[OTR-users] Using OTR clients for visually impaired users?

[Ian Goldberg]

On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 03:45:33PM -0700, Mike Wirth wrote:
> Folks,
> 
> I work with several visually impaired engineers here at Adobe Systems (on
> ways to make Acrobat PDF files more accessible to the blind, of course).  We
> have an internal Jabber server, which is normally used for work-related IM
> traffic, and which is also available when offsite (over VPN).  But of the
> known IM clients, the only one which is accessible to blind users (via
> screen reader software, e.g., JAWS on Windows) is AIM.
> 
> One solution for us to communicate might be to use AOL IM accounts.  But
> this exposes work-related traffic to the open Internet.  Therefore, I¹d like
> to use OTR to encrypt the AIM traffic to and from the AIM server.
> 
> Additional complications:
> * I¹m typically running Adium on a Mac at my end which shouldn¹t be an issue
> for OTR and which allows me to talk to people on the internal Jabber server,
> as well as AOL IM, simultaneously.
> * Both I and the blind user may be remote, i.e., connected via VPN, which
> may complicate the proxy configuration.
> 
> My questions:
> 1. Is there a Jabber client which is ³accessible² (i.e., usable via a screen
> reader)?  If so, this would be the simplest solution.
> 2. If not, and we have to use AIM, what¹s the appropriate OTR setup?
> Something like:
> 
> <blind user>---<JAWS on a Windows machine, running AIM>---<OTR/SOCKS
> proxy>---<VPN>---<local net connection>---.....
> 
> {Internet}...----<AIM server>---...{Internet}...<local net
> connection>---<VPN>---<Mac, running Adium with OTR>---<me>
> 
> Any advice would be appreciated,

Interesting question.  Would a command-line OTR-aware client like climm
be easier for a screen reader to handle?

   - Ian