Gemini Live Camera Stream and Screen Sharing Impressions: Is Gemini Ready to Be the AI Assistant for the Blind? accessibleandroid.com/gemini-l…

David Goldfield reshared this.

in reply to David Goldfield

So I honestly think it could make a great light-us emachine. I have not tried JAWS on it, but NVDA runs pretty well. I can certainly tell it has a lower-end processor, but if you splurge, there's one with ahigher-end process for $400. I almost picked that one, but was a little hesitant to spend that much on a hobby. I will also say it doesn't seem to get very hot. It lives in my master closet so I don't interact with it much, but I have gone in to check it, and it isn't hot to the touch.

Hi all! Good news — Google has decided to restore the permissions to our #Android app so we can bring back the full file syncing functionality. Expect a test tonight and final later this or early next week. Thanks a lot for your support, it is what made all the difference!

#PowerOfCommunity

arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/0…

Postboxes Version 1.1


The Postbox and Zen Postbox add-ons have been updated with a bunch of new styles!

* Solid Colors renamed to match HTML color names
* 24 new solid colors added
* 5 new gradient backgrounds added
* 17 new pattern backgrounds added
* 11 animated backgrounds added
* Fixed the load order so it overrides Postbox styles in Bookface if present

The previous solid color names have been mapped to the new ones, so any existing Postboxes in your feed using the old names will still look good.

Solid Color Postbox Options

The gradient backgrounds were ones that got missed from the initial release and are similar to the ones Facebook used to offer.

Postbox Gradient Background Options


The pattern backgrounds all use pure CSS, no images, so they will render fast and do not incur an additional resource load from the server.

Postbox Pattern Backgrounds.

The animated backgrounds are exclusively available on servers that use either of the two add-ons. None of the animated styles are included in the Bookface scheme because some of them use SVG images. They use pure CSS animation as well, no JS code or animated GIF images.

Postbox animated backgrounds.

Notice how I said the gradients were similar to the ones Facebook used to offer? Shortly after I introduced Postboxes to Friendica the backgrounds on Facebook were coincidentally(?) completely overhauled. IMO Friendica now has a nicer selection anyway and even Facebook doesn’t offer animated post backgrounds.


Zen Postbox (Adds a style button to the post Composer):
gitlab.com/randompenguin/zen_p…

Postbox (Just adds the styles, you need to manually type BBcode):
gitlab.com/randompenguin/postb…

#Friendica #Postboxes #add-on @Friendica Support @Friendica Admins

in reply to Pygoscelis Papua

Note: These styles ONLY work on Friendica and only if the viewer is using Bookface 1.7 or either of these add-ons is enabled, and the animated backgrounds only work with the add-ons. For most other platforms (Mastodon, Bluesky, etc.) they'll just see the content inside the postbox. However you should know there are still issues with Postbox posts shared to either Diaspora or Hubzilla.
in reply to Pygoscelis Papua

You can see a live demo of the animated ones here: randompenguin1.github.io/sampl…

They are coded to stop animating when you hover or touch them, adopting a default appearance. I did it that way because "animation-play-state" is still a bit unreliable and I liked the idea of them having a "poster" state rather than just pausing at where ever they were in the animation loop.

Bookface Version 1.7 Release



These are the changes and fixes in this release:

* Restyled “New Message” button to make it more obvious.
* Fixed Profile Pics and Cover Photos not working in old iOS browsers
* Moved Postbox styles to the end of the stylesheet
* Minified Postbox CSS.
* Restyled Item Responses
* Action Buttons you’ve interacted with before now adopt accent color.
* Fix for disabled Action Buttons to make it clear they are disabled.
* Fixed issue with slow-loading secondary toolbar in Safari
* Updated with Postbox version 1.1 styles
— names of solid colors now match HTML color names
— 24 new solid colors
— 5 new gradient backgrounds
— 17 new pattern backgrounds

Some of these will be fairly obvious. The big one is that the Action Buttons below posts and comments used to change to the accent color on hover and there was no indicator if you’d previously interacted with any of them. NOW they have a slight shift in darkness/lightness on hover and the accent color indicates you’ve previously clicked the Like, Dislike, Share, or Event buttons (the exceptions being Comment or Quote). If a post's scope is limited (not public) the "Share" and "Quote" buttons are now obviously disabled by being faded out.


