Nostr notes by Peter Vágner

@[url=https://dragonscave.space/users/TheQuinbox]Quin[/url] I ...

2026-10-01T14:36:23Z

In reply to nevent1q…2v7c
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@[url=https://dragonscave.space/users/TheQuinbox]Quin[/url] I think the @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] one looks to be acontinuation of talkback-foss. If your changes would be accepted there I think it might become a nice place for your improvements.
Graphene are modernizing a lot of android aosp apps enhancing or rewriting them including camera, messages and more.

Perhaps they will be fine including curated screen reader changes from you. That way everyone would benefit.

@[url=https://dragonscave.space/users/TheQuinbox]Quin[/url] Are ...

2026-10-01T07:01:16Z

In reply to nevent1q…87qz
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@[url=https://dragonscave.space/users/TheQuinbox]Quin[/url] Are you considering joining forces with either @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] or the talkback-foss?

Grapheneos fork is at: [url=https://github.com/GrapheneOS/talkback/]https://github.com/GrapheneOS/talkback/[/url]

Talkback-foss is at: [url=https://github.com/talkback-foss-team/talkback-foss]https://github.com/talkback-foss-team/talkback-foss[/url]

What a surprise ...

2026-09-07T09:13:13Z

What a surprise #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=reaper]reaper[/url] #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=osara]osara[/url] is now a thing on #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=linux]linux[/url] as well. So far it makes focused reaper controls accessible to orca.

I've just got it installed, imported the keymap, tested recording is working and now I have to learn a lot to do something usefull with it.

I'm just wondering if I have missed it or it's not as hot within the blindness comunity as I'm feeling about it.

[url=https://github.com/churst90/osara-linux]https://github.com/churst90/osara-linux[/url]
[attachment type='link' url='https://github.com/churst90/osara-linux'; title='GitHub - churst90/osara-linux: A port of the accessibility extension Osara for the Reaper digital audio workstation. It provide speech output to Orca via speech dispatcher.' publisher_name='GitHub' image='https://opengraph.githubassets.com/60bb325979ff751417d4a4eea3393e944cf3320051c1419bab0ff80901911434/churst90/osara-linux';]A port of the accessibility extension Osara for the Reaper digital audio workstation. It provide speech output to Orca via speech dispatcher. - churst90/osara-linux[/attachment]

Yes! @[url=https://infosec.exchange/users/pancake]pancake[/url] ...

2026-09-04T08:17:56Z

Yes! @[url=https://infosec.exchange/users/pancake]pancake[/url] has just shipped massive screen reader #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=accessibility]accessibility[/url] related improvements for Native multiplatform @[url=https://chaos.social/users/delta]Delta Chat[/url] client build with @[url=https://floss.social/users/gnome]GNOME[/url] technologies called #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=parla]parla[/url] in v0.8.8.
[ul]
[li]Message list can be navigated with the keyboard with all the message details being reported with a screen reader. It's popup menu is now reachable with the keyboard too.[/li]
[li]Conversation list in the sidebar is now more pleasant to use with a screen reader running.[/li]
[li]Message typing is no longer interrupted by announcements of conversation list updating.[/li]
[li]Windows and Mac OS binaries include #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=accesskit]accesskit[/url], backent for #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=GTK]GTK[/url] accessibility so this might be one of the pioneer apps where GTK windows accessibility might be tested easily by the end users. CC @[url=https://toot.cafe/users/matt]Matt Campbell[/url][/li]
[li]If you are screen reader user and you were looking for an accessible app besides electron based deltachat-desktop, I am now considering parla to be more than viable choice.[/li]
[/ul]
Keep on chatting!

@[url=https://ani.social/u/TheMightyCat]TheMightyCat[/url] Oh ...

2026-07-23T12:47:36Z

In reply to nevent1q…yn8a
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@[url=https://ani.social/u/TheMightyCat]TheMightyCat[/url] Oh yes, thanks for your interest and a nice comment.

A somewhat simplified explanation of linux accessibility stack from an advanced user (not developer) looks like this:

Standard linux screen reader running alongside graphical desktop environments such as gnome or KDE is called orca. It uses a dependency called at-spi2-core for delivering and interpreting accessibility events from different toolkits such as GTK4, QT6 and similar.

Thus at-spi2-core has clients on both the sides. Orca usually consumes events and GUI toolkits and other standalone apps generate them.

For the full picture there are apps that communicate to at-spi2-core directly to provide its accessibility for example web browsers (Firefox, Chromium and webkit-gtk) and libreoffice are doing this.

