than others.

I myself have a vision impairement, and am lucky to know enough 
to get a Linux system set up for myself with accessibility. I share your 
thoughts re accessibility, however it is an area of software development 
and usability that is often overlooked. We as a team are certainly 
trying to address this.

> As an outsider, I would like to make a few suggestions:
> 
> - Forum: I believe it would be highly beneficial for there to be a
> sub-forum somewhere for people to post accessibility howtos, and for
> interested/affected people to ask questions and offer suggestions to
> each other.

If people have howtos, they are welcome to contribute to the wiki. There 
is information on the wiki about Ubuntu's Accessibility at 
http://wiki.ubuntu.com/Accessibility. As for the forums, see above for 
my view on this.

> - IRC: This would be mainly beneficial for walk-ins, such as the
> individual tonight, where they can ask a question to people who can help
> them.

Again, see above.

> I would also like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the
> accessibility team for all their hard work. Although I have not the need
> for their efforts at this time, one day, I may.

Thanks for the suport. We are trying as much as we can to get some form 
of accessibility included in the next release, however even this is 
becoming increasingly difficult, as we are waiting for a responce about 
a couple of issues from people higher up in the distro team, which 
hasn't happened yet, and feature freeze is less than a week away.

If you frequent IRC, please feel free to drop into #ubuntu-accessibility 
and give me a prod. If I am around, I will be more than happy to answer 
any questions you may have, or make a note/discuss any suggestions you 
might have.

Thanks once again for taking the time out to send us an email.
-- 
Luke Yelavich
GPG key: 0xD06320CE 
	 (http://www.themuso.com/themuso-gpg-key.txt)
Email & MSN: themuso at themuso.com
ICQ: 18444344
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