Archive for the ‘Accessible Applications’ Category

TTYtter, an Awesome Console Based Twitter Client

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

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TTYtter is a great command line Twitter client. To get it up and running to its optimal capabilities can take a little work, especially if you would like to get pop up notifications on your desktop with libnotify. So, here is a guide that will show you how to get it all working. Even if you are normally a GUI only sort of person I would still like to suggest you give it a try. TTYtter is my favorite Twitter client. These instructions work on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic and later and should work on other systems with minimal modification.
To install TTYtter with readline support and get the curl package open terminal and type:
sudo apt-get install libterm-readline-perl-perl curl
Now, to download the file:
sudo wget --output-document /usr/bin/ttytter http://www.floodgap.com/software/ttytter/dist1/1.1.03.txt
sudo chmod 755 /usr/bin/ttytter
If you do not have system wide access save it to ~/bin/ttytter instead of /usr/bin/ttytter and use chmod 700 instead of 755. It may be necessary to create the ~/bin directory.
Note that the version of TTYtter may have changed. If you have any trouble with the instructions, visit http://www.floodgap.com/software/ttytter/dl.html and check the version number. If it is different replace the number in the instructions with the new one.
TTYtter is now installed but missing some of its coolness. If you were to launch it by typing:
ttytter
You would have to also include some arguments to get it going like your username and password. It’s much better to save this information in a ~/.ttytterrc file. So, here is the ultimate .ttytter file. The slowpost setting is set to 7 seconds to give screen readers time to read the tweet before it is posted. If you don’t need/use a screen reader you can lower the number or remove the line altogether. If you do not plan to use the notifications with libnotify you can leave out the notification lines too. Copy and paste the following in to a file called .ttytterrc
#TTYtter settings
mentions=1
avatar=eog %U
urlopen=firefox %U
pause=auto
ansi=1
vcheck=1
hold=15
newline=1
slowpost=7
readline=1
wrap=1
notifytype=libnotify
notifies=dm,me,reply,search,default
#end TTYtter settings
To enable notifications takes a little more work. The notify-send package is available from the repository, but for some reason a patch that
adds required functionality has not been added in to the distributed version. So, instead of using the standard package, we have to roll our own. If you are not sure if you already have it installed, in terminal type:
sudo apt-get remove libnotify-bin
To build the libnotify-bin package and apply the patch type the following in terminal:
cd
apt-get source libnotify-bin
sudo apt-get install gtk-doc-tools
sudo apt-get build-dep libnotify
then visit http://trac.galago-project.org/attachment/ticket/147/notify-send-support_body_from_file.patch and at the bottom of the page where it says "Download in other formats" click on the "Original Format" link. After the file has finished downloading:
cd libnotify-0.4.5/
The number in the directory name above may change as new versions are released. If you type libnotify and press tab it should complete the name, then press enter to get in to the directory. Then, apply the patch. My files save in ~/Downloads if your files download to another location you will need to alter the path in the next command to point to the downloaded file:
patch -p0 < ../Downloads/notify-send-support_body_from_file.patch
./autogen.sh
make
sudo make install
I had to restart before notifications worked as expected. Now TTYtter is installed and should work with its ultimate coolness factors enabled. Enjoy, but be warned, TTYtter will be your new favorite Twitter client after five minutes of use. For instructions check out http://www.floodgap.com/software/ttytter/.

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Commanding the Command Line (Part 2)

Sunday, January 17th, 2010

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This is part two of a discussion of accomplishing your hearts desire with out the use of a GUI. It’s back to the console for us as we dive in to such fun things as web browsing, instant messaging, and text editing.

Instant Messaging with Finch

Pidgin and Finch are closely connected. finch is the command line version of Pidgin. So, the way I handle setting up accounts is with Pidgin. Then, in the console launch by typing finch. The first time you run it you will be presented with the accounts list. Use highlight tracking in Speakup because it works better with Finch. Press space on each account you want activated. Move through them with the up and down arrow keys. When you activate an account it will say X to show that it is checked. When you have activated all of your accounts, press alt+a to be taken in to a menu with items like buddy list, plugins, sounds, etc. Select the sound option and tab until you find the first sound option, probably "Someone says your name in chat". Press space to check each item for which you would like to have sound. Use the up and down arrows to navigate the list. After selecting the sounds you want, press alt+a to get back to the menu. I must say that I have never successfully gotten sounds to work in Finch but I know people who have, so it’s just my problem apparently. Select Plugins and check the plugins you would like to activate. Most of the plugins that work in Pidgin also work in Finch. This is a good time to mention my favorite sets of plugins. Some of these only work with Pidgin, but I will include them anyway. Pidgin-musictracker displays your currently playing track in Pidgin. Pidgin-plugin-pack, lots and lots of useful plugins. Pidgin-mbpurple, adds Twitter and a couple of other things to Pidgin. To get them all:
sudo apt-get install pidgin-plugin-pack pidgin-musictracker pidgin-mbpurple
When you have the plugins configured the way you want them, press alt+a to get back to the menu. If you are not on your list of groups that contain your contacts, press tab until you get to it. Only buddies who are on-line will show up. To expand a group press space and to close it press space again on the group title. If you press f10 you will get another menu with things like add buddy in it. If you would like to turn off time stamps, while chatting with someone press f10 and press enter on show time stamps. To exit Finch press alt+q.

