Speakup (Re: Ubuntu Accessibility)

[Luke Yelavich]

On Tue, Nov 09, 2004 at 10:39:18AM EST, Matt Zimmerman wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 08, 2004 at 04:18:36PM +0000, Henrik Nilsen Omma wrote:
> > I'm copying in Luke Yelavich who knows more about provisions for the 
> > blind than I do, and the development list where features for the next 
> > release are being discussed. We do currently have the gnopernicus screen 
> > reader available in Ubuntu, but I get the impression that the 
> > console-based speakup is actually the preferred solution for most people.
> > 
> > You would obviously prefer that speakup was included in the stock kernel 
> > by default, but others might be weary of feature creep. You say that the 
> > speakup patch is small, how much does it affect overall performance and 
> > stability?
> 
> Here are some rules of thumb that we've applied so far for kernel patches:
> 
> - The patch must be actively maintained

That it is. The most current version is CVS, but the lsat release does 
not work with 2.6 kernels. 2.0 is supposed to be released soon, but when 
that is exactly, I am unsure.

> - If the patch is safe and unintrusive relative to existing functionality
>   (e.g., adding a driver), this is much preferred

It can be either in the kernel or as a module. When it is in the kernel, 
it allows anybody using Speakup with a hardware speech synthesizer to 
hear all kernel boot messages, kernel panics, filesystem checks, etc. 
For hardware synth owners, this is what they would want.

> - We much prefer patches which are on track to be merged into Linux mainline
>   (Linus' tree).  Patches which have been rejected upstream due to being the
>   wrong solution to the problem, for example, are generally unacceptable

I am unsure whether it was submitted upstream, but I don't think so, 
purely because not many people need it.

If you don't want to patch it into the main Ubuntu kernel, I am happy to 
make speakup-modified versions for others, although this is a little 
more work.

Hope this helps.

Luke