Getting started with Ubuntu, Orca and Linux

[Jon]

Hi Ari,

hope to answer some of your questions:

Yes orca does come atomatically on the orca cd.
The live cd can also be used to install ubuntu on your laptop.
To do it on your own is a bit complicated, but if you can find some 
sighted assistance it makes it far easier.

In terms of orca usability, its great, and every release it makes a vast 
improvement.

I can manage to get around most of the things i need doing, except 
internet browsing (which i think is a very big thing).

Unfortunately the interaction between orca and firefox is a bit lacking, 
and it will be the thing that will cause you headakes.

I keep a windows machine (or dual boot with xp) to do my web-browsing 
needs.

Navigating in firefox with orca (looks reasonable from afar) but when 
you get to use it its quite unintuitive, especially if you are use to 
the windows screenreaders.

Saying this, the firefox on the cd isn't the one that orca works with, 
so it might be dificult to get a feel of it without installing ubuntu.

I sincerely wish that work on orca should consentrate on getting more 
functional internet browsing, because thats the only show-stopper for us 
blind people, or alternatively write up a test case of how it should be 
used, so that people know exactly how to use it, rather than 
experimenting, with variating results.

I definately would encourage you to install it though, its definately 
worth playing around with.

Try Ubuntu 7.10, has a good version of orca and should have least issues 
with hardware.

Also you are welcome to join the orca mailing list,
to post to the list: orca-list at gnome.org
orca website: http://live.gnome.org/Orca

Hope to see you there.

-Jon
On Mon 12/11/2007 at 18:02:51, ari wrote:
> Hi all,
> I am totally blind, so the questions in this post, I'm hoping to be able to 
> do everything myself, like getting everything up and running. A while ago, I 
> was interested in getting started with Ubuntu, but Orca was still not really 
> usable. My situation is that, first, I am not a computer pro, I use my 
> computer for everyday tasks, I do like messing around with it, but I'm more 
> an average sort of person, I don't, for example, have hardly any experience 
> of doing stuff like using command lines, modifying configuration files, etc, 
> I've just been brought up on Windows. I'd like to use Orca with a laptop, is 
> it now easily possible? How usable is Orca now with Openoffice, Firefox, and 
> email? Can I use Orca comfortably for doing most everyday things? By using 
> Orca and Linux, I'll later get used to the whole text-based environment. The 
> most important questions, first, I'd like to try the live CD, where do I get 
> the latest version, plus a getting started guide? Also, if I order the 
> normal Ubuntu CD's, will Orca be on there and easy to set up? Would you 
> recommend that I still wait a bit more before trying it out, or is it 
> generally much better now?
> Thanks
> Ari 
> 
> 
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