Vinux Changelog

What's new in Vinux 5.1

Jan 19, 2017
  • Up to date accessibility infrastructure.
  • Gnome-ORca 3.20 with updates available for 3.22
  • AT-SPI 2.20 with updates available for 2.22
  • Brltty 5.4
  • Speech-dispatcher 0.8.5
  • Liblouis 2.6.2
  • Firefox 48 with updates available to 5.0.1
  • Thunderbird 45.2 with updates available to 45.5
  • Unity 7.2.4
  • Gnome-shell 3.10.4
  • Mate 1.8
  • LibreOffice 4.2.8
  • Espeak 1.48
  • Evince 3.12.2
  • Clam av 0.98.7 with updates available to 0.99
  • Kernel 4.40 from Xenial

New in Vinux 5.0 (Nov 4, 2015)

  • New re-designed Vinux boot logo.
  • Up to date accessibility infrastructure.
  • Current Gnome-Orca and accessibility framework.
  • Improvements with Nautilus file manager when processing large folders.

New in Vinux 4.0 (Jun 1, 2013)

  • This is the first Vinux release featuring the Unity-2d Desktop which improves on transition to Vinux and introduces newer and increasingly stable accessibility features.
  • Some of the highlights in Vinux 4.0:
  • Brand new build process: Vinux now uses the same method to produce our
  • images as Cannonical produces Ubuntu.
  • Console speech just works. Much time and work has taken place to meet our blueprint goal https://blueprints.launchpad.net/vinux/+spec/vinux-4-functional-console-screen-reader
  • Voxin is easy to set-up. Vinux has taken one step further in making
  • Voxin easier to install.
  • Quantal kernel: We are using a newer 3.5 kernel back ported to Precise offering better hardware support than ever.
  • Classic menu. Vinux now has a Classic menu indicator which provides the old style menu whilst in a Unity environment.
  • Vinux wiki. Our community is highly committed to providing clear and easy to follow documentation. http://wiki.vinuxproject.org/
  • Vinux easy install scripts converted to meta packages.
  • Pico voices. We are shipping with the Pico voices once again.
  • Fixes:
  • Images now work on optical and USB media instead of separate builds in the past.
  • Weather indicator fixed, previously stopped working due to API changes.
  • Gnome login sound fixed, Ubuntu set to be disabled by default.
  • Fresh and clean sound theme added.
  • PC speaker beep removed from blacklist, console users can again use it.
  • Console branding. Vinux will identify itself at a virtual terminal and upon login offer tips of the day.
  • Flite and Pico now available as separate packages.
  • Cicero moved to a separate package also, will stop loss of speech from the curious.
  • Revised keyboard shortcuts.
  • Software:
  • unity-2d 5.14
  • LibreOffice 3.5.7
  • Speech-dispatcher 0.8
  • Gnome-orca 3.4.2
  • Espeak 1.47
  • Firefox 21.0
  • Thunderbird 17.0
  • Cry for help, remote assistance by Vinux gurus.

New in Vinux 3.0.2 (Mar 15, 2012)

  • Kernel 2.6.32.39.
  • Orca XDesktop 3.1.19.
  • Firefox 10.0.2.
  • Thunderbird 10.0.2.
  • Minor package changes as well as Vinux specific console branding grub configuration.
  • Vinux tips on console log in.
  • Orca Customizations and man text scripts thanks to StormDragon.
  • Easy install scripts optimized.
  • Extra system sound schemes added.
  • USB install script included.
  • Luke's speakup DKMS package included, you no longer need to run restorespeech after a new kernel is installed. Speakup automatically builds at kernel install.
  • Please be sure to leave Linux-headers-generic metapackage installed.
  • CFH, openssh and CPU frequency daemon installed by default.
  • Remastersys no longer deletes ssh keyss for remastering.
  • YASR is no longer included, encountered frequent errors and not used.
  • Removed ISO master and GTK record my desktop to insure the CD image is under 700 MB.
  • Vinux 3.0.2 manages extra sources with apt-add-repository, /etc/apt/sources.list.d contains stable Mozilla, vinux and more package archives.
  • The default desktop is Classic GNOME 2.x as you have come to expect from Vinux LTS releases.

