[Hudlug] changing to linux

[Ben Fowler]

On 01/09/06, MICHAEL WEAVER <michaelweaver1 at btinternet.com> wrote:
> ...
> For example a lot of my time is spent on the Internet so I need a good
> web browser which will work in preferably both shell and graphical
> environments as I know text browsers are not as up to date and can be
> limited to the pages they will launch.

    Believe it or not some people still use plain text browsers. These
can count for as
    much as half a percent of hits on a site, depending on the nature
of the site. The
    main plain text browsers in use today seem to be lynx, links and w3m.

http://librenix.com/?inode=2202

I am still very fond of Lynx, exempli gratia:

    Lynx was once popular with visually-impaired users, but better screen
    readers have since reduced the appeal of Lynx to this user group.

http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/resources/webbrowser.xml#body.1_div.6 ,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynx_(web_browser) , and
http://leb.net/blinux/blynx/

    BLYNX: Lynx Support Files Tailored for Blind and Visually Handicapped
    Users

> I can cover something like this with Firefox and maybe links and as a

Actually, although Firefox does have some accessibility features, it
does not use GTK/Gnome widgets, so does not communicate throught the
Gnome accessibility layer to Orca. I am not sure whether it is the
Orca folk or the Firefox team who need to research this and develop
something, but you might want to make Firefox a second choice at this
stage, and wait to see what other people do,

There is a bowser called "links" and it is a good one:
http://artax.karlin.mff.cuni.cz/~mikulas/links/ but I can't say
whether or not it is the first choice for accessibility. Another is
Diilo. I would have thought that the main criteria would be the
ability to switch into screen-reader mode instantly, and the ability
to control the browser, fully, using the keyboard.

> last resort by a browser that works in Emacs if I have to learn Emacs.

If you are an emacs guy, then emacs is the first resort not the last.
It has many advantages in this context.

> I need something for email and News so I suppose that would be covered
> by Evolution or again something else maybe even one from the shell again.

emacs or mutt. I like mutt.

    The mutt slogan is "All mail clients suck. This one just sucks
less". The authors of
    mutt claim that while all e-mail clients are flawed, mutt has
fewer flaws than any of
    the competition. The application of "foo sucks less" has been
observed making its way
    into mainstream hacker jargon as a form of compliment.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutt_(e-mail_client) . It is the mongrel
of mailers. a dog in world in which most porgrams are named after
trees.

> At some point I hope to create my own web page so I need something I can
> use that is equivalent in Linux which would cover a Windows application.

Which windows program?

You would be best off starting writing pages with vi, gedit or of
course emacs and once you have gained some confidence find out what
other people are using.

> The same for FTP.

At this stage, very definitely use the command line.

> If I decide to do messenging I need something that will work for that
> for example Gaim.

I don't know much about IM, but I think that gaim should be fine.

> ...I don't want to go into an application area and find
> there isn't a Linux Screenreader accessable alternative to an
> application that would work with a screenreader under Windows.

Right, but Orca plugs into the GTK accessibility layer, and anything
that GTK can render visually to the screen, Orca can read to you.

Note: Some of these points are also on the wiki, exempli gratia
http://www.hudlug.org.uk/wiki/News_and_Notes:Assistive

Ben.