Action Buttons with accent color indicating previous interaction.


Engagement Counts also now show an icon indicating the type of engagement, which should make it easier to see what kind of engagement a post or comment is getting. And if there are 2+ the individuals are revealed in a pop-over box rather than pushing the entire layout down.

Engagement counts with icons and detail pop-over

The new Postbox pattern backgrounds are done with pure CSS, no images! So they’ll load and display fast and don’t incur additional server calls. Postboxes are just a nice looking way to dress up your text-only posts. Of course only Friendica users will see them, and only if they are using the Bookface scheme or their instance has installed one of the Postbox add-ons. The styling doesn’t transfer to other platforms (Note: there are still issues with Postbox posts shared to Diaspora and Hubzilla).

The new Postbox Pattern Backgrounds


Thank you to everyone who gave me feedback, reported issues, and tested things for me to help improve Bookface for everyone. :D

#Friendica #Bookface @Friendica Support @Friendica Admins

Server Styles:
gitlab.com/randompenguin/bookf…

User Styles:
gitlab.com/randompenguin/users…

This entry was edited (7 months ago)

Be My Eyes and Innosearch Join Forces to Bring Seamless, AI-Powered eCommerce to Blind and Low Vision Users

‍Be My Eyes announced today – on Global Accessibility Awareness Day – a strategic alliance with Innosearch.ai, an AI-powered eCommerce portal. The alliance will provide super-accessible online shopping to the users of the Be My Eyes app,, without the clutter and noise present of many other websites.

Be My Eyes users will benefit from an exclusive 2% cashback credit into their Innosearch account for use against future purchases made through the Be My Eyes app. The service is currently available in the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia, with more regions to follow.

The alliance represents a significant step and new direction for Be My Eyes, as it lays the foundations of the Be My Eyes app and the underlying technology platform becoming the de-facto access-tech of choice for people who are blind or have low vision, wherever they are – at home, at work or at play.

bemyeyes.com/news/be-my-eyes-t…
#globalaccessibilityawearnessday
#gaad #a11y #bemyeyes #innosearchai #innosearch #blind #shopping #disability #assistivetech

Big news for #GAAD2025! 🎉 Accessible online shopping is now built into the Be My Eyes app, thanks to our collab with InnoSearch AI.

Shop products, book travel, earn 2% cash back.

No fees, no barriers. Just tap + shop! 🛒

bemyeyes.com/news/be-my-eyes-t…

#BeMyEyes #AccessibleTech

Netflix will show generative AI ads midway through streams in 2026.

It says it is testing the types of advertisements its subscribers are willing to endure. If you want to opt out you have to pay more money.

The enshittening of Netflix is almost complete

arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/0…

This entry was edited (7 months ago)

Čerstvý NMS Market Research posílá za mimo Sněmovnu Motoristy i hnutí Stačilo. V pásmu ohrožení jsou i přes mírný růst Piráti.

ANO zaznamenalo solidní návrat +2,2
Spolu je na nejlepším výsledku letos 21.7
SPD upevňuje pozici na 13,7
STAN si vybral velkou oddechovku a klesl během 2 měsíců o 4 pb z 13,9 na 9,9
Piráti vyrovnali letošní maximum 6,1
Motoristé podruhé s nemalým poklesem, nyní až mimo Sněmovnu na únorová čísla
Stačilo poprvé měřeno pod 5% hranicí

This probably has to be the worst speech synth of all time! It's called JS1k (JavaScript 1 KB), it's web-based, formant synthesis method, completely monotone, sample rate is 8 kHz, has very rough phoneme transitions, a terrible formant filter, and is entirely phonetic (i.e. you have to enter the phonemes in, so it's not doing actual standard English text-to-speech conversion). I'm glad this will not be one that us screen readers will ever use! If you don't understand what it's saying, the sample says, This is a speech synthesizer in one k, type any text and press enter.

