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Here's my latest update on Newton, the #Wayland-native, #Flatpak-friendly #accessibility project for the modern #FreeDesktop ecosystem, developed as part of @gnome and funded by @sovtechfund. It's not ready for production yet, but this blog post includes a demo video and links to GNOME OS and Flatpak runtime builds you can try. As a bonus, because I'm integrating #AccessKit into #GTK, GTK apps will finally have #a11y on Windows and macOS. blogs.gnome.org/a11y/2024/06/1…

Update on Newton, the Wayland-native accessibility project – GNOME Accessibility

blogs.gnome.org
#a11y #Accessibility #gtk #Flatpak #Wayland #accesskit #freedesktop @GNOME @Sovereign Tech Fund
in reply to Matt Campbell

Rule 34
Rule 34
• •

Awesome! This is incredibly needed! Thank you!

Any thoughts on when the voice stop hurting, though? I think if I had to listen to that thing all day my ears would start bleeding pretty quickly :/

I understand that is probably not your area, but maybe you have some insight into what work is being done there?

in reply to Rule 34

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
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@forteller Ha, I wondered if someone would complain about the use of eSpeak NG in the demo.

The Spiel project (project-spiel.org/), which also got some STF funding, is working on making it easy to install voices as Flatpak apps, and on distributing better voices. But that's not yet available on GNOME OS. So eSpeak NG was it.

Spiel: A Speech Framework for the Free Desktop and Beyond

project-spiel.org
@Rule 34
in reply to Rule 34

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
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@forteller eSpeak NG is more tolerable, even entirely acceptable for some of us, if you speed it up, but I knew I couldn't run the voice at the speed I typically use, when doing a demo for a mixed audience.
@Rule 34
in reply to Matt Campbell

Rule 34
Rule 34
• •

Sorry for bursting in on this fantastic stuff you're doing and demoing with a complaint! I just don't want my blind brothers and sisters in Linux/Gnome to also go deaf, you know? 😉

Thanks again! Happy to hear that there's work ongoing on the voice too!

in reply to Rule 34

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
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@forteller No problem, it's a valid concern. Really though, a lot of us who use this stuff every day are fine with eSpeak. I'm using it right now, by choice.
@Rule 34
in reply to Matt Campbell

Rule 34
Rule 34
• •
That sounds like some kind of Stockholm syndrome to me. But hey, as long as you and other users are happy, I'm happy! 😄
in reply to Matt Campbell

Hannes
Hannes
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@forteller I would love to see an audio snippet of how fast you usually have it.
@Rule 34
in reply to Hannes

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
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@13hannes11 @forteller mwcampbell.us/audio/espeak-ng-…
@Rule 34 @Hannes
in reply to Matt Campbell

Lorenz
Lorenz
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@13hannes11 @forteller wtf, that would take me years to get used to. Really amazing. Is that a big UI with many widgets, or just a lot of text in it?
@Rule 34 @Hannes
in reply to Lorenz

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
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@lw64 @13hannes11 @forteller That particular audio sample I sent was just a passage of text, a comment that I wrote on a Hacker News comment thread a few years ago.
@Lorenz @Rule 34 @Hannes
in reply to Matt Campbell

Lorenz
Lorenz
• •
@13hannes11 @forteller still amazing, and at that speed you can read a text? that seems much faster than how I read a text (with eyes)
@Rule 34 @Hannes
in reply to Matt Campbell

Ivan Molodetskikh
Ivan Molodetskikh
• •
fantastic work! Is there any guide or pointers on what I should do if I want to try adding this into my compositor? I have no existing a11y integration and very little clue of how it is supposed to work.
in reply to Ivan Molodetskikh

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
• •
@YaLTeR It might be a bit too soon to add this to another compositor. The protocol isn't stabilized yet, so I would like to keep the freedom to make breaking changes to the whole stack for a little longer.
@Ivan Molodetskikh
in reply to Matt Campbell

James Scholes
James Scholes
• •
Not to diminish the Linux side of things as the primary beneficiary of this work, but are there any demos of a Windows screen reader working with a GTK application? Or, a documented method I can follow to try such a thing?
in reply to James Scholes

Matt Campbell
Matt Campbell
• •
@jscholes Not yet. It wouldn't be hard to record a demo, but I'll see if I can package up something that people can play with.
@James Scholes
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