Accessibility

[TomVal]

Hello,

I'm a music teacher, my eyes are anything but good. When I create music, I can't constantly hunt for a mouse pointer, so I'd like to be able to just use my PC keyboard for creating new music. Is this possible in LMMS? Is there any effort to make LMMS accessible for people with low vision, who still can use their sight, but not as much as sighted people? Is it possible to enter music in Musescore way? Are various panes accessible for keyboard-only navigation? Is there an alternate interface for VST plugins, accessible for people who can't use a mouse comfortably? You know, constant hunting for a mouse pointer is real pain for my eyes.

You might want to adapt LMMS for 7" Windows tablets, so that we, people with low vision, could use such layout on our 20"+ screens to get everything comfortably large

[musikbear]

i support you, but unfortunately, lmms is not able to accommodate 'keyboard-only' UI.
The mouse is very much a part of lmms - What could be done maybe, was some possibility to customice the mouse-icon, allowing it to be better visible for sight-impaired users.
This is something i like to take further.
Thank you for your input!

[TomVal]

Well, as I said, my eyes hurt if I have to hunt for a mous pointer too long. I have to be only less than an inch away of the screen if I have to use a mouse. So that means heavy hunting for a mouse pointer is quite neck-intensive as well. And since I can see only a little section of a screen at a given time, it means working with mouse is like this:

1. Locate the control you wish to manipulate, often moving my head
2. Locate the mouse pointer, which is left somewhere on screen.
3. Move the mouse pointer to a desired control, being very close to a mouse pointer.

Can you imagine having such a workflow for several hours??? My eyes (and neck) would be very sore.

So it's quite weird - sound is a natural means of self-expression of blind people, but sound manipulation software is heavily mouse oriented, thus inaccessible for such people. Very sad

[musikbear]

Can you imagine having such a workflow for several hours??? My eyes (and neck) would be very sore.
So it's quite weird - sound is a natural means of self-expression of blind people, but sound manipulation software is heavily mouse oriented, thus inaccessible for such people. Very sad :(

100 % agreed. I will take your input to the hub, where development and features are discussed and decisions are made. Currently a lot of the focus in development is on the core, and i am afraid that it will be hard to find time for a keyboard-only UI version, at the moment. But i promise, that i will do my best.

[musikbear]

@TomVal - i have to ask you if you know about lmms' capability to 'record' played notes, in piano-roll?
If you read "Playback & Record" here: https://lmms.io/documentation/Piano_Roll_Editor
The buttons for this
Are the 2 in the middle
You should use a high 'Q' value, when you 'record' / catch notes.

I also made a video some time back, that explain how to replay, and make live changes in a song :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFy8tipBbB8

I can also tell you that i have raised the request on hub, and it is now in the 'melting-pot', so to speak
What would help us, would be if you could describe the minimum design and workflow, that would make lmms usable for sight-impaired users.
If you can give us a good understanding of this, it will be much easier to assess the development and workload involved, and to design the UI.

[tresf]

@TomVal,

Your concerns are well received. Unfortunately we lack the development resources to put any serious time table on this request, but your request has been filed in our tracker where you can subscribe and receive update notifications.

Also, we have an outstanding request for better note control via keyboard input here:

https://github.com/LMMS/lmms/issues/1421

and your bug report:

https://github.com/LMMS/lmms/issues/1935

I anticipate we'll eventually consolidate these into an "umbrella" accessibility topic and link to the related topics (as we have for similar sized initiatives).

In the mean time, if you know anyone with coding experience that can get involved to help make this happen, we'd love to show them the code.

-Tres

[TomVal]

@musikbear It's not only about note entering, but generally about navigating within the project, navigating within various windows, entering values comfortably, a good event view editing mode with adjustable font size(s), etc. I prefer step editing more than real-time input.

[TomVal]

Thanks for your interest. I was googling about lmms and accessibility, nothing relevant could be found, so I resolved to express myself here. You know, I'm in desperate search of good music making tool, which won't hurt my eyes excessively, and the situation is very, very unpleasant.

@TomVal,

Your concerns are well received. Unfortunately we lack the development resources to put any serious time table on this request, but your request has been filed in our tracker where you can subscribe and receive update notifications.

Also, we have an outstanding request for better note control via keyboard input here:

https://github.com/LMMS/lmms/issues/1421

and your bug report:

https://github.com/LMMS/lmms/issues/1935

I anticipate we'll eventually consolidate these into an "umbrella" accessibility topic and link to the related topics (as we have for similar sized initiatives).

In the mean time, if you know anyone with coding experience that can get involved to help make this happen, we'd love to show them the code.

-Tres

Unfortunately, I don't know any person good in coding, who could understand music making tools as well. I really wish I could help in this direction.