Keyboard Accessibility Audio Feedback

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Keyboard Accessibility Audio Feedback
by D.A. on Sunday 25/Sep/2005, @15:21

I realize many people in the 'nix world view keyboards differently than people using Windows and Macs, but one KDE accessibility tool I have yet to find that has existed in Windows for 15 years is a simple audio beep when toggling Caps Lock, Num Lock, and Scroll Lock. Some people debate the usability of those keys, but many people still find them useful.

I think GNOME has this tool and I wonder why KDE does not. Additionally, the Insert Key needs the same toggle beep. That key often is used to toggle between Insert and Overwrite mode. Yes, I realize that with 'nix users Shift-Insert is still popular for pasting text, and the audio beep should sound only when the Insert key is toggled without a modifier key.

Slowly the past couple of years I have been migrating to GNU/Linux and I especially enjoy KDE, but the lack of this audio feedback often frustrates me. Seems if the code already exists in GNOME that adapting that code to KDE should be straightforward for the heady KDE developers. I hope. I wish. With each release I keep waiting for this accessibility tool. Will version 3.5 finally be the one or will I continue to wait?

Related Links

·   Articles on Accessibility
·   Also by D.A.
·   Contact author

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Re: Keyboard Accessibility Audio Feedback
by cm on Sunday 25/Sep/2005, @21:55

I think your chances of getting that wish fulfilled would increase if you headed over to http://bugs.kde.org/ and entered it as wishlist entry.

Just register and report it as bug with severity "wishlist" (or vote for the already existing entry, if any).

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Re: Keyboard Accessibility Audio Feedback
by Olaf Jan Schmidt on Monday 26/Sep/2005, @06:59

The feature is already part of kdeaccessibility 3.4. It shows the modifier state in panel, and it can be configured to beep when the state changes. Or it can open a passive popup and read out a message via text-to-speech.

Just add the Keyboard status applet to the panel. Then you can enable the beeps or passive popups in KControl (Sound & Multimedia / System notifications). Text-to-speech can then be configured under Regional & Accessibility / Speech Synthesis.

Olaf

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