New in Vinux 3.2.1 (Jul 8, 2011)

  • The main difference between this and the recently released Vinux 3.2 is that by default it boots with Pulseaudio running in 'user' mode rather than 'system' mode.
  • This prevents pulseaudio from crashing at boot on a small number of sound cards, but it means that speakup is not available from the live CD or immediately after installation. However there are now two simple commands for switching Pulseaudio from user to system mode in conjunction with a reboot of the machine.
  • This version also includes an accessible zenity front end for Unetbootin which allows users to install Vinux to a USB pendrive with persistent storage. Users who have already installed Vinux 3.2 can upgrade to this version quite easily without having to reinstall.
  • There are two new applications included in 3.2.1, usbinstall and cdburn. These are accessible scripts for installing Vinux to a USB pendrive and burning a CD/DVD and checking the md5sum of the burnt CD/DVD. They are still prototype scripts with no error checking so I have not included them in the menus yet, they must be launched by pressing alt+f2 and then typing usbinstall or cdburn - then pressing enter.

New in Vinux 3.2 (Jun 28, 2011)

  • I am happy to announce the release of Vinux 3.2 based on Ubuntu 11.04. this is a cutting edge release featuring the latest versions of Orca (3.1.2-xdesktop) and Speech-Dispatcher (0.8~2784+13~maverick1) from the daily build repos. This version is available as CD and DVD in both 32 and 64 bit editions. The DVD version provides the same software as the CD but with the addition of libreoffice and some non-free multimedia codecs etc. The default desktop is Classic Gnome 2.x but Unity is available from the GDM login screen if your video card supports 3D. This release includes the Pico TTS voices in addition to Espeak, the Epiphany Internet Browser and built-in keybindings to quickly organise multiple windows with x-tile. It also features some new packages including Orca-Teacher, Talking Clock and CDBurn. This version also plays a system bell when the isolinux boot screen appears allowing you to select different boot options including an experimental 'toram' mode. There is also a Vinux 3.2 PLUS edition which features lots of extra packages for partially sighted users:
  • I have managed to fit more text tools on the CD edition including: sox gpm screen, splitvt, figlet, cmatrix, txt2html, html2text, pdf2svg, pstotext, units mc, trash-cli, vrms, dict, sc, htop, linuxinfo, w3m, elinks-lite, urlview, finch, axel, calcurse, tdl.

New in Vinux 3.0 (Jun 1, 2010)

  • On behalf of the whole Vinux community I am happy to announce the 3rd release of
  • Vinux - Linux for the Visually Impaired, based on Ubuntu 10.04 - Lucid Lynx. This
  • version of Vinux provides three screen-readers, two full-screen magnifiers, dynamic
  • font-size/colour-theme changing as well as support for USB Braille displays. Vinux is
  • now available both as an installable live CD and as a .deb package which will
  • automatically convert an existing installation of Ubuntu Lucid into an accessible
  • Vinux system! In addition, we now have our own Vinux package repository (from which
  • you can install our customised packages with apt-get/synaptic) and a dedicated Vinux
  • IRC channel. In the very near future we will also be launching a Vinux Wiki and
  • releasing special DVD, USB and Virtual Editions of Vinux 3.0!

New in Vinux 2.1 (Nov 9, 2009)

  • I am happy to announce the release of Vinux 2.1 Leviathan! This is a monsterous hybrid of the Vinux CLI max edition, the standard GUI edition and a wide range of additional applications including Open Office 3.0, the Evolution mail client, the Inkscape vector graphics package, the Scribus desktop publishing tools, the Bluefish webpage editor, the Gambas 2 IDE as well as much more. Obviously not all of these extra tools are accessible to speech/braille users, but partially sighted users can access them with the screen magnifier. This is a very large ISO (1.7GB) so you will need a reasonably fast broadband connection to download it.