Web Browsing with Elinks

To get elinks, in Ubuntu, type:
sudo apt-get install elinks
When you first install Elinks, it takes some configuring to get it working optimally with Speakup or any other console screen reader. To launch it type:
elinks
If it is the first time you will get a welcome message. Press enter to go to the next screen. Here it will ask for a URL. Press escape to get into its menus. In Speakup, it is a good idea to turn on highlight tracking if you haven’t already. Press right arrow to get to the Setup menu, then down to Options Manager and press space to activate it

Numbered Links

Move down to Document and press space to activate it then down to browsing and press space again. Go down to links and press space. Move down through the menu until you find Numbered Links and press tab until you get to Edit then press enter. For some reason these selections do not read exactly right. when I was on the Edit option, for example, it said "Info Edit". Press backspace to remove the 0 and type the number 1 in its place and press enter. Now links on pages will be numbered. To activate a numbered link type its number and press enter then enter again to activate it.

Turn Off Frames

Press down arrow until you get to Html Rendering and press space. Go down to Show Frames and tab to the Edit option and press enter. Change the 1 to 0 and press enter.

Remember to Save

When you have finished setting options, be sure to save. Tab until you get to the save option and press enter. In this case, Speakup read it as "Search Save". You will know you did it right if you get a message about the configuration being written successfully.

Tips and Tricks

You can launch elinks with an address so when it opens you will go directly to a web page instead of having to type in the address. for example:
elinks http://www.stormdragon.us/
or:
elinks stormdragon.us
To enter a new URL press g. If you would like to be able to copy the current URL, press shift G. You can use screen’s excellent copy feature to get the current address.

Email with Alpine

To get Alpine, in Ubuntu, type:
sudo apt-get install alpine
To launch Alpine type:
alpine
the first time it runs it will create a mail folder and show you a welcome message. Press enter to get to the main menu, then s for setup and c for configure. If you want to use Alpine with your gmail account, there is an excellent guide that shows you how. If you get imap errors when trying to retrieve your email, open the .pinerc file and search for the line that reads:
inbox-path={imap.gmail.com/ssl/user=YourEmailAddress@gmail.com}
Remove any extra characters after the right brace } and save the file. It should now work correctly. Alpine works very well with Speakup and the menus are clear and not difficult to follow.

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Commanding the Command Line (Part 1)

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010

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In the event that you decide to, or for some reason have to go completely command line for a while, you will likely be wondering how to do certain things. There are some things that have to be done on any computer to make the computer in question worth it’s plastic. So, here is part one of a discussion on doing these important tasks from the command line. Some of this may be covered elsewhere here but I am including it again for the sake of completeness. To get to the console from gnome, press control+alt+f1 through f6. You have six consoles to choose from, but when you wanna go back to gnome, it is control+alt+f7. If you want to use the console you will need a screen reader for it like Speakup. For information on installing Speakup in Ubuntu read "Speakup Revisited".
If you are completely new to the command line, you can use these two tutorials to get started with it quickly:
Into the Linux Command Line Interface (CLI) and Introduction to Command Line Interface (CLI) 2.

Multiple Terminals With Screen

I am pretty sure that Ubuntu comes with screen installed. I don’t ever remember installing it, but it could have sneaked in as a dependency for something else though I doubt it. If you don’t have screen, you need it. To launch it, type screen. You will have to press enter after it starts to get your prompt back. Screen makes it so you can have several terminals all at once. To create a new one, press control+a followed by c. You can have as many as you want, one for music, one for email, one for instant messaging, etc. To switch between terminals, press control+a followed by n for the next one or p for the previous one. To close a terminal that you no longer need, type exit. Another great feature that screen has is the ability to copy and paste. When you need to copy something, press control+a followed by either the escape key or [. Use the arrow keys to position the cursor on the first of the text you would like to copy and press space. Find the last part you want to copy and position the cursor on it with the arrow keys and press space again. Now, when you need to past the copied information press control+a followed by the ] key.