Today in the iOS app store in the Today tab, I encounter a heading with the title
Accessibility Awareness, the Best Accessible Apps and Games, Curated by App Store Editors

I swipe right and what do I then encounter?
Six separate buttons, all labeled "App Suggestion" with no accessible titles.
So, VoiceOver users just hear "app suggestion, button", "app suggestion, button", "app suggestion, button" ...
I have reported this to Apple Accessibility.
Happy Global Accessibility Awareness Day.

This entry was edited (7 months ago)

reshared this

The European Accessibility Act (EAA) is coming — is your website ready?
Accessibility expert Annelies Verhelst breaks down how you can get your WordPress site compliant in less than 3 weeks at #WCEU2025.
Whether you're a developer, site owner, or agency, this practical, fast-track session is your roadmap to action. #WordPress #a11y #a11yEvents
europe.wordcamp.org/2025/sessi…

Measles case confirmed on board plane from Turkey to Montreal

montreal.citynews.ca/2025/05/1…

Masking is not just for COVID. And vax your spawn. It's not a personal choice.

Today is Global #accessibility awareness day and I think I speak for a lot of people in the community when I say I'm tired. Particularly over the last few months, the overall climate towards accessibility and #diversity hasn't been super welcoming and while I have a good support network that can remind me that I am, in fact, human and worth existing, many do not. If you receive a request to make something #accessible, from anyone, keep in mind that may very well be the 5th, 10th or even 100th attempt this person has made today at screaming into the void hoping to be seen as a person rather than a potential drain on resources. Rather tna big companies showing off #AI gizmos that mean we've offloaded a problem we didn't want to deal with onto a fallible set of algorithms, maybe #gaad should be about being aware of how ridiculous it is that accessibility professionals and consumers need to fight to even be seen as human these days, because make no mistake, we do.

reshared this

in reply to Florian

Agreed with this. I really wasn't that impressed with Google's announcements this time around, not doing much to move the needle. Apple, on the other hand, actually had stuff that would likely be useful to more people, and while they have their problems, I think in general they have a better understanding of the challenges disabled people face on a daily basis, rather than trying to make everything about AI solving issues most of us didn't really have in the first place.

Linux 6.15 is right around the corner, which means it's time for another progress report! We have been pretty busy behind the scenes and we have some exciting developments to share with you all!

As always, we want to thank everyone who support us as none of this would be possible without your generous support.

asahilinux.org/2025/05/progres…

Today is the day for a new release! This one comes with:

- Added toggle for enhanced text size
- Better unifiedPush support
- Improvements to Iceshrimp by Jacocococo
- A bunch of small fixes and improvements

Download it at github.com/LucasGGamerM/moshid…

#Moshidon

This entry was edited (7 months ago)

Blind software developers on fedi, I have a question!

Have you used GDB? and if so, do you still use it? I'd love to hear experiences from blind users because I can't tell how good or bad our interface is for users.

For more context, GDB is the main debugger (that I know of, at least) for C, C++, Rust, Ada and Fortran. If you used a debugger for a program in one of those, you probably used GDB with maybe some interface on top.

Because GDB is all text based, I'd think it could reasonably well suited for blind users, but I'm sure being accessible isn't as easy as "the text is there" so I'd love to hear the experience of blind users!

I tried searching online but couldn't find any experiences from GDB users specifically (only general tool advice from coding with eyes closed), so direct experience would be appreciated!

Boosts are welcome!

Peter Vágner reshared this.

Lightweight open source Google reCaptcha alternative: ALTCHA leverages a proof-of-work mechanism to safeguard your website, APIs, and online services from spam and abuse. Unlike traditional solutions, ALTCHA is self-hosted, does not rely on cookies or fingerprinting, and ensures complete user privacy. It is fully compliant with GDPR, WCAG 2.2 AA-level, and the European Accessibility Act. github.com/altcha-org/altcha

#privacy #webdev #security #opensource

This entry was edited (7 months ago)