The fact screen reader is interpreting accessibility events delivered to it through at-spi2-core is a nice thing and it's a huge part of the puzzle however screen reader has more functionality than dealing with the stream of accessibility events.

For example screen reader needs to be able to review the content by words, by lines and provide different navigation actions.

For that it needs to react to user key presses.

On wayland reacting to keypresses without having a control focused is a security risk thus a protocol extension has been developed which allows screen reader to ask at-spi2-core to coordinate grabbing the keys with the compositor. I don't fully understand this part so it may be a very rough explanation. However it's key point to understand that for touch screen operated device it's not enough to read what has happened in response to some touch screen gestures. We need an ability to review the screen content before executing actions. On different platforms such as android, IOS or Windows it's implemented in a way so touch interaction model works a bit differently when screen reader is running. This is not yet implemented for linux no matter which form factor.

Technically speaking if I would have an USB keyboard connected to the phone I would certainly be able to use parts of its graphical interface but that would not be practical enough.

Please excuse me for commenting on your announcement thread even adding such a long attempt at explaining my situation. I do really appreciate all the work and advancements you are releasing to the public.

It's just that I am partially saddened by the fact I can't experience this linux mobile movement on my own.

Nostr event nevent1qqszcv30ud6vrq4fr095k6vjfwry0hc0y0rk55zh55vk6xt5twt327szyqqwld2s6pjufrfnrtxx9tpksdu0ymdkx7k0797cl5faqxecdgva5v44e7g

2026-07-23T10:42:56Z

In reply to nevent1q…rjag
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@[url=https://dragonscave.space/users/menelion]André Polykanine[/url] While registering at @[url=https://social.anoxinon.de/users/Codeberg]Codeberg[/url] I've got a very friendly captcha solving registration patch / assistance in a few minutes after contacting their support. I would say they don't want to host loads of unmaintained one time generated personal projects. If a project is maintained with more contributions from humans this should not be a real problem I would say. @[url=https://swecyb.com/users/troed]Troed Sångberg[/url]

@[url=https://ani.social/u/TheMightyCat]TheMightyCat[/url] Oh, ...

2026-07-23T10:24:34Z

In reply to nevent1q…44gs
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@[url=https://ani.social/u/TheMightyCat]TheMightyCat[/url] Oh, this really sounds as a cool update.

It's a pity screen reader accessibility is not yet a thing on mobile linux at least I can't find someone making great progress with that.

@[url=https://toot.cafe/users/matt]Matt Campbell[/url] It's ...

2026-06-21T18:31:15Z

In reply to nevent1q…guvh
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@[url=https://toot.cafe/users/matt]Matt Campbell[/url] It's still trained using the same stack like piper and runs through onnx runtime but @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] people have forked matcha TTS and even managed to write their own phonemizer for english so it no longer needs espeak. They are hoping to improve the performance of their speech services android app using it. I think it's worth looking into and taking some good use of.

[url=https://github.com/GrapheneOS/Matcha-TTS/]https://github.com/GrapheneOS/Matcha-TTS/[/url]

[url=https://github.com/GrapheneOS/SpeechServices]https://github.com/GrapheneOS/SpeechServices[/url]

Nostr event nevent1qqsr4gepps3k2ewkckyp328gh30djf9wue3ymkgcpplyc3q8f5hltlszyqqwld2s6pjufrfnrtxx9tpksdu0ymdkx7k0797cl5faqxecdgva5xlev8w

2026-05-26T09:37:51Z

In reply to nevent1q…l8pm
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@[url=https://social.highenergymagic.net/ap/users/116201069828972775]Ra (Freyja) (it/its)𒀭𒈹𒍠𒊩[/url] I know you are trying to make the most of this for you and other power users, however I just wish to add that not all the blind users are so hooked up to eloquence TTS and only a few of them can use their TTS at such high speech rates. I have understood with this initial version of Graphene Speech services we can at least independently pass the initial setup of @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] and then we can switch to our TTS synthesizer of choice. For example I am very unlikely to stop using #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=RHVoice]RHVoice[/url] and you are very unlikely to stop using #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=Eloquence]Eloquence[/url] no matter what do the Graphene OS folks implement.
Having really good modern open-source natural sounding TTS for reading books is not a waste as you are pointing out especially if they are planning to make the other direction part of the app i.e. speech to text as well.

We have the same thing with #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=NVDA]NVDA[/url] on windows. By default it uses natural sounding voice built into windows that has the same mistakes you are pointing out here, then it has espeak-ng included as an opensource alternative capable of running at very very high speech rates. And you are still adding eloquence into your setup eventhough you need to pass extra hoops in order to even make it run on the modern hardware and software configurations.