Twitter From The Command Line

The program twidge is an excellent command line Twitter client. A lot of distros include it in the repositories. In Ubuntu, for example, you can get it by typing in terminal:
sudo apt-get install twidge
If your distro doesn’t include it you can download it from http://software.complete.org/software/projects/show/twidge.
After installing Twidge, you need to configure it. To do this, type:
twidge setup
There are only two questions and they should be very easy to answer. After twidge is configured, you can get the latest tweets very easily. First though, you should run:
twidge lsrecent -su
This gets the last 20 tweets and also sets a place marker so you won’t see them or anything before them if you do not wish to do so. After running this command, you can then get all new tweets by typing:
twidge lsrecent -asu
To post an update type twidge update and press enter. Type your update and press enter again, just remember not to go over the 140 character limit. For more detailed instructions on Twidge and its uses, type:
man twidge

Weather Information

I wrote an article on weather a while ago. There is a great program called weather-util for the console. To find out how to install and configure it, please read "…And Weather For All".

Command Line Music Player

I have tried several terminal based music players. None of them worked well with Speakup. I was about to lose hope in ever finding a good one to use with a screen reader when I heard of cmus. In Ubuntu, get it by typing:
sudo apt-get install cmus
Launch it with the command:
cmus
and close by typing:
:quit
After the first time you start and close the music player open the ~/.cmus/autosave file. Find the line that reads:
set softvol=false
Change it to true and save the file. softvol allows you to change the music players volume without changing volume for the whole computer. There are a lot of other settings that can be changed in this file including repeat and shuffle. To add music to the library use :add and the directory where the music is stored. You can use :a as a short cut if you prefer. To add all of the songs in ~/Music and its sub directories, for example, you would type:
:a ~/Music
Use – to decrease the volume and = to turn it up. Previous track is z, play is x, pause is c, stop is v, and next track is b. Use the up and down arrows to move through the tracks in your library and enter to play the currently selected song.. For more info on cmus, type man cmus.

Sox, the Swiss Army Knife of Sound Processing Utilities

Sox is one of my favorite command line programs. It can play audio, record, convert from one file type to another, and add effects to audio. Unfortunately it is not packaged with all of its powerful abilities enabled by default. The best way to deal with this little problem is to download and install it yourself. The only thing it is lacking is the ability to write mp3 files. It can play them, but by default, in Ubuntu and I assume other distros, it can not write mp3 files. So, if you do not care about this functionality, just do the normal sudo apt-get install sox. If you want to be able to convert to mp3, you will need to download it from http://sourceforge.net/projects/sox/ and install it. Before installing though, you will need to get some other libraries. In Ubuntu type:
sudo apt-get install libmp3lame0 libmp3lame-dev libsox-fmt-all
sudo apt-get build-dep sox
Next extract the sox files with the following command. The version may have changed after this writing, so be sure to use the current numbers in the file name:
tar xzvf sox-14.3.0.tar.gz
Change to the newly created directory with:
cd sox-14.3.0/
./configure –with-lame
make
sudo make install
For more information on the options that can be used when compiling sox read the included INSTALL file.
Sox can do so many different things that it would take a long time to write them all down here. Here are a few things to get you started though:
sox filename.wav filename.ogg
Convert filename from a wav to an ogg file. Don’t worry, it doesn’t delete the wav file. You can convert from any type to any other type of audio.
play filename.ogg
Plays a file it can have effects added and the volume can be adjusted as well.
rec filename.ogg
Creates a file and starts recording to it. for all of the incredible things sox can do, type man sox.

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Speakup Revisited

Monday, December 7th, 2009

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In Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic, the way speakup is installed has changed. You can still build it from source if you want, but now it is included in the repository. Here are the instructions for installing it. In terminal type:
sudo apt-get install speakup-source espeakup
After the packages have finished installing type the following:
sudo m-a a-i speakup-source
You may also want to install the speakup-tools package. To get it type:
sudo apt-get install speakup-tools
The method used to get speakup to start automatically has not changed. Just type:
sudo gedit /etc/modules
Move down to the end of the file and on a blank line add the following:
speakup_soft start=1
From then on, when you start your computer speakup will be running. The espeakup program also starts so you will have speech. You may want to change the voice to your language. To do so, in terminal type:
sudo gedit /etc/default/espeakup
Add your chosen voice to the end of the line that reads VOICE= like so:
VOICE=en-us
Now, it will speak your language.
Finally, the way you adjust speakup’s settings has changed slightly. From speaking with users of other distributions than Ubuntu, I have learned this is the way most if not all the rest of them were doing it. Here is an example of turning off key echo:
sudo echo 0 > /sys/accessibility/speakup/key_echo
To turn it back on change the 0 to a 1. For a list of things that can be changed type:
ls /sys/accessibility/speakup/
You can add the command to /etc/init.d/rc.local to have it automatically happen at start-up. To save all of your speakup settings, if you have the speakup-tools package installed, type:
speakupconf save
when you have everything set the way you want it. To get it to load at startup add the line:
speakupconf load
to the end of your ~/.bashrc file.
As said in the beginning of this article, this applies to Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic and possibly new versions of Ubuntu. If you are using an older version the following link will be more helpful:
http://stormdragon.us/?p=44

