To my fellow blind DOS users. I have some real machines and genuine hardware synthesizers, but at the moment, they're not available. I have a Windows 3.1 virtual machine with ASAP installed. Someone gave it to me a few years ago. But I think there's a problem with com0com. I have both 32-bit and 64-bit versions. I think the older one I used wouldn't work on 64-bit systems. Regardless, I forget how to use it. I know I need to set it to com9, so that ASAP thinks I'm using a Braille-N-Speak, when it's really NVDA that's outputting the speech. Can anyone help me? Also, I know that many developments have taken place since the last official version of MS-DOS, from FreeDOs, to FreeDOS-32, to Enhanced DR-DOS. I also know that the Provox screen reader has been made open source. To my knowledge, it's the only one that has. Has anyone tried to update it or use it with the later versions of DOS? What about real software synthesizers? Is there any way for me to obtain a full version of Vocal-Eyes, now that the company that made it isn't even around anymore, let alone supporting it?

#accessibility #ASAP #blind #DOS #EnhancedDRDOS #FreeDOS #FreeDOS-32 #MS-DOS #Provox #screenreaders #speech #virtualmachines

Stages of a Dos-Lover's Linux Journey
1. Ooh! There's an operating system I haven't tried, and it has a screen reader!
2. Yay! I chose one. Let's download it.
3. Hurray! It's installed. Wait. It's not talking. What's wrong? let's try another. Okay, that one talks.
4. Why isn't it seeing my shared folder from VMware? Never mind, I'll just ask Perplexity.
5. Great. It gave me some commands, let's try them.
6. What the hell is this! Why are there no drive letters? What is that command? Why is it a mile long? Why must I always enter sudo for everything?
7. Okay. Several hours have passed. This is maybe my third or fourth attempt in the last two months or so. Even Perplexity admits that it was giving me the wrong commands! sigh Let's try this one.
8. Yay! It finally sees my folders! At last, I can learn the operating system!
9. What the bloody hell! It sees my text file as an executable? How the hell can a .txt file be an executable? How do I fix this to make all .txt files be seen as... normal text files!
10. Back to the commandline,again, because people can't figure out how to do this graphically! Why do Linux commands give me a headache when I can work with DOS all day? Why don't these make any sense?
11. Even Noel Coward would be blushing at my hypothetical vocabulary right now, so I won't type the rest. I'm going back to XP, 7, and DOS! On second thought, I'm going to make a cup of tea, watch an operetta, and forget that computers exist at all!

#accessibility #commandline #Debian #Linux #DOS #Orca

If I truly need to research something and ensure that the answers are accurate, I do so on my own. But for many things, I use Perplexity. It has helped me in numerous situations, from simple things to writing code to help me use Supermium more efficiently. But I do have a few questions.

1. Why isn't it possible to delete conversations from the website? It forces me to use my phone.
2. Why, when I try to search my threads for keywords that I know were used, it never finds them? I do this on the site.
3. Finally, why is their Android app so inaccessible? I can do basic things, such as delete threads, with it, but I certainly couldn't replace the website with it.

#accessibility #Android #ai #artificialintelligence #NVDA #Perplexity #searching #Talkback #Windows

Can anyone recommend an accessible course to learn html? It must work with NVDA. I've heard of Code Camp and W3Schools, but how accessible are they and how do they differ in content and style? I like courses with a structured approach, where things are explained i.e. a deductive and not an inductive approach. I usually don't need a tutorial, but I am fine with general instructions. In this case, though, exercises would be very beneficial. I am using this prior to beginning Part 2 of the Web Developer's course at Deque. I am not a developer, but they don't have one for accessibility testers.

#accessibility #blind #blindness #computing #DequeUniversity #html #learning #NVDA #programming #screenreaders #W3Schools

I'm trying to figure out which is the best computer for my needs. I'm caught between three options. I want something very portable that's smaller than my Del Latitude 3120, and even than my Acer Aspire One D270! I would use all of these with an external keyboard. The MeLes can run off a power bank and needs speakers, while the Toughbook has its own battery and speakers. The MeLes have more usb ports, where as the Toughpad would require a usb hub (owned). Some of these come with more ram or storage. I tried to choose similar specifications when possible. All cost about $300, once you add in the power bank for the last two, though they may be on sale, due to Black Friday.

Panasonic Toughpad FZ-M1 MK3 with 7th generation Intel Core i5-7Y57 vPro processor with two cores and four Intel Hyper-Threads, 8GB of soldered DDR3L RAM, and a 128GB M.2 2280 SSD.

amazon.com/gp/product/B0DK7W87…

MeLE Mini PC Quieter 4C, 12th Gen Alder Lake-N100 - processor. Featuring 4 cores and 4 threads, with speeds of up to 3.4GHz, 8GB of LPDDR4x RAM (4266MHz) and 128GB of storage (128GB eMMC, M.2 2280 PCIe 3.0x4 3940MB/s).
(Note: the m.2. is just a slot, not an installed drive, so it's empty, and I won't be taking things apart to install it)

amazon.com/MeLE-Mini-Quieter-4…

MeLE PC PCG02 Pro, with Quad-Core Alder Lake 12th N100, 8GB 4266MHz LPDDR4 ram, 128GB emmc storage and a Micro SD port that supports expanding up to 2TB.
(Note: I think this is for a micro sd card, which I can insert and use on my own)

amazon.com/MeLE-PCG02-Pro-Comp…

If I chose one of the last two, and wanted to use it with a power bank and not the regular cord, it would have to be this one, as no others are accessible to the blind.

accessibility.energrid.us.com/…

These are the programmes I use.

screen reader: NVDA

Internet Browser: Supermium (modern fork of Chrome, works with XP through 11)

Text Editor: Notepad2 (11), Notepad (XP/7), with spell checker: Jarte (all)

Media Player MPCHC (all)

MP3 Recorder: Virtual Recorder v1.4.0.2 (all)

E-Mail Thunderbird (Legacy 102 (7/11) Icedove or Outlook Express (XP), considering Windows Live Mail (all)

Youtube: Accessible Youtube Downloader (11)

Friendica: site (all) TweeseCake, TWBlue (11)

Timer: Cook Timer (all)

Computer Cleaner: CCleaner 5.49 (XP) KCleaner (all)

Uninstaller: Revo Uninstaller (much older version, newer is not accessible) (all)

OCR/pdf converter: Openbook, Kurzweil 1000 (all)

Virtual machines: VMWare Player 6.0.4, VmWare Workstation 17 (11)

#accessibility #blind #computers #powerbanks #tablets #technology #virtualmachines #Windows7 #Windows11 #WindowsXP

To make a very long story short, I am considering entering the field of accessibility. More specifically, website testing. For those interested, I wrote about it here. If you can offer any suggestions, recommendations, etc. either here or there, please do so. I would love to hear from you!

dandylover1.dreamwidth.org/214…

The long story, for those who are interested in my background in technology and how I came to this decision, can be found here. My blind peers, in particular, may enjoy this, though it may also take you on a trip down memory lane.

dandylover1.dreamwidth.org/214…

#accessibility #blind #BlindInstituteofTechnology #blindness #coding #computers #DequeUniversity #education #FreeCodeCamp #html #NVDA #screenreaders #technology #W3Schools #websites #Windows

Howto FT8 en 27mhz

charliebravo27225am.blogspot.c…

#ft8 #27265 #27mhz #11m #radio #digimodos #digitales #ham #radioaficionado #jtdx #WSJT-X