New in Vinux 2.1 (Nov 6, 2009)

  • I am happy to announce the release of Vinux CLI 2.1 which is now available in three different versions: The "dna" version is a minimal Debian system which only has five additional applications installed: the speakup screenreader the remastersys installer, the wodim iso burning tool and the aptitude package manager. It weighs in at just under 200MB and is aimed at advanced users who want to build their own customised installation and/or distribution from scratch. The "std" version is a standard Vinux CLI system with a range of basic desktop applcations including the lynx internet browser, the nano text editor, the mutt e-mail client, the midnight commander file manager and the pdmenu application launcher. This is just under 400MB in size and is aimed at intermediate users who may want to customise the standard version by adding extra applications. The "max" version is a full CD"s worth on command line applications containing as many useful desktop tools and utiliies that I could find in the Debian repositories. This aimed at users who want a ready made CLI system with all the bells and whistles! Both the "std" and max" editions have the Vinux single character command aliases and a menu system which allows uers to browse and run installed applications. Entering "m" will open the menu, entering "h" will bring up a help file which lists all of the keyboard shortcuts and installed applications. These new versions were all built with the new Vinux build script which is included in the /root folder of each edition. You can use this to install pre-selected suites of applications or modify it to build your own customised system. This is also available as a seperate download if you want to modify an existing version of Debian.

New in Vinux 2.0 (Oct 24, 2009)

  • The CLI edition comes in the form of an installable live CD which provides a console only version of Debian Lenny 5.03 with Speakup installed and enabled by default. This edition is aimed at intermediate and advanced users and perhaps beginners who want an easy introduction to the command line interface. It was inspired by GRML, but is aimed specifically at VI desktop users rather than sighted sysadmins. It comes with over a thousand packages installed covering all of the main categories: editors, browsers, mail clients, text-based games and lots of utilities etc. It also features over 60 single character command aliases for all of the most common commands.

New in Vinux 2.0 (Sep 2, 2009)

  • Vinux is moving away from Ubuntu and will use Debian as the foundation of the next release. Here is an explanation of why: In short, Debian is the world's largest community developed Linux, with over 25,000 pre-built packages. Debian hackers have gotten Debian to do just about everything for everybody. It's perhaps the world's best operating system for true hackers. Many in the Debian community believe fiercely that all software should be free, including source code. There are far more Debian contributors than Ubuntu contributors.
  • Ubuntu is based on Debian, like several other flavors of Linux, and Ubuntu benefits from all the innovation in Debian. Ubuntu takes Debian, and then changes it to be less of a hacker-optimized Linux, and more like an operating system for Windows users. It has better hardware support, partly because Ubuntu doesn't mind being friends with commercial software vendors who don't provide source code for free.
  • Vinux can be built on Debian, Ubuntu, or other Linux systems. The advantage of Debian is that it has clean, clear, simple, and robust audio support for accessibility. This is partly because the Debian community releases "stable" versions of their code that works with very good performance. The advantage for Ubuntu is that by default it comes with things to make life simple for regular Windows users, like network-manager - a tool many hackers despise. It also tends to "just work" with hardware better than any other flavour of Linux. The disadvantage of Ubuntu is that it is laser-focused on competing with Windows, and in doing so, it pushes out technologies before they are really solid, like the Compiz window manager with 3D effects, which does not yet work well with Orca, and pulseaudio which is causing havoc right now.
  • It is entirely natural for the blind community to prefer very stable software with good speech performance, where few problems are introduced when they do routine updates. It makes perfect sense to me to have Vinux based on Debian for these reasons. Once you get Debian running, you can expect it to run with few problems for years. On the other hand, the latest and greatest technologies are installed by default in Ubuntu's releases, so I find it better for debugging technologies coming down the road, like the Compiz window manager, pulseaudio, and whatever other new packages which will cause us grief in the future.
  • So, oddly enough, it seems Debian is better for building robust Vinux for most blind users, while Ubuntu is better for software developers focused on improving future accessibility.

New in Vinux 1.52 (Jul 13, 2009)

  • This is a minor update of 1.51 with backup-manager removed to prevent peoples hard drives filling up in the even they have a large number of multimedia files. There is no need to download this version if you already have 1.51 as you can just remove backup-manager by typing "sudo apt-get remove backup-manager" into a terminal. This version has been released for the launch of Vinux at the Sight Village Exhibition.

