Devin Prater

Accessibility drives me. I use all the major operating systems in some way, and find great things about all of them. I also enjoy reading, eating, relaxing, eating more, and chatting. I want to be a cat when I grow up.

My opinions are my own, and definitely do not reflect those of [my employer](https://www.aidb.org).

Public Key

npub10l7vmv6agpz954gcq97hy4u3cgx246pr4j2laypca8qvm83qd0vq863qkc

NIP-05 Address

devinprater_at_tweesecake.social@mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqs8llxdkdw5q3z625vqzltj27guyr92aq36e907jquwnsxdncsxhkqpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumn0wd68ytnzv9hxgqg3waehxw309ahx7um5wgerztnrdaksnh7u6q

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relay.nostr.band

nostr21.com

Author Public Key

npub10l7vmv6agpz954gcq97hy4u3cgx246pr4j2laypca8qvm83qd0vq863qkc

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Last Notes

2023-11-29 12:47:05

Holy crap it's already Wednesday. Wow.

2023-11-29 04:25:29

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@npub1cxy…vryr Ooo cool what fandom do you write fanfics for?

2023-11-26 09:46:52

So, please boost for reach if you can. I have to do something about all the stress from work. Our workplace has what appears to be an Employee assistance program/service. Like, counselling and such. Does anyone have any experience with EAP's, or EAS? Is their confidentiality for real, or have any of you found them leaking info to your bosses and such? I just, can't keep going like this.
#EAP #EAS #work #counselling

2023-11-25 07:22:37

I've found lately that my patience for bullcrap is so thin these days. If someone posts an image without Alt-text, I'm more likely to just unfollow than send it to GPT for a description. It's so freeing, kinda. Sometimes I feel bad about it, but tonight I looked on Telegram at the Blind Android Users group. I'd sent a day or so ago, jokingly, asking if someone could buy me a Pixel. And this Android oldtimer pops up all angry, telling me to go on Amazon and buy one myself, and that if I can buy an iPhone Pro (I don't even want a pro lol), that I can buy a Pixel, and as always for these types, to stop complaining. So I left. It didn't take much thought either. I don't have room in myself for all that. Not now. Maybe a few months ago, or a year ago, I would have sent back some rage-induced reply, and I almost did. But no. It's not worth it. Images without Alt-text aren't either. They remind me of how abnormal I am in a world full of sighted people. And yes, I do believe that this world is made for the sighted. But lately I just don't want all that. I deal with myself, my lack of self, my restlessness, but no outlet for that restlessness, no energy to put it out there, and the people around me that can somehow stay awake and full of life for a good 16 whole hours, as it is. And I'm sorry if this hurts anyone's feelings. I'm sorry that I'm here clogging up your feed with my bullcrap. But goodness sometimes I just have to help myself. I don't do that nearly enough. Always helping people, buying food for people around me that can't possibly learn to use DoorDash /s, and I just want to enjoy something. But books aren't fun anymore, games are often too complicated or hard, or some riddle in an MUD I can't solve cause quests are hard sometimes. I don't know. I'm awful at music. Maybe Survive the Wild, that crafting game. I should see about getting back into that. It made me feel like I was building something, doing something that'd last a minute. Ugh I'm so broken.

2023-11-19 20:41:38

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@npub1zyl…t54n You ate the mug too? :D

2023-10-28 14:45:53

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@npub1zyl…t54n @npub1e6z…g0aa I bet they got some kind of project manager that saw it and got it shoved through. Kinda like TalkBack on Android, very little work until a few years ago, and then boom. Hope the momentum continues!

2023-10-27 15:06:43

Can't anyone around where I live tell me I've done something good for once? Every day it's "you didn't do this right" or "Hey you posted this too early so update this," or "Hey don't forget to do this or it'll be late" or "hey we request that you do this as soon as possible" or "I need you to do me a favor" but it's something you have to do, thanks haha. Oh hey her's a Chromebook, enjoy haha.
Yeah I need to start looking for a new job before I break and I don't want to know what will happen when I break.

