[manjaro-dev] mexican standoff. Both calamares and thus aren't usable at the moment

[kendell clark]

hi all
Subject line pretty much says it all.  I'm in the final stages of our
2016.6 release, just making sure there are no major bugs and that all
programs work as they should before releasing our new sonar release.
However I'm against a wall. The thus installer has bugs people don't
want to fix because, very understandably, you guys have switched away
from it and want to drop it. I understand this, really I do, and I'd
love to switch over to calamares with you and be done with it. But
calamares isn't accessible yet until it runs completely as whichever
user starts it and uses proper privilege  escalation techniques for the
parts that need it. Pam or policy kit or whatever is the best to use. If
it runs as root, orca can't get at it. That's just how things work for
us. Thus has a bug where it freezes completely just after the keyboard
layout screen and so you can't use it to install. I can't release sonar
in this state, something has got to be done. At this point I'm so
frustrated I don't really care which installer is used, so long as I
have one that I can use. I'm not frustrated at you guys either, I want
to make that very clear. You guys go above and beyond what I could
expect every day, especially since most of you don't need accessibility
software and could easily blow me off. No, I'm frustrated because
although I've said time and time and time and time again that the
problem of root apps being inaccessible needs to be fixed and fixed
soon, I get blown off. The answers are different but everyone either
says that they don't know what's causing it or to just use gnome shell
and you won't have to deal with it. I'll put this in perspective.
Imagine using a computer with the screen broken. You can't turn the
screen on because the power button is broken. But the screen is only
broken for some apps and not others. That's what we experience. Apps run
as root are completely blank. Orca can't see them. I think magnification
tools and on screen keyboards might be able to get at them so the
situation isn't quite dire, but a large portion of linux's disabled
community is blind, so uses orca. Would someone please help me? The
complaints aren't too bad yet, but the longer I have to delay the more
"I'll just switch back to windows because it just works, this distro is
useless" comments I'm going to get. I'll file whatever bugs I need to,
help however I can. I don't expect anyone to do this for me. But I need
someone who knows more than I do to step in and help. I know teo is
working on calamares and he's willing to put the significant amount of
work in to make it accessible, which is fantastic. Thus though ... I
don't know. It's getting more and more unreliable and I completely
understand why people want to drop it. It doesn't do all of what
calamares does and calamares is just a better installer. The people I'm
speaking of that I'm frustrated with are the orca community and the
various desktops I file bugs against. Gnome shell gets around this whole
issue somehow. Mate suffers from it though. If I'm being annoying, just
let me know and I'll moderate my tone. This is partially my own fault, I
put off working on sonar until the time schedule got so tight I had to
do it. I need to reinstall myself, which is what led me to notice the
thus issues.

Thanks
Kendell Clark