It's a very good thing you are advocating for all the blind users here but still if I were you I would try to calm down a bit.

Nostr event nevent1qqszzgaseyjfx46qrsrn3fgqmw66zt5l387ynl7g4tjedx5hhvk6gcqzyqqwld2s6pjufrfnrtxx9tpksdu0ymdkx7k0797cl5faqxecdgva5httghw

2026-03-09T09:12:28Z

In reply to nevent1q…ys0q
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@[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] I'm looking if I might be able to add support for different languages in the future. I see you've written a phonemizer doing the g2p as a part of the app. However training is done on a computer running your improved matcha TTS. While training what phonemizer were you using? Matcha's fork of Misaki or something else? I will be looking more into it, I'm also too excited about it right now.

@[url=https://caneandable.social/users/NoahCarver]Noah Tobias ...

2026-02-02T15:30:19Z

In reply to nevent1q…qd7v
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@[url=https://caneandable.social/users/NoahCarver]Noah Tobias Carver 👨🏼‍🦯🇺🇦[/url] @[url=https://dragonscave.space/users/pitermach]Pitermach[/url] @[url=https://infosec.exchange/users/prism]Drew Mochak[/url] I think you can install google talkback into @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] if you so wish. It's just that there is an open-source variant of talkback included from the start.
And the updates to talkback are coming in slightly slower pace, but it's not abandoned.
[url=https://github.com/GrapheneOS/talkback/pull/99]https://github.com/GrapheneOS/talkback/pull/99[/url]

I have asked a friend and ...

2025-09-16T10:58:38Z

In reply to nevent1q…zxwp
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I have asked a friend and @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] community chat members for the help with initial setup and now I am fully configured with RHVoice as my current TTS of choice.
Except of one GPS navigation app I am used to everything is working fine for me including proprietary stuff for my work like Microsoft Teams, banking apps including Poštová banka, George and Revolut and the other apps I like such as Bitwarden as a password manager, Arcanechat, Conversations, ElementX, FairEmail, Open Key Chain for chatting and emailing, Antennapod, BubbleUPNP, Foobar 2000, Kore, Voice, NewPipe, ytdlnis for podcasts, music, audiobooks and videos, , Catima for lojalty cards and tickets, some other apps. For downloading apps I am mainly using F-droid and Aurora store. I am not signed into the google account but I am using play services for push notifications and other compatibility reasons for apps which need it.

Thanks for everything you are doing, it's fantastic and I like it verry much.

Nostr event nevent1qqs8uq6pyase4luw5jdrkhwf32y2v70lynrnyuq3rtshwvae5ygvdpczyqqwld2s6pjufrfnrtxx9tpksdu0ymdkx7k0797cl5faqxecdgva55cyf8c

2025-09-12T19:49:07Z

Hello @[url=https://grapheneos.social/users/GrapheneOS]GrapheneOS[/url] screen-reader users and other #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=a11y]a11y[/url] friends,

There was an interesting debate going on at the end of may where screen reader users were asking for #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=tts]tts[/url] engine included with GrapheneOS base system.
[url=https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/114569769406507110]https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/114569769406507110[/url]

I understand this is very unlikely to change in the near future as I am not aware of a TTS system that is open-source and modern enough to be included.
@[url=https://mastodon.social/users/accessibleandroid]Accessible Android[/url] has a list of TTS engines sorted by language at this page: [url=https://accessibleandroid.com/list-of-languages-with-available-tts-engines-on-android/]https://accessibleandroid.com/list-of-languages-with-available-tts-engines-on-android/[/url]
Except of eSpeak-ng and RHVoice there is another opensource app called SherpaTTS that can use Piper TTS and Coqui based voices at: [url=https://github.com/woheller69/ttsEngine]https://github.com/woheller69/ttsEngine[/url]
Including eSpeak-ng, RHVoice, SherpaTTS and the list of TTS engines mentioned by accessible android, is there a viable TTS engine or at least one that is close enough to be viable to get included in the foreseable future?

Another approach I have been thinking about is to add / inject the TTS app or any other app I'd like as a part of the install process. It turns out I am not the only one speculating about that idea and it's not practical and feasible either as it's also breaking the security model.
It's been discussed recently at: [url=https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/25899-ability-to-installreplace-privileged-system-apps-for-user-freedom/9]https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/25899-ability-to-installreplace-privileged-system-apps-for-user-freedom/9[/url]

Another way on how to install an app on an android device would be using adb install from a computer. I am not definatelly sure on this but GrapheneOS does not allow enabling ADB on production builds. In order to instal a TTS app over ADB we'd need to find a way on how to install GrapheneOS with ADB preenabled on first run. This is a huge security hole as well.

