Re: [orca-list] Web site comments (Webaim survey)

[Zahari Yurukov <zahari yurukov gmail com>]

Hi,
Yeah, I've learned about the survey from Twitter, but I also recieved an
e-mail from AISquaired (I've subscribed for something in the past),
inviting me to participate in the same survey, so I won't be surprized
if Window-eyes scores a very high percent.
Linux has 20 year history in accessibility (first Emacspeak, then
Speak-Up, then Orca, activly developed for all those years, and this is
only part of the technologies making it possible), so it is not fair
placing it in the "Other" category, and briefly mentioning it like "John
doe also stars".
Besides, There are thousands of people using only the blind-specific
distros, and this is not so much of a requirement to be a screen reader
user under Linux, not to mention that there are many low vision users
who only use magnifiers, so the count of vissually impaired people using
Linux every day could very well be above 10000 (I'm not mentioning the
people who have only tried Linux a time or two, BTW the Vinux 4 alone
has above 10k downloads).
I.e. I'm much more concerned that Linux is not recognized as a viable
platform for accessibility, which I disagree. And that's the general
impression which not only the web developers, but the participents in
the survey will get.
Yeah, we're a tiny percent of all users, but Linux is not some exotic
OS, which was born yesterday and will die tomorrow, and the
participation of the app developers is very important for the
accessibility, so we can't let them ignore us.

I agree with the person, who said that many people are unaware about the
accessibility options under Linux - that's where we could help.
I also think though, that we need more developers working on the
accessibility stack, which means we need some money to support that.
Unfortunately, a direct donation to this projects is not possible as far
as I know and also for unknown reasons.

I don't think every single Linux distribution should be accessible out
of the box - that's what a distribution is: a package of software
targeted at specific needs, though if one distribution is marketed as
mainstream, it should provide access for people with dissabilities - and
we have that, more or less. We also have few distros targeted at
vissually impaired users, which are somewhat different one from another,
and those should pritty much satisfy most people.

Linux of course is very different from other operating systems, and many
Windows users fail to understand that. Having many distributions is
indeed a strenth, rather than a weekness, and the fans of the big
corporations also fail to understand that.
It surely has some impact on the accessibility experiance, but I think
it is much more lack of knolage.
So I think that the documentation should be improved too, both for end
users and developers. Looking at the source code of course is an option,
but I don't think many people will want to do that just to get started
(and it will take them much more time if they do).

One thing that the community could easyly handle are the translations. A
software, translated in your own language, is much more pleasant to work
with, especially for a screen reader user.
So if Orca isn't translated in your language, or the translation isn't
frequently updated - step up and handle the translation - I'm sure that
you'll be much more satisfied Orca user after that, and you'll even
learn a thing or two about Orca you haven't known before in the process.
 GNOME has many modules, and some of them may need translating too.
Actually, from accessibility standpoint, you'll need also ATK, GTK+ and
WEBKIT.

Although the cost is part of the equation, don't look at Linux just as a
free alternative, but instead as an ecosystem which is transparant and
thus secure, a system which respects your privasy, and system you can
learn from.

Talking about web accessibility, I realy think that should be
cross-platform, and should be based on standards, not on individual
screen readers. So we should thank Joanie for her participation on that
front.
As far as the browsers are concerned, Mozilla are doing a very good job
for us in Firefox, so we should thank them too.
Google have many work to do, not only under Linux, but also under
Windows, and that's really a shame for a multibilion dolar company, who
does so much talking recently.
The individual web developers are hardest to convinse here, and that's
as I understand the goals of WEBAIM, which of course is good, except
they won't even consider testing under Linux now.
Let's hope they'll take a note this time, cause the world is not only
Apple, google and Microsoft.