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GMA Games in Wine

Tuesday, June 16th, 2009

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Audio games available from GMA Games work very well in Wine. The one exception is "Shades of Doom" it works until you try to enter a door, then freezes. The only way to close it is to go to system monitor and end the process. The rest of the games have not given me any problems. The basic pattern to follow when installing these games is to right click the setup file, select Open with Wine Windows Program Loader, and wait for a few seconds for it to open. Use alt tab to move between windows until you find something like "Setup inaccessible". When you have moved to that window, press the following keys to install the game:
alt-y
alt-n
alt-y
alt-n
alt-n
alt-n
alt-n
alt-n
alt-i
At this point, the game will install. Wait about ten or so seconds and then press alt-f to finish the installation. Most of the games add a shortcut to the desktop. You can use the shortcut to launch the game or open applications, Wine, Programs, and find the game listed there. On the desktop you may find a second shortcut with a .lnk extension. It is safe to delete the .lnk shortcut because they do not work in Linux (as far as I know). When you start the demos, there are a couple of windows that do not talk, just press enter three times and game sound and speech should begin. The first few windows are where you can enter your information when you have purchased the game. In the game Lonewolf, the information is spoken from the very beginning. I have tested all of the game demos as well as the free games and I have to say they are all impressive and very addictive. I highly recommend any or all of these games.
One last note, in VIP Mud, when you first launch it, the opening window will read as "Product Security inaccessible" I am not sure what this window is, but if you press enter three times it will start talking. For some reason, voice settings are not always remembered and the "interrupt this voice with typing" option doesn’t work. I have not used it in Windows, so I am not sure if this is a Wine only problem or not. You can interrupt speech with the control key if you need to do so.

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The Sendspace Wizard with Orca

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

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A couple of months ago I found out about a service called Sendspace.
It is a great service that allows you to upload files and send links to them by email. You can also use the links on your blog or website if you have limited space or if your host doesn’t allow files to be uploaded. One of the things that makes Sendspace great is the Wizard. Instead of navigating through the Sendspace website to upload or download files, you can install the Wizard and use it instead. It is a very convenient piece of software for Linux, Mac, and Windows. I downloaded the Wizard shortly after creating my account. When I opened the Wizard for the first time, it was almost completely accessible with Orca. There was one exception though, and that one problem prevented me from being able to use the Wizard at all. The local and remote file views are displayed on something that Orca just refers to as panels. I noticed a “send feedback” option in the Wizard’s help menu and selected it. I was taken to the Sendspace website where I filled some information into a form and explained the problem I was having. I had also noticed that two of the keyboard shortcuts used by the Wizard conflicted with shortcuts used by Gnome, so I included that in the message as well.
I have contacted several companies in the past requesting accessibility improvements, or a Linux version of their software. In the past I have met with very little success for my efforts. Usually, after a week or two, the company would respond with some variant of “no”. This was not the case with Sendspace. I received a reply from them almost immediately. The message said that they would begin work on fixing the problems I had described. They were as good as their word too. I even got updates about the progress being made. Last week, the new version for Linux was released. It was slightly behind the Windows version, I suspect because of the problems with getting Orca to read info in those panels. When the new version came out though, it was usable with Orca. It now has a general file selection dialog that Orca can read as well as the panels. The keyboard shortcuts were even fixed. I am really impressed with how fast they responded to and fixed the accessibility issue I reported. It is great to know that a company is dedicated to providing their software to anyone who wants to use it regardless of platform or disability. In fact, Mike, a Sendspace Representative says, "We’ve been committed to accessibility ever since we found out about it and we’ve been improving it slowly but surely since then (on all three platforms, mac, windows and Linux)."
So, if you need to send files that are too large for email attachments or need to host files for your blog or website, get your free Sendspace. account today. Tell your friends and family. When a company s dedicated and responds to accessibility requests as fast as Sendspace, they deserve all the support and promotion we can give them. Honestly, I can’t say enough good things about this company. Thanks to the Wizard developers for all of your hard work.

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