Linux GUI FAQ/tutorial?

[trev.saunders at gmail.com]

Hi,

> From: <trev.saunders at gmail.com>
> > Personally I prefer yasr to speakup, and like vim as an editor.  vi m 
> > works well with yasr, and is useable with speakup.
> 
> Well, maybe my espectations are wrong because they are based mostly on my 
> Linux - cli experience in a SecureCRT console from Windows, but I was lost 
> each time vi started as a default editor.
> 
> To be more specific, I would like to be able to use an editor that lets me 
> to use the arrow keys to read the text line by line and word by word and 
> char by char with up and down arrows, control+left and right arrows, or 
> simply the left and right arrows,

the arrow keys work as expected in vim, unlessyou are at the top / bottom / end of a line at which point the default behavior is to beep.  Was this perhaps the windows screen reader not handling ncurses correctly?
BTW when you get used to it using h j k l as the navagation keys is very convienent.

>  allow me to select the text using the 
> shift key, selected text that can be read by the screen reader when I want 
> to, to be able to copy/paste the text from a program into another with a 
> simple combination of key, 

I generally use screen which has acopy function that works well with vim,Vim has it's own internal copping  system if you want to copy internally, If you would like to copy using the x clip board gvim might be better, (this is not a problem I care about much).

> execute the currently open program source code 
> with a specified interpreter that also offers me the possibility of 
> specifying some parameters, 

vim can do this with :!.  I tend to write the file with vim and switch to a different shell in screen and use that to run the code.  

> find/replace using regular expressions with a 
> simple combination of keys, and very few other things.

I feel like there is a way to do this in nano, but I don't remember what it is.  Ireally like vim for this because it supports the same s/// operater as perl php etc.  I believe gedit can do this too.

> 
> I ask if these are possible, because as I said, when vi was opened in an SSH 
> console and I tried to use the arrow keys, I used to hear only some beep 
> sounds, without beeing able to read anything, and instead of giving 
> combinations of keys for exiting/saving like Control+S, Control+Q or 
> something like that, I needed to type simple text commands like ":", which 
> is very strange for a modern editor.

certianly the way vim works is different from gedit / notepad etc, howeverthis makes it very powerful.  it sounds like you might want an IDE?  If so I would suggest taking a look at eclipse it was reasonably ccessible under linux atleast so far as my one quick look went.

> 
> > I think by far the best option is mutt.
> 
> I guess mutt is accessible under Linux. I have tried a Windows version that 
> had big accessibility issues.
> Is mutt able to create/display html mail messages?
> Can it group the messages by conversation? Can we define more folders and 
> rules for moving the messages automaticly in those folders based on some 
> conditions?
> I guess the answer is yes, but I want to know what I should expect.
> 

I'm currently using nmh, but considering moving to mutt.  I suspect the problem on windows like vim is an ncurses issue (windows screen readers atleast in my experience sock at ncurses.)  I believe all of the features are supported.

> > agreed, bash makes a pretty excellent file manager.
> 
> Well, for some tasks yes. I would be very happy if Windows command prompt 
> would have the features of bash. But for some tasks a file manager like 
> Windows Explorer is much better, but it is good if there is one for Linux 
> also.

the gnome thing seems to be accessible, the like 1 time I used it.

> 
> However as I said, my biggest fear remains the text editor. Under Windows 
> there is no text editor without issues. The best is TextPad, but it doesn't 
> fully support UTF-8 which is very bad.
> I have tried tens of editors under Windows and all of them have issues, but 
> under Linux I think I don't have so many editors to choose unfortunately.

as discussed there are several editors that are accessible (vim, emacs, gedit, nano ...) the question is if any of them work the way you like,  From what you seem to be looking for I think you may want to use eclipse.  (I can't believe I just said that).

HTH
Trev


> 
> Octavian
> 
> 
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