Category: Geeks r Us
I knew it! There really is an ESpeak for DOS, and even better, it's already compiled!
http://www.freedos.org/freedos/news/technote/231.html
So, apparently, it's not just for the Windows versio of DOS but can work with FreeDOS as welln. Now to see if it'll work with Interface
http://acharya.iitm.ac.in/disabilities/software/jawsfordos.php
and JAWS for DOS
http://www.freedomscientific.com/fs_downloads/morejaws.asp
If so, then I'll have a practically perfect system and I won't need to worry about a hardware synth, though I'll still miss my KeyNote Gold. On the upside, ESpeak can recognize Greek, eliminating the need for Windows on that front, though I'll still return to it occasionally for the unbeatable Acapella Dimitris voice. And now I'll have a free pcmcia card slot and/or serial port. I just need to see if I can create some kind of hockey, or if one exists, so that I can easily switch languages. Not sure how I'd type at the prompt in a Greek keyboard. lol This will be so incredible if it works! Must try. But I must get a p.computer with a sound card first. loll Now that I'm bringing up the XP desktop I could try with a virtual machine. Need to put DOS onto floppies or cd though… Hmm. I also don't know what they mean about UnZip32. Do I need to find someone who uses Linux to help me with this, since it's a Linux binary of ESpeak that I need to download. I've never done this.
I remember you and I having a conversation about you looking for a dos-based web browser. I asked you how you go about that and you answered with "you kick and scream."
Now I must ask:
Why do you want to use all this stuff for dos?
Just wondering.
Because she wants to live in the past. I really don't think theirs a better reason for it.
Keep at it girl! Smile.
Pritty much, she just believes its going to be the best thing she could ever have (once its working, we've hurd this clame before.) But, from everything I've seen, she's just going threw the motions, not truely linking everything she's learned into one cohesive unit of information and action. So, until she enternalizes it all, not just looks for solutions to bring it up to par with her requirements (modernize) I fermly believe she will remain stuck in a rut. What good are pieces to a puzzle if one can't make them all fit together? Just my thoughts.
Still, I wish you well, on your truely pointless project. Who knows, you could create something that will change peoples lives and make you happy but, if you think you've got a snowballs chance in hell then, you really need to get a machine running and put all the pieces together.and you've got a verry verry long hard rode ahead of you.
Okay, that was a harsh, and dare I say, pointless post. I was just trying to make the point that such toys of the past suck. As a programmer it is laughable to think that this stuff is in any way good for anyone. I am not attacking you Tiff, just giving you my humble view of the matter.
Now that I have my XP machine up here, I can at least get some version of DOS running in a virtual machine or just partition it and install it that way. I found out that the program that I need to put Enhanced DR-DOS on a floppy is called makedisk.exe. It can be done from cd too but that's a bit more complicated. So I can finally get to play with all this stuff and see what works and what doesn't. The only thing is I either need sighted assistance or I need to figure out how I'm gonna do this on my own. I might install to one of my cf cards via usb, since I found instructions on that.
http://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/177704-dos-on-usb-flash/
It'll take a little tweeking and a driver install but if it works with a screen reader, it'll be worth it. Then, the only sighted assistance I'll need is installing my DOS reader. At any rate, this will give me good practice while I save up the money for my laptop. *smile*
I just remembered that I also have QuickBasic 4.5 on that machine, so I can just work off the Windows command prompt for now so that I can finally start my lessons. then, once everything is properly installed, I can play with the multitasker and see how well it works! I like this. *smile*
I keep insisting that your local computer shop, or maybe college computer department could be that sighted assist. They'll put it all together. It won't work mainstream, if it did it still be for sale on the stores shelves, but as a plaything cool!
It's interesting but I question the practicality.
hmm, get a coppy of VMware or another virtualization cliant on that XP machine. With VMware, its easy to set up a virtual machine with lets say a virtual 1gb hdd, 64 mb ram and all that. From there, I'm sure you could install an ISO of Inhanced DR-Dos and play around from there. If you've aflopy drive, or cd drive, it should be easy at that point to install all you should need.Once you've got USB drivers, I'll bet your work will get easier.
Have fun hobbying around and tell me what you try on the virtual end.
So it'll see my floppy drive and ports? Will it talk as I install the os and screen reader or will it be like installing them natively? Bravo. I like that! I'm not sure how much use for the usb drivers I'll have other than for my Muvo T100 for music and my Kingston compactflash card for documents etc, since the desktop, of course, doesn't have a pcmcia card slot.
Sorry. No clue why The Zone did that.
If I go with VmWare, which version is the most accessible?
Come on now girl! This is your baby. You have to tell us? hahaha
i know nothing about virtual machine software. I saw several versions of Vmware so don't know which to download. As for DOS, itm definitely starting with Enhanced DR-DOS. And more good news. Spiros won a truly beautiful laptop that I found for him on Ebay, so he's giving me his old one. It's terrible for XP, but with a 363 mhz processor, it's wonderful for DOS, and it's got a cd rom, a serial, a parallel and a usb 2.0 port, a pcmcia slot, and I believe, ethernet as well. the only really bad thing is that it doesn't have a floppy drive. So I'm either gonna have to get an external or put DOS onto something else, like a cd or my compactflash card. Still, this is a golden opportunity and I'm gonna take it. Just have to wait for him to give it to me. In the meantime, I've gotta figure out how I'm gonna do this. I could buy the cd too and then install the patches. I like that. Then, I've gotta see what sound card this laptop has... *smile*
Okay. Found some instructions and need to clear up a few quick things.
"Note: DR-DOS can co-exist with Windows 95. However, it cannot be installed with Windows 95 running: you must start your computer in MS-DOS mode."