2023-10-09 20:22:33

So, #Elementary OS. Tried it. No, it's not blind friendly. Alt + Tab doesn't speak with Orca most of the time. In setup, the full name, username, password fields aren't labeled, so tabbing with Orca says nothing. After setup, the welcome screen is full of "GTK button checkbox" and other mislabeled stuff. It's not ready for blind people to use.
#foss #linux #blind #accessibility

2023-10-06 17:04:58

You know, I'm honestly glad to see people looking at the disability community, especially blind people in my case, and going "You know, I had no idea it was *this* bad." Like that thread on learning to code for kids? Yeah. Best way is to hit the ground learning through typing in code and hearing the response. It sucks. It really, really does. And the kid, or even teenager or adult, would have to first know how to use their device; iPad, computer, phone, notetaker. And *then* they'd need to learn to code. Like, as blind people, we cannot just pick up a device and automatically know how to use it. We have to learn how to use the screen reader on the device, practice with the device, and then start using it for whatever we picked it up for in the first place. And I know I'm a terrible person for saying this, but I think more people *need* to see these kinds of failings of technology before anything substantial wil be done about it. Because it's so easy to scroll on passed yeah another blind person mad at tech, yeah some screen reader update, yeah foss bad Apple good and all that. But it's another to see a blind person, right in front of you, trying to learn to use an iPad, *and* learn to code, or do whatever on it, at the same time. It's really sad. But honestly, I think more people need to be sad about it before we can move any further as a society on disability issues.

2023-09-27 15:31:23

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@npub1jc2…klw0 *headpats*

2023-09-27 03:37:39

There’s a new Kindle for Mac! It seems to be like the iPad version, and signing in is kinda weird. But the book contents are accessible with VoiceOver now!
#kindle #mac #accessibility #blind

2023-09-07 16:52:55

You know why some blind people are really leaning into AI to fix accessibility issues? No, not like overlays that probably barely have any if/else statements in them, let alone AI, but stuff like Be My Eyes, and *gasp* screen recognition in VoiceOver for iOS? Because shit sucks, and it's sucked for the last 40 years of computing history for blind people. That's why whenever we get even a bit more light, even if 20% of what an AI says is fake, that 80%, that gives us 80% more info than we didn't have before. And yeah, we should *all*, every single one of us, know that AI can give false info by now. Hell, Mastodon folks have been shoving that into our ears with an oversized cue tip since the day ChatGPT came out. We get it. But hot damn, being able to point my phone out the bus window and take pictures as I'm going to work, hearing about a fire station, or a house with a dog in the yard, or that it's a sunny, clear, nice day outside even, is really freaking nice. And sure, maybe it's not a firestation. Maybe it's a courthouse, or a post office, or something else. but it's something that I would never have known before. Because I don't have some sighted person telling me about what's around, and I wouldn't *want* any other human to have to do that for me. Like, this is the thing. In order to get 100%, perfect info, I'd have to hire another human who, all they do is look around and tell me in extreme detail, what's around me? Now, sighted people of Fedi, would *you* want that job? Maybe for a day. Maybe for a week. But months of that? I doubt it. And *that* is where AI comes in. No, it ain't perfect. And the more you deviate from its training data, the less accurate it gets. And maybe eventually we'll get to a point in the middle of what VoiceOver Recognition is, and what MML's are. But I'm just getting tired of this OMG AI is the end of the world rhetoric. It's really getting old.
#accessibility #ai #llm

2023-08-28 16:38:29

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@npub1gaj…78dz I wouldn't either if it weren't a part of my job. Luckily they've been saying that they're upgrading their widgets to Lightning, so hopefully they get this stupid text field I write my progress reports in. Now that I think about it, that whol panel thing is sluggish. So I just copy and paste into notepad and write in that, then copy and paste back into that field.

2023-08-28 16:12:35

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@npub1gaj…78dz Yeah I use Chrome and NVDA. ECM, the company we contracted to build us this, may still be using some old visualforce widgets. But still, my goodness I've never seen something lag with backspacing before like this thing does.

2023-08-28 16:11:19

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@npub1gaj…78dz Of course you never have any issues. :P It may be an old visualforce module.

