FOSS and Disabled Communities Out of Touch

Yinepuhotep writes "Newsforge has a thought-provoking article on the lack of communication between the FOSS community and disabled persons." From the article: "How can the FOSS community address the issues of the disabled? The most urgent task is to improve documentation. Perhaps you can make it a personal goal to be able to configure your favorite FOSS tool blindfolded while someone reads your improved instructions aloud. Your local LUG could organize ways to connect volunteers to assist disabled users with installations. Be sure to contact local disability rights groups to let them know what you're doing. They may also be able to provide more feedback about needs in your community."

Slashdot Editor's Being Un-PC

[MSTCrow5429]

FOSS and Disabled Communities Out of Touch

The article headline is a bad joke, right?

What we need is more disabled OSS developers...

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

... poke an OSS developer in the eyes today!

Just to be crass and insensitive

[nickgrieve]

The FOSS community has enough trouble getting things working for the able bodied let alone the disabled...

rimshot

thanks, I am here all week... tip your waitress...

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

"open source zealot" and "software engineer" are two entirely different occupations.

Re:Not surprising

[MSTCrow5429]

Trigun, don't feed the anoynmous trolls! And being an extreme-right winger myself, disabled users sounds like a great underexploited market niche.

Re:Gimme, Gimme, Gimme

[geminidomino]

Guide to Emacspeak...

Forcing the blind to use emacs goes beyond discrimination and into just plain cruel. ;)

Re:Gimme, Gimme, Gimme

[Anonymous Coward]

Blind person installing photoshop.. interesting.

Re:someone needed to read it aloud?

[stebe]

I am all for these man pages that read themselves aloud. Sometimes it is just so hard to muster the proper indignation needed to tell a blind newbie GSTRTFMTY (Get Someone To RTFM To You).

Re:Slashdot Editor's Being Un-PC

[UltimateRobotLover]

Yes! We're all individuals!

Re:Slashdot Editor's Being Un-PC

[Mindwarp]

I'm not!

Blind people rock

[caffeination]

Less serious than my other comment, I've just found this gem in a page about how a CLI is better for the blind [eklhad.net]:

If you watch a sighted Linux user for an hour, you will notice that he spends most of his time in screen applications.

Seems even the visually impaired have trouble catering for themselves all of the time. Either that or this guy's got a very subtle sense of humor.

Re:someone needed to read it aloud?

[sznupi]

On the bright side, one is shielded from effects of goatse then...

Re:This is a tough place for developers to be in..

[Anonymous Coward]

A tough place?
Just follow the new GNOME path: remove all useful GUI-accessible options and features, and make people edit text files and registries instead, and BAM you're "user friendly". Take this to the extreme, and it should suit disabled people.

Or is there something wrong with the "logic" behind the GNOME HIG? :)