Of course, this computer has XP. But I want to format it so that it has no operating system on it. Will it still be able to read from a cd rom drive without an os installed? If I were to keep XP on it, just until DR-DOS is on the machine, can I even start in a DOS mode? I didn't think XP supported that.
"DR-DOS cannot be installed in the same disk partition as a FAT32 drive. If you are unsure, ask your PC manufacturer."
I'm pretty sure that I can tell XP to format the drive as Fat16. As a sidenote, Enhanced DR-DOS has overcome this and can now support Fat-32. However, that's only with the patches installed. If I plan on doing this from the bootable DR-DOS cd, from the original manufacturer, it won't have those patches.. And what is the difference between those kinds of drives anyway?
Think I found a work-around… sort of.
"To install on a Windows 95 computer with no DOS-based CD-ROM driver:
1. With Windows 95 running, copy the files from the DRDOS directory on the CD-ROM to a directory on your hard disk.
2. Restart your computer in MS-DOS mode.
3. Change to the directory with the DR-DOS files.
4. Type INSTALL Enter."
Um, that's fine, but then I'd need to partition the drive right? I might need to do that anyway, since I'm not sure how large it is. But keeping the other part for XP is pointless. So basically, I could have two drives for DOS to see, one with the os and the other with my stuff? If so, then I can do that with Windows and maybe even install DOS onto that partition accessibly, since NVDA could read from the Windows DOS prompt. Once I install the patches to make it turn into Enhanced DR-DOS, it will be able to access much larger drives. Is it possible for me to change that partition so that the os will see only one large drive?
I hope it doesn't install the Windows Utilities and dual boot files, since I won't need them. Anyway, I found all of this here.
http://www.drdos.net/documentation/qkstart/02ugch2.htm
This is also the main manual for DR-DOS. So I'll be accessing it a lot.
Geez, and to think I was having trouble with finding out how to put Debian onto my jup drive. You have fun with this.
hmm, is it possible to install from the disc/ or do all those files need to be coppied before hand. If its possible to install from the disc, you're going to need to remove xp from the system makeing sure the bios knows there is no XP so it won't attempt to boot it. Then, reformat the HDD with a partition manager to fat 16 and install your OS.
This won't be blind friendly...
Neither are most Linux or Unix installs...:) But seriously, at least with Linux and Unix you can get help with accessibility, and the accessibility for Linux or Unix works for the most part.
True, She really would gain much more from linux of some type.
I feel almost like someone's trying to convert me to a new religion, only slightly less annoying here. I'm not switching to Linus. lol Anyway, yes. It can be installed directly from the cd, which they still sell. How do I insure that the Bios knows that there's no XP on there? If it helps, this machine was most likely originally made for 95/98 and XP was probably put on afterword. I say that cause of it's slow speed, but could be wrong. I found out today that it's a Dell Latitude of some kind, and I know that these can definitely handle DOS, so that's a very good thing. So yeah, once I delete XP from there, what did you mean about a partition manager? Wouldn't I need to have an os installed in order to use software that could partition the drive? If it's of a decent size, do I still need to partition it?
It's an x, not an s, unless you're trying to spellout Linus the creater of Linux's name. The reasons many of us, myself included are saying for you to at least give linux a try is because accessibility is built in, and you can install it from the CLI (Command Line Interface), aka shell if you want. Not trying to get you to "convert" in a religious sense, just trying to save you from possible failure. On that note, Ubuntu 10.04 and Vinux 3.0 which is directly based on it are working hard on Orca accessibility. It is almost as fast as a Debian 5 install with Alsa only and the GNOME desktop, no PulseAudio. I elieve that Orca doesn't have long to go before it matches or surpasses Windows screen readers or Voice Over for the Mac. If anyone has constructive stuff to say that differs from the views expressed above, no flames please. Then do so.
I actually spelled it with nx but the stupid Mac changed it. Yet another wonderful thing about Snow Leopard. *sigh* Does that all the time.
Yeah, I'd like some "constructive stuff" that actually answers some of these questions. lol I thought that these would be fairly easy for people who are really into tech. Looks like I've gotta either Google again or ask on another forum. I'm just really getting excited here cause I'm so so close to finally installing my os it's crazy. and if ESpeak really does work, which was the original topic of this thread, it'll make things so much easier. *smile* The only drawback is that it will limit me to using JAWS and I'm not sure if that's the best screen reader or not. Ah well, I'll see.
You! Guys! She is doing Dos. That is what she wants.
Now to your question. You'll need to remove XP, because it will boot. If you do a dual boot it will always be an issue, or conflict. When installing any OS is is best to reformat, so not blind friendly, but best. Continue. Your hot! Smile.
I'm not sure but I think you should format your hard drive from your dr dos cd, there should be a format command.
Ah okay! So that's how it's done! *smile* It says the cd is bootable, of course. So I should boot into DOS and then do format c: or is there another switch that I'd need to use here? I need to make sure it formats as Fat-16, but if I'm doing it from the cd itself, I'm sure it would do that.
yes, you either format the drive with the OS install, or you get a partition manager (a program running on a live cd moste likely that will allow you to creat, delete and format/reformat partisions.) and I know she's not switching, Spike just said she should, I agreed, don't get all pissy as I wasn't attempting to flame.
If the OS can format easily, this will be the easier way to go. I'd review/obtain exact install command options so you could know exactly what needes to be done once you start the process.
Hmm, I'll see if there are partition instructions or if there's a utility on there. If not, perhaps I can get Partition Magic or something. Yeah, I didn't see any flaming. *smile* It's just that everyone seems to want to get me to switch. Some, and I'm not saying you, but some people leave comments only about Linux, which do absolutely nothing to help me in my quest.
Talk about stubbornness!