There might be a way to build my own flavour of GrapheneOS, but that's too involved, I'd need very powerfull machine for the actual build process and I would again compromise security by either disabling or handling future updates on my own building each new release on my own.

So given the current state I am afraid we screen reader users are out of luck and there is no way to get this thing running on my own with no help from someone else.

The end result is that I'll either get security or I can look elsewhere to get accessibility.

Please am I getting it right or might I have overlooked something that might help me to install GrapheneOS on my own?

Thanks for reading to the end

@[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url] Hmm, I ...

2025-04-12T17:54:53Z

In reply to nevent1q…cnp4
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@[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url] Hmm, I can't get it to work no matter what I'm trying.
When I have started my $XDG_DATA_HOME environment variable was not set meaning it should fall back to the default ~/.local/share as per the XDG spec.
I have added it into my /etc/profile.d/0000-xdgdirs.sh file, rebooted, rebuilt delta-tauri with its dependencies but I'm still getting the same error.
Printing $XDG_DATA_HOME now gives me /home/myusername/.local/share, the directory does exist with 0755 permissions and it contains nested directories created by other apps on my system.
Is there a way to find out what the file path and the file name of the resulting log file should be?

@[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url] I am ...

2025-03-30T21:26:15Z

In reply to nevent1q…8s36
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@[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url] I am using gnome 48. I guess I might be missing something as I can reproduce it with various head positions e.g. 364932abf or 76ca7442e.
I am using rustc 1.85.1 through rustup 1.28.1
I am trying to follow arch packaging guidelines.
I am exporting this variables:
[code]
export RUSTUP_TOOLCHAIN=stable

[/code]
And also I have experimented with
[code]
CFLAGS+=" -ffat-lto-objects"

[/code]

Dear @[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url] I am ...

2025-03-30T20:46:49Z

In reply to nevent1q…f9tc
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Dear @[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url]
I am trying to build #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=deltatauri]deltatauri[/url] on ArchLinux and I have issues running the resulting binary.
Upon launch it prints:
[code]
Failed to setup app: error encountered during setup hook: current logfile does not exist

[/code]
I am removing all the targets except of deb, then building like normal and moving files into place.
[code]
sed -i 's/"targets"\: "all"/"targets"\: ["deb"]/' packages/target-tauri/src-tauri/tauri.conf.json5
pnpm install
cd packages/target-tauri
pnpm tauri build

[/code]
Can you please think of where I am failing likelly? I can run binaries built elsewhere so I guess webkit-gtk and other dependencies are installed.

Nostr event nevent1qqsymlnyxfl2uxag7el7xjdfww87u7hpkskcxkrdkvw0qprsp74k2pczyqqwld2s6pjufrfnrtxx9tpksdu0ymdkx7k0797cl5faqxecdgva5qrhlxe

2025-01-18T20:57:20Z

In reply to nevent1q…ammd
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@[url=https://mastodon.social/users/Davidsm]David[/url] @[url=https://fosstodon.org/users/treefit]treefit[/url] Looking into the #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=aur]aur[/url] there's deltachat-desktop-git which I think you can edit to point to that release very easily.
[url=https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/deltachat-desktop-git]https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/deltachat-desktop-git[/url]

Dear friends, ...

2025-01-08T20:59:35Z

Dear friends, #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=screenreader]screenreader[/url] users, #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=blind]blind[/url] users and #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=accessibility]accessibility[/url] professionals in particular.
Are you using chat over traditional email as provided by #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=DeltaChat]DeltaChat[/url] / #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=DeltaLab]DeltaLab[/url] / #[url=https://fedi.ml/search?tag=ArcaneChat]ArcaneChat[/url]?
I like it uses traditional email infrastructure, is federated, supports end to end encryption, rich content including audio / voice messages. I have even recognized @[url=https://mastodon.social/users/adbenitez]adb[/url] has implemented screen reader accessibility specific features into the android app.
However I have quickly tried electron based app on linux with orca screen reader, exchanged a few messages back and fort between two of my personal accounts using the DeltaChat app and thunderbird and I haven't found the user experience verry appealing. I can't understand how to effectivelly navigate in the list of conversations and list of messages.
Therefore I would be interested to hear a few comments from people knowing this platform better. How accessible is it on different platforms?
On the desktop is the electron based app a prefered choice?
Also some other questions. For the best experience, do I need a new email address or can I use my existing self-hosted one I have already configured in thunderbird?
Ffeel free to point me to a FAQ, some up to date introductory documentation if you think my questions don't make much sense please.