106.3. Accessibility
Weight: 1
Description: Demonstrate knowledge and awareness of accessibility technologies.
Key Knowledge Areas:
- Basic knowledge of keyboard accessibility settings (AccessX)
- Basic knowledge of visual settings and themes
- Basic knowledge of assistive technology (ATs)
Terms and Utilities:
- Sticky/Repeat Keys
- Slow/Bounce/Toggle Keys
- Mouse Keys
- High Contrast/Large Print Desktop Themes
- Screen Reader
- Braille Display
- Screen Magnifier
- On-Screen Keyboard
- Gestures (used at login, for example GDM)
- Orca
- GOK
- emacspeak
There are some people with disabilities . A disability is any condition that makes it more difficult for a person to do certain activities or interact with the world around them. People with disabilities might like to work with Linux too . The good news is that Linux distributions provide great advantages over proprietary alternatives for people with disabilities!
Accessibility , means making software usable by disabled people. That includes blind people of course, but also people who have low vision, are deaf, colorblind, have only one hand, can move only a few fingers, or even only the eyes.
These options are available in display managers (login screen) and in major desktops (like gnome, kde, xfce, ...). Its logo is a human stretching its hands a legs.
In Gnome the config is located at Settings ~ Universal Access.
Linux provides accessibility in 3 sections:
- 1.AccessX : AccessX or the Keyboard Accessibility preference tool allows you to set some options for people who have difficulty with keyboard .
- 2.Visual Settings : Visual Settings help people with vision problems:
- 3.Assistive Technologies : things like text-to-speech (tts)
- Sticky keys: Helps users who have trouble pressing multiple keys at once, and users who have use of only one hand
- Slow keys allows the user to specify the duration for which one must press-and-hold a key before the system accepts the keypress.
- BounceKeys: Requires a delay between keystrokes before accepting the next keypress .
- MouseKeys: Enables a group of keys to emulate a mouse. Pressing keys in this group will move a pointer around the screen and perform mouse button actions.
- RepeatKeys: Enables the user who has trouble releasing keys quickly once they press to slow down how fast keys start repeating once they're pressed.
- Hover Click: Enable click or drag simply by hovering mouse pointer over a control or object on the screen.
- High-contrast : Helps users who have trouble seeing text unless contrast is corrected, such as white text on a black background, or vice versa.
- zoom (Magnifier) : Helps users with visual impairments who need larger text and images.
- Large Text: Make reading text easier by using larger fonts in menus.
- On screen keyboard: Helps users who cannot type at all, but who can use a mouse.
GOK is the Gnome On-Screen Keyboard. As the title implies, it is a keyboard that appears on the display as an alternative for those who are not able to use a regular keyboard.
- Visual alerts: Replace system sounds with visual cues(like flashing th e screen)
- Screen reader: A text-to-speech system to read what's on the screen
There are some Text to speech software in Linux which read dialog boxes for us . Software like orca and emac speak .
.
.
.
.