Re: [school-discuss] special needs Linux tools

On 6/25/05, Gordon J. Holtslander <holtslander@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Hi:

Emacspeak looked appealing to me so I tried installing it on my system.  The
install is fairly simple, but it appears to need a version of IBM's ViaVoice
for linux, that does not appear to available any longer.  I've asked
Emacspeak's developer for more information.

Gord

On June 24, 2005 01:51 pm, Daniel Howard wrote:
> Thanks Gord, this looks very attractive for some of the visually-impaired
> kids, I'll check it out.  I just installed MS Office 2000 on the refurb PC
> that we just put in the class so I could run PowerTalk for the visually
> impaired kids.  Wish it worked with OpenOffice...
>
> Two of the Win/Mac applications that are of great interest and used often
> in the special needs class are the Edmark (now Riverdeep) Let's Go Read
> series and the Laureate software Talk Time with Tucker and Tiger's Tale,
> all of which encourage children to talk (or at least vocalize) in order to
> make things happen on the screen.  Neither of these titles are available in
> Linux, although I've noticed some of Riverdeep's other titles like Reader
> Rabbit being available in Linux now.  And I found that a conventional PC
> microphone did have the quality and volume required for these titles, and
> so have installed a USB mic which does work well with the software titles.
>
> I also changed the subject heading to better reflect this thread.
>
> Daniel
>
> At 01:43 PM 6/24/2005, you wrote:
> >Does anyone have experience with emacspeak
> >http://emacspeak.sourceforge.net/
> >
> >this may provide the sound interface Daniel is interested in.
> >
> >The emacspeak release (version 22.0-1) is fairly new, but much of the
> >supporting documentation is a few years old.
> >
> >Both KDE and Gnome have accessibility projects
> >
> >KDE http://accessibility.kde.org/
> >Gnome http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gap/
> >
> >The applications from KDE's accessibility project are now part of the
> >standard
> >KDE applications from version 3.4 and up.
> >
> >Xandros uses KDE
> >
> >Gord
> >
> >On June 24, 2005 06:56 am, Daniel Howard wrote:
> > > Does Xandros/Crossover give good support for sound, microphone and
> > > USB/serial ports?  That's one of the issues in a special needs class in
> > > our school.  The special needs software uses microphone input for
> > > children with speech impediments, and there are also several USB/serial
> > > communication devices (touchscreens, communication assistance devices,
> > > etc.) that we need to support.  Since Wine and Win4Lin often do not
> > > support such devices, I'm stuck with using Windows2000 refurbished PCs
> > > (XP won't run much of the older software) and am concerned about
> > > hooking them to the Internet for the same reasons below.
> > >
> > > Daniel
> > >
> > > At 07:22 AM 6/24/2005, you wrote:
> > > >On Thu, 23 Jun 2005, Daniel Howard wrote:
> > > > > By the way, I set up a conference call yesterday with our four
> > > > > principals, who are either switching to Linux K12LTSP or
> > > > > considering it, and two other
> > > >
> > > >...
> > > >
> > > > >          2.  The other K12LTSP principal said he still had Windows
> > > > > 95/98 PCs at his school in order to run legacy Windows software,
> > > > > but that he would not let them be connected to the Internet as a
> > > > > measure to prevent viruses and other malware.  The Linux thin
> > > > > clients are the only ones that can access the Internet.
> > > >
> > > >I'd be curious to know what legacy software, and if any attempt has
> > > > been made to run it on a Xandros with Crossover. I've had excellent
> > > > results using this.
> > > >
> > > >--christine
> > >
> > > Daniel Howard
> > > President and CEO
> > > Quadrock Communications, Inc
> > > 404.264.9123 main
> > > 678.528.5839 fax
> > > 404.625.1593 cell
> >
> >--
> >Gordon J. Holtslander     /     Dept. of Biology
> >holtslander@xxxxxxxxxxxxx  /    University of Saskatchewan
> >tel 306 966-4433          /     112 Science Place
> >fax 306 966-4461          /     Saskatoon, SK Canada
> >                           /     S7N 5E2
>
> Daniel Howard
> President and CEO
> Quadrock Communications, Inc
> 404.264.9123 main
> 678.528.5839 fax
> 404.625.1593 cell

--
Gordon J. Holtslander     /     Dept. of Biology
holtslander@xxxxxxxxxxxxx  /    University of Saskatchewan
tel 306 966-4433          /     112 Science Place
fax 306 966-4461          /     Saskatoon, SK Canada
                          /     S7N 5E2