console screenreader (using /dev/input and /dev/vcsa)

Jos Lemmens jos at jlemmens.nl
Fri Dec 28 21:26:45 UTC 2007


Hi Chris,

A few years ago I already made a console screen reader. I've called
it screader. It is based on the Screen package:

   AUTHORS
      Originally created by Oliver Laumann, this latest version was  produced
      by Wayne Davison, Juergen Weigert and Michael Schroeder.

You can find more about screader at:

   http://www.jlemmens.nl/homepage/uk/screader.html

This package was debianized by Denis Barbier <barbier at debian.org> on
Tue, 12 Nov 2002 21:37:23 +0100.
I don't use screader myself for I've written a driver for my Alva
braille terminal with speech build in.
    Regards,

        Jos.

On Fri, Dec 28, 2007 at 03:07:10PM -0600, C.M. Brannon wrote:
> Hi list,
> I want to write a user-space screenreader for the console.  It would
> run as a daemon process.  The program would read screen output from
> /dev/vcsa.
> Screenreader programs also need to be able to intercept keystrokes,
> such as those used for reviewing the screen.  Keyboard events can be
> intercepted through the /dev/input/event0 device provided by newer
> 2.6.x versions of the Linux kernel.  I think it is possible to prevent
> applications from receiving the screen review keystrokes using the
> EVIOCGRAB ioctl and uinput device.  That is, the screen reader daemon
> obtains exclusive access to the stream of keystroke events using
> EVIOCGRAB.  Keystrokes that perform review functions are interpreted
> by the screenreader, and the remaining keystrokes are forwarded back
> to the console using uinput.
>
> Given these two features of the Linux kernel, a user-mode console
> screenreader seems viable.
> Is anyone else interested in this effort?
>
> Merry Christmas and happy New Year,
> -- Chris                                         
>
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