New in Vinux 1.51 (Jun 8, 2009)

  • Some Vinux users have found that the backup-manager application has filled up their hard drive if they have large files or a small hard drive. To stop this happening simply remove the program by typing "sudo apt-get remove backup-manager" into a terminal and this will prevent the hard drive filling up.

New in Vinux 1.51 (Jun 1, 2009)

  • I have released a patched version of Vinux 1.5 and Vinux 1.5 Plus with fixes for the two bugs I found shortly after releasing it. These were the lack of a keystroke to start/restart Orca and the fact that the desktop was switched off which prevented icons being drawn on the desktop and also caused problems for using sudo in the terminal. If you have already downloaded/installed 1.5 there is no need to download 1.51 you can just implement the following two fixes:
  • You can restore the Orca keystroke by pasting the following code into the .xbindkeysrc file hidden in your home directory. Open your home directory press ctrl+h to show hidden files, find and open the .xbindkeysrc file. Then between any two other entries paste/type in:
  • #Orca
  • "orca"
  • m:0x5 + c:32
  • Control+Shift + o
  • (The last two lines should be tabbed) This will add the Orca restart keystroke to xbindkeys and should be functional as soon as you save the file.
  • To turn the desktop back on open the Config Editor on the System sub-menu open the Apps>Nautilus>Preferences page and then check the Show Desktop entry. Then logout and back in again the problem will be gone.

New in Vinux 1.5.1 (May 29, 2009)

  • I have released a patched version of Vinux 1.5 and Vinux 1.5 Plus with fixes for the two bugs I found shortly after releasing it. These were the lack of a keystroke to start/restart Orca and the fact that the desktop was switched off which prevented icons being drawn on the desktop and also caused problems for using sudo in the terminal. If you have already downloaded/installed 1.5 there is no need to download 1.51 you can just implement the following two fixes:
  • You can restore the Orca keystroke by pasting the following code into the .xbindkeysrc file hidden in your home directory. Open your home directory press ctrl+h to show hidden files, find and open the .xbindkeysrc file. Then between any two other entries paste/type in:
  • #Orca
  • "orca"
  • m:0x5 + c:32
  • Control+Shift + o
  • (The last two lines should be tabbed) This will add the Orca restart keystroke to xbindkeys and should be functional as soon as you save the file.
  • To turn the desktop back on open the Config Editor on the System sub-menu open the Apps>Nautilus>Preferences page and then check the Show Desktop entry. Then logout and back in again the problem will be gone.

New in Vinux 1.5 (May 27, 2009)

  • New features include:
  • Speech-Dispatcher as the default speech server
  • YASR configured to use the Festival speech synthesiser
  • New shortcuts to start/kill Speech-Dispatcher (ctrl+shift+s and ctrl+shift+k)
  • Orca weather keystroke (insert+w) set to Birmingham UK (UKXX0018)
  • Larger fonts and higher contrast theme by default
  • Installation of the Firefox Accessibar plugin
  • Mousekeys enabled by default
  • Gedit's advanced plugins enabled by default and the Medibuntu repository enabled by default.
  • I have not yet implemented all of the features I wanted to include in this release. I have fitted as many features as I could on a CD sized image, but I could not fit on Emacspeak, LinuxSpeaks or support for foreign languages etc., in a 700MB image. I hope to release a "Vinux 1.5 Plus" edition shortly which will contain both of these extra accessibility packages, support for foreign languages and some more multimedia codecs etc. However this will obviously be larger than 700MB and will have to be burnt on to a DVD.
  • Vinux 1.5 will probably be the last release of Vinux based on Ubuntu as there are too many bugs in the latest release and their rapid and cutting edge release cycle means that it is not really a suitable base for creating a stable accessible distribution. So once I have released "Vinux 1.5 Plus", I am planning to switch to Debian as a base. I believe this will provide a much more stable platform in the long term.

