I’ve used XFCE, Gnome, and MATE, I’ve found GNOME best for my accessibility needs. I has carrot tracking in it’s screen magnifier. It works on certain apps. The thing is, I don’t like GNOME’s default workflow. I know it’s possible to install an extension to make it more like MATE. I may dual-boot on my current machine and give it another shot. The other issue I have is that Orca, Linux’s GUI screen reader doesn’t highlight words. It’s designed for totally blind Linux users.

I’d love to. There’s already a good write up by a blind user. However visually impaired users and those with chronic illnesses have needs that are a little different.

Years ago it looked like an accessible Linux desktop would be a thing. You had distros like Vinux. It was especially patched for the needs of disabled folks. I recall it being Ubuntu based. When I tried it I was very impressed. It had a fully accessible installer amd screen magnification. This was back in the days of Gnome 2.

Unfortunately the MATE desktop has been neglected, and as a result has neglected accessibility. Right now full screen magnification is done in a very hacky way by enabling compiz and using the enhanced desktop zoom plugin. One of the big problems with screen magnification under Linux is that except for it GNOME 42., there is no carrott tracking. I e. The screen magnifier does not track the cursor when one is typing. You have to manually move the mouse to keep your text from going off screen. This is simply ridiculous to put it frankly.

As far as the needs of chronically ill folk, speech recognition is primary. We need reliable speech recognition so that when we’re having a bad pain day we can still write. And use our machine. Under Windows I’ve used Dragon Naturally Speaking. The speech recognition is par none. They’re pretty much the standard in the industry. You install the software. and after a short training You are able to pull up MS Word and write with your voice seamlessly. Think of Dragon as the Photoshop of speech recognition.

I totally love LibreOffice. I have installed on my machine now. The problem is it doesn’t support the Windows accessibility API. Or at least it didn’t back in the XP days. Of course it does support the GNOME accessibility API. I’ve always had good luck getting Orca to play nice with Libre office under Linux. Orca is a screen reader. However it’s designed for totally blind folks.

I use ZoomText under Windows. It’s a screen reader specifically designed for the visually impaired. It has a ton of great features. And it also gets the basics right. Is it proprietary well yes. It also cost a pretty penny. I got access to it and Dragon through a non-profit the center for accessible technology.

Sorry for the typos I wrote this on mobile.