2023-08-28 14:58:29

Y'all I don't know what this specific Salesforce thing is originally called, but there's this widget that's a text box with all kinds of formatting tools before it, and it's sluggish as crap and I hate it! I mean this is a good computer, 32 GB RAM, 2.1 GHZ at the lowest setting, I mean this ain't a PC problem. Even backspacing is sluggish!
#accessibility #Salesforce #blind

2023-08-09 01:36:53

I visited a #NFB meeting today. Came home with a print piece of paper that I cannot read. I won’t be joining. So tired. But it’s whatever. I’m glad I found out before joining.
#blind #accessibility

2023-08-08 15:57:23

So for blind Windows users, what mail client do you use? I'm kinda getting tired of Gmail, having to hear lots of stuff before each message, and having to turn on browse mode and arrow through all that to get to the message, all that. And Thunderbird is messy in 115. I might have to just get used to Outlook.
:boosts-OK:
#Windows #accessibility #blind

2023-08-05 15:24:22

More Orca development, Orca now has a command to tell the user what the default button in a dialog box is. It also now has an Actions menu, for performing different actions besides pressing the object. It can now do object navigation, and can restrict the navigation to the current control. All that is in development. Messages to the Orca mailing list have gone from maybe one a week to several per day, and I’m loving it! I’ll enjoy proofreading and doing documentation work.
#accessibility #orca #linux #foss #blind

2023-07-16 10:06:27

Reading Braille is a bit different than reading with speech, simply because with Braille, we can skim and pattern-match a bit easier. Speech is incredibly linear. Braille, well if there's a load of question marks, or dashes, or whatever, I can just feel across the display or page until I come to something different. With speech, though, if it's reading punctuation or can't read some punctuation and just says "symbol symbol symbol symbol," or "question mark question mark question mark," then there's no way, on that line, to skip to the next different text. In a document or site, you can skip to the next line, but you then don't know if the previous line had something else on it. Maybe you can skip to the next word, if symbols are all together with no spaces. Especially in apps like Tweesecake, though, where text is sent directly to the screen reader, you can't skip forward throughout a post or message passed repeating symbols or emoji. That's why I always try to follow a format for my posts. My thoughts or info at the top, links next, and any hash tags at the bottom. Having hash tags in the middle is okay if they're spaced out throughout the text, and I do that sometimes too.
#blind #Braille #accessibility

2023-07-05 15:37:01

More posts from blind people trying Linux:
https://forum.audiogames.net/topic/48880/current-status-of-linux-accessibility-with-orca-gnome-and-kde/
#foss #Linux #accessibility #blind

2023-07-03 15:24:33

On Twitter, it felt like people added image descriptions in a kind of "Oh fine I'll do it," kind of mood. Here, it's so hard to believe that people do it delightfully, kindfully, in a spirit of helping others not just because Twitter kept pushing it.
And I think that, if this attitude of actually wanting to help, wanting to work together, pushes from Mastodon to the rest of computing industry, I think things will be a lot better. Because this is a lot of what anti-ableism is. Not doing something begrudgingly, like Twitter, but doing it because it's good, because it helps, because if it were you on the other end, you'd want someone to do it for you.
#AntiAbleism #accessibility #ImageDescriptions

2023-07-02 20:11:30

The Rings of Google's Trusted Testers program: https://devinprater.micro.blog/2023/07/02/the-rings-of.html

2023-06-25 01:37:07

A itty bitty kitten just climbed on top of me and sniffed around.

2023-06-20 17:04:49

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@npub1gaj…78dz Oh definitely. I'm not trusting this 100%. But my goodness if we could hook this up to an NVDA addon and play video games with it, ugh.

2023-06-20 16:59:45

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@npub1gaj…78dz bing.com in Microsoft edge

2023-06-20 16:58:12

Looks like Bing can describe images now! And it can read, unlike Llava! Here's the description it gave for this image:
Received message. The image you sent is from a video game. The character is standing in front of a castle-like structure that is built on a cliff and has a wooden door. The structure is made of gray stone and there is a body of water below. The character is wearing a purple outfit and has a sword in hand. The sky is pink and purple with clouds. The game stats and options visible on the screen are "Skill", "Straight Chain", "Gil", "KP", "Map", and "Customization". Unfortunately, I don't have more information about the game or the character. Is there anything else I can help you with?
https://cdn.tweesecake.social/media_attachments/files/110/577/595/668/865/613/original/a68550b605052b37.jpg

2023-06-12 08:18:55

Well good.
A recent "Dear Colleague" letter issued jointly by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Office of Civil Rights of the Department of Education (OCR) places colleges and universities on notice of recent enforcement activities under Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (Section 504) directed at digital accessibility. Referencing recent consent decrees entered into between OCR and more than 50 institutions of higher learning in just the last year, the Letter sends a clear message that institutions should meaningfully address the accessibility of their online properties and communications:
https://www.adatitleiii.com/2023/06/ocr-and-doj-send-a-message-to-higher-ed-make-your-websites-accessible/
#accessibility