Best wishes,
Zahari


На 27.07.2015 в 22:21, Alex Midence написа:
> Dear Jared,
>
> I thank you for your gracious and comprehensive response below and your courteous invitation to share this 
> with the Orca community at large.   Since I happen to be the driving force behind the "active recruitment" 
> you mentioned on the Orca list, I feel it necessary to inform you that I myself would never have known of 
> your survey had it not been for Window Eyes (my secondary work screenreader) having some sort of built-in 
> pop-up script that directed me to your site each and every single time I launched it.  I finally broke down 
> and took it after the third day so I could get it to go away.  Seeing as how Window Eyes now comes free to 
> anyone who has a license for Microsoft Office 2010 or higher, you wanna talk about active recruitment, that 
> will certainly drive the numbers much higher than they otherwise would've been.  my modest message to the 
> Orca list and a few other Linux lists informing them of its existence on the very last day it could be 
> filled out is hardly indicativ
 e of acti
ve recruitment.  You are right though to consider the numbers inaccurate since they would've been somewhat 
higher had I posted my suggestion sooner.  I know this because of a number of respondents tried to take the 
survey only to find that it had been closed.  I am going to take this opportunity to make a suggestion to the 
Orca developer and anyone else in the community with the necessary programming skills to add a similar script 
to Orca so that our user community is better represented in these sorts of things.  
> Thanks again for your response and enjoy the rest of your day.
> Alex Midence
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jared Smith [mailto:jared webaim org] 
> Sent: Monday, July 27, 2015 1:40 PM
> To: Alex Midence
> Subject: Re: Web site comments
>
> Yes, I'm familiar with the Orca screen readers. We do not list all possible screen readers in the list of 
> possible choices for simplicity's sake. There are many dozens of different screen readers (see 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_screen_readers) and it would be unusable to everyone to try to sort 
> through all of them. We don't, for example, list every possible browser or mobile device out there. We only 
> list the most common options. I can assure you that this is not an effort to actively ignore or dismiss 
> Linux users. In early surveys we did list Orca as an option, but the number of respondents that indicated 
> using it was extremely low, so we removed it from the list - again, not because we don't care about it, but 
> to make things more accessible to respondents.
>
> In taking a quick look at our responses from this survey, only around 1% of respondents were on Linux and 
> only 18 (.6%) indicated using Orca in the comments. And this number is perhaps inaccurately high due to the 
> active recruitment on the Orca mailing lists to get users to complete the survey so that Orca could be 
> better represented. Of note is that despite this usage of both is lower than on previous surveys.
> If we had listed Orca as an option to choose from, it would not have provided very useful information 
> anyway - knowing whether Orca is used by a minimum of .6% or a maximum of 1% of respondents would have 
> virtually no impact on development practices.
>
> I appreciate your comments. And you are welcome to share my response with the broader Orca community.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Jared Smith
> WebAIM.org
>
> On Mon, Jul 27, 2015 at 12:07 PM, Alex Midence <alex midence gmail com> wrote:
> > Sent from the WebAIM website at 6:07 PM, July 27th, 2015:
> >
> > Hi.
> >
> > I'm writing this to you in an effort to build awareness of our screen 
> > reader community.  I recently took your survey on screen reader accessibility and noticed that the screen 
> > reader I use at home was missing from the list of choices.  I have been a user of the Orca screen reader 
> > for Linux for five years now.  Recent improvements to the Linux accessibility stack have resulted in a 
> > large number of new users to this accessibility solution particularly in the last 2 years.  Distributions 
> > like Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian and Archlinux now come with accessibility built-in out of the box.  All a new 
> > user has to do is hold down a hotkey combination prior to installation and the operating system gets put 
> > on their machine complete with screen reader right from the get-go without assistance from non-disabled 
> > persons.  Couple this with a free price tag and you have a very attractive solution for a segment of the 
> > population which is typically unable to afford some of the higher end screen rea  ders out there like Jaws 
> > and Window-eyes nor are they often able 
 to afford
 or willing to pay for Windows or Mac machines since many are on fixed incomes or student salaries.  So, 
where once it was a viable solution to the extremely technically savvy, Linux has now become a very 
attractive solution to many screen reader users all around the world.  This is especially true in India, 
South Africa, Brazil and other parts of latin America, Europe and Asia.  Whould would you need to see in 
order to justify mentioning the Orca screen reader and screen magnifier in your future surveys? the usual 
browser of choice for such users  is Firefox although lots of work has been going into making Epiphany,  a 
webkit-based browser for the Gnome desktop an accessible alternative.  An answer would be immensely 
appreciated and will be greatly anticipated.
> > Yours truly,
> > Alex Midence
> > Orca user
> > Alex Midence gmail com
> > Orca community member:
> > Orca-list gnome org
> > https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/orca-list