Excellent Reads

It’s hard because it doesn’t care.

I like this idea because it speaks to two different but related concepts in one statement. Linux doesn't care how you use it, and in that sense you are free because it's happy to place deep system internals in your hands. But at the same time, it also doesn't care for you. Not much emphasis is placed on fit and finish beyond a handful of people who just want to make their DE, their app, their audio system work great for their needs. There's not really a "barrier to output" and dumb decisions/broken code gets shipped all the time, although, I think this is becoming increasingly commonplace on the commercial side of things too.

Linux is a beast of its own. No one is exercising unilateral control over the software ecosystem, and that comes with great power and great responsibilities.

That was a great read, and I think an important one too. Thx a lot for sharing it with us. I hope it reaches more devs and people that are able to impact the way Linux is made.

I'm not blind myself but I've enough serious health issue that I've know for quite some time that I may become blind, anytime. I don't know what I would do when/if that happen. I really don't want to move back to Apple as a user, but I'm also not a hacker at all. I won't be able to do all what you did, nor go through all that.

I'm a 50+ years old user that is so not technically proficient that I realized it was simpler for me to try various distros up until I found one on which I was able to... connect my Airpod because I could not get them to work on the distro I was using back then, despite dutifully reading all the docs, forums and blog posts I could put my hands on. So, yeah, blind I would be completely lost and without much help to count on I would probably not have much choice but to quit using Linux.

BTW, if anyone is wondering, Mint was the distro that 'Just Worked' with those stupid Airpod. It worked great out of the box and it still works great a few years later and has been working so with anything I've thrown at it so far. And, yep, since Mint I also have completely quit switching distro. That being said, I have no idea how great it would work as a blind user... I think I'll have to check that asap.

Once again, thx for sharing your experience, as well as your emotions on that. I don't know about others, but I do think emotions are at least as important as facts when we're considering users. I also think it would help Linux a lot to realize how this lack of care you mention is a real issue, if not the main issue. I mean it at every level, not just with potential deal-breakers situations like what you're faced with. And, yeah, I say that as a most-of-the-time happy Linux user myself.

ooo, this is a good read. It's got my brain firing way too late in the night. Yawn! This person has to let their wifey migrate even if it's an uphill battle. Cause a) she wants to and b) she is clearly open to doing her own research which is like...Linux 101. I get what's going on here though, it's like a call to action for developers as a whole to be more aware of accessibility needs. I get it. I see the hell that they've been through, and all the duct-tape they need in order to get a semi-functional system to work for them. To be honest most legally blind folks I have met (and know what systems they're using) tend to use windows. It's really good for accessibility and you can blow everything up 700xs to make things much more readable. I get not agreeing with their practices as they seem to be constantly jumping off the rails of what I myself would be comfortable using. I think having something you can use at all trumps having nothing you can use because you're not the "intended" user. I think it kind of shows how accessibility tends to come with finances and really the only place I have ever seen it baked in that was made for the people is via the Government (and even then, that was more of a state-based thing over a federal setup). People will for sure grumble down on me saying something about this, but this might be a point where AI could help? I'm not sure, but it might be able to fill the gap well enough that someone can string things together to frankenstein better support or squash some usability bugs. Idk. I feel this person's frustrations, I just wish I had a better idea for solutions if they want to stick on Linux. Lord knows what is going on the Mac side, because I find their software heinously unfriendly, but I don't really use it much because of that.

Honestly I think this is what using Linux is like in general.

I’ve also fought with ALSA. I can’t get my Bluetooth mouse to work correctly, but have a workaround in that it works fine when connected wired. Plugins I’ve added for the the UI stop working when the computer wakes from sleep. Bad package updates made the command line borderline unusable until I found a way to package the broken package.

But ultimately, it’s still usable even if it’s frustrating. And I can always have something to debug because I can see and visual output is coded in at the lowest levels.

Having to do that sort of debugging just to get some usable output sounds awful.