Re: Noobie questions about installing Debian for blind user
Susan,
> On Oct 19, 2023, at 11:41, john doe <johndoe65534@mail.com> wrote:
>
> On 10/19/23 03:19, Susan Fowle wrote:
>> My blind husband, Tom, has used very old Debian version Jessie on a very old machine for many years. Something finally broke or got corrupted.
>>
>> So we are planning to buy a new small computer (Kingdel Desktop Computer, Intel i5 CPU, 8GB RAM 256GB SSD, Intel HD Graphics 4400, 6xCOM RS232).
>
> 8GB of ram is quite low and RS232 quite unusual for a disktop even if
> you have a brail display that does not support USB.
One certainly can use many different usb to serial adaptors for connecting the braille display. If Tom is certain that he wants to continue using his doubletalk lt with speakup, the usb to serial route is not an option at this time. It's possible that he would like the espeak-ng software synthesizer with the espeakup connector to speakup, but this depends on his personal preference.
8gb of ram is a little bit low, but for the tasks you mentioned it's totally fine for years to come. If you went with 16gb of ram it wouldn't hurt, and it's hardly an expensive upgrade. Same with the storage.
Snip...
>> We plan to install Debian 12 stable (or possibly 11 if that turns out to be better for our needs).
>
> Debian 11 is old stable.
I don't see any reason why Debian 11 would be preferred over Debian 12. If there are issues report them as regressions.
>> Tom wants Debian to boot into the console/terminal, and plans to use GUI only for occasional web browsing. He uses a DoubleTalk speech synthesizer and Speakup, plus an Alva braille terminal -- the hardware requires COM ports, hence our choice of computer. He uses Mutt for email and text browsers Lynx, Links, etc.
>>
>
> For the sake of simplicity, I would suggest you to install with
> accessibility support enabled (will be Mate instead of Gnome).
> Links/w3m are fine but sometime Firefox or alike are useful as well.
> When Tom is more comfortable with Debian, he will be able to install
> Debian to his liking which is totaly possible without sighted help! ;^)
It seems like Tom wants to install Debian on the console using a virtual terminal, and I wouldn't steer him differently in this regard.
It might be interesting to have a discussion on the this list about the best practices of installing a desktop environment from the terminal.
>> What is the best way to start? debian-live-12.2.0-amd64-gnome.iso? Something else -- jigdo?
>>
>
> Look at the debian accessibility wiki, there is no need for you to mess
> with jigdo! :)
I forgot to mention in my previous mail, to forget completely about jigdo.
>
>> We have a copy on a flash drive of the data from the older machine (everything under /home). What is the best way of re-installing all this personal data after the system has been installed?
>>
>
> The best way to have a stable Debian is by not copying stuff from an
> older set up to a new one, unless Tom wants to learn Debian the hardway.
Clearly, someone will want there personal files, documents, app configurations, etc. I don't disagree that this can be tricky, but for the most part I've used the same configuration files for 22 years. Every time one upgrades from one release to another they should diff there config against the new one and see if there are any modifications that are required for similar functionality.
--FC
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