New in Vinux 1.4 (Mar 25, 2009)

  • Security: Unlike previous versions Vinux 1.4 has been built from scratch
  • using the Ubuntu 'mini.iso' 10MB network installation which means it
  • contains all of the latest packages and security patches as of the day of
  • release.
  • Audible Boot Prompt: The Live CD now sounds the system bell three times
  • when the boot prompt appears on the screen, which then gives you thirty
  • seconds to type in any cheatcodes or boot options you require.
  • e.g. typing 'textonly' will boot into console only mode, you can then
  • type 'yasr' to start a console based screen-reader.
  • Braille Displays: The Live CD now supports a wide variety of serial Braille
  • displays in edition to the automatic detection of USB Braille displays.
  • In order to use a serial Braille display or a USB Braille display with a
  • different language table you simply have to type in a short code at the
  • boot prompt. e.g. 'alde' for an Alva Serial display using the German
  • language table, or 'alude' for an Alva USB display using the german
  • language table. There are a full list of cheatcodes included in the
  • 'cheatcodes_braille_displays.txt' on the CD. By default Vinux supports
  • USB Braille displays using the en_uk language table.
  • Talking Login Screen: Once installed espeak will now ask you to enter
  • your username and password when the login screen is loaded providing you
  • do not enable autologin during the installation process. It will not
  • however echo what you type, but if you enter the wrong username and/or
  • password you will be asked to enter them again. It is important that you
  • should not enable autologin if you are using a wifi connection as the keyring
  • manager workaround detailed below depends upon a manual login to work!
  • Keyring Manager Workaround: Vinux now includes a workaround of sorts for the
  • keyring manager which is currently inaccessible with Orca. We have set up a
  • pre-configured keyring password 'vinux' which is retained on both the Live
  • and a full install. This means that when you try to connect to a wifi
  • network and Orca stops speaking when the keyring manager password dialog box
  • opens, you simply have to type 'vinux' into this box and as long as
  • autologin is not enabled you will never have to enter the keyring password
  • again.
  • Lynx Fix: Lynx, Netrik and Firefox now use a local copy of the vinux.org.uk
  • homepage as their starting URL's by default which means that you can
  • open the broswers without problems whether you have an active internet
  • connection or not.
  • Menu Entries for Console Applications: I have added menu entries for some
  • of the extra console based applications provided in Vinux. This is to enable
  • beginners who may not know the names of these applications or their way around
  • the console to find and experiment with them more easily.

New in Vinux 1.31 (Mar 8, 2009)

  • This release contains a fix for the cups server problem which was still present in the 1.3 release. It was caused by the presence of two ssl keys Ubuntu added to beef up the security when using a cups server on an open network, and after discussions with frag the developer of remastersys, we came up with a solution which will be included in the next version of remastersys. If you have already downloaded version 1.3 and installed it then you can fix the cups server issue with three simple terminal commands: "sudo rm /etc/cups/ssl/server.crt", "sudo rm /etc/cups ssl/server.key"; and "sudo /etc/init.d/cups start";. This issue does not effect the 1.3 Live CD itself or a USB pendrive install. Sorry for any inconvenience caused!

New in Vinux 1.3 (Feb 23, 2009)

  • drbongo and ald0 are proud to announce the new release of Vinux - Linux for the Visually Impaired!
  • This release includes a variety of new packages and features, as well as solutions for bugs in earlier versions:
  • It includes a range of useful console applications and the yasr screen-reader, a selection of forensic/recovery tools so it can be used as an accessible recovery CD/USB pendrive by more experienced users. You can now install it straight to a USB pendrive using the Ubuntu USB installer, from the live CD or the ISO image once installed to hard drive. The username and password entered during the installation process is now retained and of course Orca, a full-screen magnifier and Braille support are all available out of the box!
  • Vinux 1.3 Keybindings etc - http://vinux.org.uk/downloads/1.3/
  • There is one known issue in this release, the cups server does not work when you install it to a hard drive, although it works fine from the live CD or a USB pendrive install. There is a very simple fix for this which you can implement once you have installed it if you want to print out any documents. There is a script which will do this for you, or you can simply type the four lines into the terminal using the sudo command!
  • Vinux Cups Fix Script http://vinux.org.uk/downloads/old/1.3/cupsfix.sh
  • If you have any questions or would like to give us feedback, please register on the Vinux Forum/Mailing List so as not to clog up these mailing lists with posts which may not be relevant to this mailing list.