2023-06-10 13:10:41

So y'all remember that post that I shared from someone who has used Linux nearly their whole lives, and posted why they've given up on GUI and all? This came from years of their own experiences. They got into Linux much more than me, and even compiled their own kernel. Well, this looks like a member of the Gnome Foundation's response to their thread. No, I'm not going to link the blind person here because they don't need anymore bullshit from fossbros. I mean, calling their heart-felt posts a "trauma dump", and that they're "making up shit on the spot", isn't it time that we've had enough of these ableist people? Developers who are indifferent to people with disabilities will definitely see this, and the Gnome folks probably see this kind of talk all the time, that "we can't do this," or "We don't have the time or money," and that kind of talk makes itself true. Accessibility will not move forward with this kind of mentality at the head of one of the most popular Linux desktops. Can we get a little solidarity here? This Gnome foundation person is attacking a blind, nonbinary, Gendervoid person, and I'm sick of this shit going unnoticed. I want you Linux users to think about this. Think about the people who sit there in power. It doesn't take all kinds of people to make a community. Some people aren't just "a little rough around the edges." We need a community of empathetic people that do not punch down.
https://mastodon.social/@ebassi/110517100226754030
#accessibility #foss #blind #gnome #Linux

2023-06-08 09:31:21

Boosts welcome: Someone I've known for quite some time, and who has used Linux for like, pretty much their whole lives, wrote a thread this morning on their experiences with using Linux as a blind person, particularly the GUI. I'd like anyone in FOSS and Linux to read it, and consider where you stand on this. Are you comfortable with using tech that excludes the most marginalized and volnerable of us? Are you comfortable with being in a community that sidelines us and calls our heartfelt feedback "very frank", and allows for sentiments like [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/gnome/comments/uofx5y/comment/i8ef59j/)? There comes a point where saying "Linux is for everyone," rings hollow. When you say Linux is "your OS", and I can barely use it, how do you think that makes me feel? When a community leader comes at someone from a marginalized community, and now we have another person, who has used Linux for even longer than I have. They have great CLI skills, but now they rely on Windows for web browsing, saying a lot of what I've said--with more technical details--what does that say about the collectivist model of free software? What does that show for any kind of collective community? And thankfully someone else in the Mastodon thread I'll link to below shed some light on how Microsoft blackmailed AFB into getting rid of its free software/hardware initiatives, threatening to pull funding if AFB didn't do what Microsoft demanded. I remember this from Twitter, but never wanted to say anything because I didn't want to get the facts wrong. You may then say "Well then Microsoft needs to pay for what they did." And you're right. But then, that means that we need a corporation to do what hundreds of developers will not. So basically we'd be saying that the collectivist model and non-corporate stance that FOSS has had, can't even help the most marginalized of us.
Mastodon Thread:
https://tweesecake.social/@xogium@tech.lgbt/110507457734423536
#accessibility #Linux #foss #blind

2023-06-05 19:53:10

Hey y'all, Apple is getting into the AT market at last! /s $3500 for a VR headset, right up there with $5500 Braille Android tablets running Android 10, $2500 Braille displays, and $4000 camera glasses with some cheap onboard AI. For those who find this shocking, or like, new, you've not looked at Assistive Technology before. I encourage you all to do so. Look at Humanware, Freedom Scientific, the OrCam, HIMS Braille Sense, and just about any other assistive technology company or device. When y'all do, you'll see $3500 is just right up their alley. Don't be shocked. Don't be caught unaware. Remember these things.