New in Vinux 1.2 (Jan 18, 2009)

  • I am happy to announce that we have now rebranded Vibuntu as Vinux after discussion with Canonical about the use of the "buntu" suffix. They were happy to let us call it the Ubuntu VI Remix but we decided to go with Vinux which now recursively stands for Vinux Is Not Ubuntu but gnu/Linux! We have been busy creating a new website, mailing list and development blog and hope to have a new release out soon - Vinux 1.3!

New in Vinux 1.2 (Dec 12, 2008)

  • I am happy to formally announce the release of Vibuntu 1.2 and I feel that this is a significant release because I have now resolved the problem of Orca being unable to read admin apps launched from the menus and activated USB Braille Display autoprobing. This was achieved by simply changing the entries in the admin menu so they launched as an "application in terminal" using the sudo or gksu command when necessary. This simply opens a terminal, asks for the admin password if required and then runs the gui application. When you close the application the terminal closes automatically and focus is returned to the Orca window. The only exception to this is remastersys gui which for some reason does not retain focus, you have to alt+tab to move from the terminal to the remastersys gui. (This is a problem with remastersys rather than Orca/Gnome etc). Sighted or partially sighted users are advised to open the admin apps using the desktop icons which will run the admin applications in the standard way. (Thanks to Luke Davies for this suggestion) Of course this solution only works on top of the changes recommended on the Orca SysAdmin page.
  • I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to this project by offering feedback, suggestions and criticisms. I would especially like to thank Osvaldo La Rosa who has enthusiastically taken on the responsibility for hosting a Vibuntu webpage and mirroring the images. This will in all probability be the last release of the year as I now want to take stock of what has been done, make available a list of features/changes, instructions on how to create Vibuntu from scratch and a wishlist of possible new features divided into easy, difficult and impossible!
  • As ever I would appreciate continued feedback and suggestions. I will set up a thread on the Ubuntu Assistive Technology and Accessibility section for people to post their suggestions!

New in Vinux 1.1 (Dec 8, 2008)

  • The new release of Vibuntu is ready for download! It incorporates several significant improvements over the first version and a handful of small changes. Vibuntu is a remaster of the Ubuntu 8.10 "Intrepid Ibex" live CD customised to the needs of blind and partially sighted users! It is designed to boot from a live cd or USB memory stick, log you in automatically and then start up the Orca screen-reader. Full-screen magnification can then be activated with a simple keystroke.
  • IMPROVEMENTS:
  • Firstly I have resolved the problem of Orca not working with applications run with root permissions by following the recommendations posted on the official Orca website: i.e. I created an .orbitrc file for the root user, disabled the gksu keyboard grab and edited the sudoers file. This allows Orca to work with applications like the Ubiquity installer and the Synaptic Package Manager etc. However, the recommended way to launch these applications is to open a terminal by pressing "Ctrl+Shift+t" and then typing the name of the application e.g. "sudo ubiquity". The reason for this is that launching these applications from the panel menus or desktop icons produces inconsistent results. In other words sometimes Orca works and sometimes it doesn"t. Finding a way to solve this problem is still my top priority.
  • Secondly I have now merged the 2D and 3D versions of Vibuntu into a single .iso image. Vibuntu will now boot into the standard 2D magnification mode by default, however you can enable/disable the 3D magnification by simply clicking on a desktop icon or menu entry. This means that you can try the 3D version without any risk of major problems because if it doesn"t work or crashes the display you can simply disable the 3D effects or restart your xserver by pressing Ctrl+Alt+Backspace".
  • Some minor improvements include Braille support being enabled at boot, a slightly larger red mouse pointer to enhance its visibility on both dark and light backgrounds, some new keybindings to open a terminal "Ctrl+Shift+t", to open the home directory "Ctrl+Shift+h", to toggle window maximisation "Ctrl+Shift+m" and to toggle fullscreen mode "Ctrl+Shift+f".