2023-05-24 12:49:57

So yesterday, I grabbed a Braille display from work that is compatible with TalkBack's current Braille support. I opened a book in Google Play Books. I began to read. I crossed a page boundary, and continued reading. And again. And I didn't have to press any other button but the panning key to scroll forward to the next line of Braille. I still saw "page content," but it looks like the Play Books team has indeed made one able to read continuously. Pretty nice!
#accessibility #Google #Android #Braille #blind

2023-05-18 12:46:50

Please boost for reach. Today is #GAAD. Instead of just reading about enhancements, bug fixes, how to make X accessible, and so on, why not try something out.
Close your eyes, put your hands on your input method of choice, and try to use your computing device. Oh no, no output? Well, I'll give you a simple cheat sheet to get started:
* Windows: (Narrator screen reader) Press Control + Windows + Enter.
* MacOS: (VoiceOver) Press Command + F5.
* Linux: (Orca) Press Alt + F2, type orca, and press Enter.
* Android: (TalkBack) Hold down both volume keys for a good 5 seconds. You'll hear instructions on how to turn it on, keep holding the buttons.
* iPhone: (VoiceOver) Tell Siri to "Turn on VoiceOver."
Now you can really start learning. You'll be frustrated, lost, and ready to open your eyes. Stick with it for a while though. And then come up for air, read about it, and consider what you've learned. Basically, walk a bit in our shoes. No, it's not perfect. You can open your eyes. We can open ours as wide as we want and still not see anything. You remember visual layouts of windows, and we don't have that data. But it's close enough for this day. And who knows, maybe you'll consider doing this more often. Maybe you'll think about making this more than a once a year thing. If so, find others who feel the same, and join the accessibility movement. We'll be glad to welcome you!
To turn the screen readers off:
* Narrator: Control + Windows + Enter
* MacOS: Command + F5.
* Linux: Alt + F2, type "killall orca", and press Enter.
* iPhone, Tell Siri to "Turn off VoiceOver."
* Android: Hold down both volume buttons, or tell Google Assistant to "turn off TalkBack."
#accessibility #blind #gaad #Windows #Mac #Linux #iPhone #Android

2023-04-20 17:04:49

For those who help out blind people by only boosting images with helpful Alt text descriptions, thank you so much. Y'all are the reason, along with Mastodon being based off of an open API, that Mastodon is not just accessible to blind people, but somewhere that we're flocking to. Like blind people aren't just using this space to talk to non-blind people about our issues anymore. It's a place where we can talk amongst ourselves too! And when you get to a point where you can comfortably, on many operating systems and apps, just not even remember that this *isn't* a space for yourself and people who share your experiences, even for a minute, then you've moved in the right direction! The API allows for accessibility, as blind people can make interfaces for blind people. Alt text, #[0], and general acceptence, though, means blind people are going to appreciate, and thus stay on, Mastodon and the Fediverse at large. And that is far more important than money, or the users on Twitter who, if their blind, will have to deal with Twitter's website and apps where before they could pop open a compose window with a single key command, or read their tweets from anywhere on Windows, like glancing at an open Twitter tab. All that freedom and flexibility is now on Mastodon, Telegram, and Github, and not Twitter. Not Facebook. Not Discord, not Reddit, and definitely not Tiktok. Of course, website accessibility is still very important. If I'm not mistaken, sighted people generally interact with Mastodon through the site and first-party app. But having that open API means a heck of a lot.
#[1] #[2] #[3] #[4] #[5]

2023-03-07 14:52:08

So I know it’s only been like two or three people so far, but sighted developers asking how to use Orca on Linux to test for accessibility, shows that the time is fast approaching where accessibility is going to matter on Linux. I don’t know if it’s gonna be the explosion of the SteamDeck, or FOSS communities, or the rising interest in non-corporate computing and social networking and stuff. But this is already trickling down. Developers are needing to know about accessibility. They use Linux. I’m so glad to see KDE working on accessibility, and I hope that, one day, blind people can boot up a Linux installer, be told how to enable a screen reader, be guided through setup and onboarding after installation (with no unlabeled buttons please even though it’s just a slideshow Gnome (And an accessible Internet accounts adding process)). Shoot I’d even be glad to write tutorial information for it, like I did for QuickDocs in Fedora. But the time is now to focus on it, not when accessibility hits the FOSS community like a train. And I appreciate every single developer that comes to me, wanting to learn and understand. It’s miles, **miles** better than not giving a damn.
#accessibility #foss #linux

2023-01-30 18:25:30

Has anyone seen this yet? The Cadence is a modular Braille display that can also show tactile graphics. It's multi-line, and works with PC and mobile, and has its own apps (written in Typescript). I got to see one today, and it's very responsive to refresh, although the prototype I saw is about as loud as an Orbit. One can even load regular JPG images onto it and AI renders them. I think I gained a little faith in humanity today. Not much, not until I have one of these of my own. But at least I know a device exists.
https://www.tactile-engineering.com/