Avoiding prompt if no sound card is detected speakup.synth=soft

Post by Samuel Thibault
Hello,

There is currently no way to avoid it.

This is realy unfortunate.

What i'm trying to do is to install Debian with accessibility
('speakup.synth=soft') support

What do you mean by "with accessibility support"?

D-I is doing a fantastic job at allowing users to have a fully usable
Debian system after installation.
This includes screenreader for DE and the console and alot of things
that I do not know of! ;^)

regardless of if a sound card is detected.

Without a sound card feedback, how can use control the installer?

You don't, if you preseed!

It's more difficult to get to the point where you can start the Debian
installation, that is make the computer boot from a USB key or via PXE
booting.
If someone can manage to get to that stage, speakup support during
preseeding installation is less importent.

What I'm hoping for, is to be able to have Debian configured after
installation with bells and wistles without having to maintain that myself.

--
--
John Doe

Samuel Thibault

2024-09-11 17:00:02 UTC

Post by Samuel Thibault
Hello,

There is currently no way to avoid it.

This is realy unfortunate.

Nobody asked for it, so that's not really surprising :)

regardless of if a sound card is detected.

Without a sound card feedback, how can use control the installer?

You don't, if you preseed!

Do you mean that you completely preseed the installation, and that "no
soundcard" is the only prompt that is blocking you to get the
installation to be fully automated?

I guess you passed auto & such on the command-line to defer the early
questions. We don't need to introduce anything new, we can just follow
the same by making auto skip that prompt too.

Samuel

john doe

2024-09-12 11:20:01 UTC

Post by Samuel Thibault
Hello,

There is currently no way to avoid it.

This is realy unfortunate.

Nobody asked for it, so that's not really surprising :)

Appreciate that, Samuel.

regardless of if a sound card is detected.

Without a sound card feedback, how can use control the installer?

You don't, if you preseed!

Do you mean that you completely preseed the installation, and that "no
soundcard" is the only prompt that is blocking you to get the
installation to be fully automated?

You are spot on!

Post by Samuel Thibault
I guess you passed auto & such on the command-line to defer the early
questions.

I use PXE booting, to avoid having to type all of this at the prompt
which is less error prone while blindly typing! ;^)

This also allows me to test that preseed file with a VM to eliminate as
much errors as possible.

Post by Samuel Thibault
We don't need to introduce anything new, we can just follow
the same by making auto skip that prompt too.

Glad to hear that is not to much trouble to implement.

" auto=true priority=critical interface=auto DEBIAN_FRONTEND=text
preseed/url=tftp://<HOST-NAME>/preseed-dir/mate-desktop.cfg
speakup.synth=soft"

Those are the kernel boot params that I'm currently using.

For anyone reading, the above works with legacy bios and UEFI!

--
John Doe

Samuel Thibault

2024-09-15 13:40:01 UTC

Post by Samuel Thibault
I guess you passed auto & such on the command-line to defer the early
questions. We don't need to introduce anything new, we can just follow
the same by making auto skip that prompt too.

I have now implemented it, for trixie.

Samuel

Cyril Brulebois

2024-09-22 19:20:02 UTC

and if I use
https://d-i.debian.org/daily-images/amd64/daily/netboot/gtk/netboot.tar.gz

That's where results should appear, except:
https://lists.debian.org/debian-release/2024/09/msg00314.html

Cheers,

--
Cyril Brulebois (***@debian.org) <https://debamax.com/>
D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant

Samuel Thibault

2024-09-25 12:10:02 UTC

Post by Cyril Brulebois

and if I use
https://d-i.debian.org/daily-images/amd64/daily/netboot/gtk/netboot.tar.gz

https://lists.debian.org/debian-release/2024/09/msg00314.html

Which is now fixed.

Samuel

john doe

2024-09-22 19:20:02 UTC

I have now implemented it, for trixie.

Appreciate that Samuel.

If I use
http://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/trixie/main/installer-amd64/current/images/netboot/gtk/netboot.tar.gz
I get:

"No kernel modules were found. This probably is due to a mismatch
between the kernel used by this version of the installer and the kernel
version in the archive.

If you're installing from a mirror, you can work around this problem by
choosing to install a different version of Debian. The install will
probably fail to work if you continue without kernel modules"

and if I use
https://d-i.debian.org/daily-images/amd64/daily/netboot/gtk/netboot.tar.gz
I get:

"E: Unimplemented function"

I will eventually be able to enjoy the fruits of your labor! ;^)

--
John Doe

john doe

2024-10-08 18:50:02 UTC

I have now implemented it, for trixie.
Samuel

Sorry for my late answer.

With your fix for daily images, if no sound card is detected for 20m, it
will continue without prompting.

Appreciate all of your help.

After a fresh install of Debian, for Orca to "speak" the "legacy driver"
suggested at [1] will make Orca usable.

What is the best way to test in d-i '/etc/modprobe.d/inteldsp.conf'
'options snd_intel_dspcfg dsp_driver=1'?

[1] https://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?t=153813

--
John Doe

Philip Hands

2024-09-11 18:40:01 UTC

Hi,
I'm trying to avoid that below prompt when preseeding with
http://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/main/installer-amd64/current/images/netboot/gtk/netboot.tar.gz
"No sound cart detected after 80 secs
Can not do software speech synthesis
press enter to continue anyway"

Are you trying to do an automated install in speech mode?

If you've completely automated the install, would if make sense to do it
in the normal automated-install mode, but pre-seeding the things that
will make the target include everything that will make it be speech
enabled?

(that may be a stupid question, as I'm not sure that everything is
actually done via debconf, so it will depend on the details of the code)

Cheers, Phil.

--
Philip Hands -- https://hands.com/~phil

john doe

2024-09-12 09:30:01 UTC

Post by Philip Hands

That's my issue I have no idea what has been done to make Debian speak
after installation.
I would first need to learn that than emulate and keep my set up up-to-date.
As everything that I need is built-in in D-I, I would prefer to use what
is available to me instead of duplicating.

In my case, my preseed file will allow SSH access when the system is
booted, which will allow me to remotely fix the driver issue to have
that sound card working.

Post by Philip Hands
(that may be a stupid question, as I'm not sure that everything is
actually done via debconf, so it will depend on the details of the code)

You never use it because you do not need it! ;^)

That is what is awsome about Debian and the built-in accessibility
support, after a fresh install everything works out of the box! ;^)

--
John Doe

Samuel Thibault

2024-09-12 23:20:01 UTC

Hello,

Post by Philip Hands

I was thinking about it too.

Post by john doe
That's my issue I have no idea what has been done to make Debian speak
after installation.

It's the espeakup-udeb finish-install, it does its tweaks if a speech
language was set with espeakup/voice. You can preseed

espeakup/voice

that does indeed trigger the finish-install tweaks.

Samuel

john doe

2024-09-14 14:40:01 UTC

Post by Samuel Thibault
Hello,

Post by Philip Hands

I was thinking about it too.

Post by john doe
That's my issue I have no idea what has been done to make Debian speak
after installation.

It's the espeakup-udeb finish-install, it does its tweaks if a speech
language was set with espeakup/voice. You can preseed
espeakup/voice
that does indeed trigger the finish-install tweaks.

Appreciate the feedback Philip and Samuel.

This is clearly a viable alternative, the only downside that I can see
is that I would need to know if a sound card is detected or not to know
what install method I should use.

When I install with speech support it will work regardless of if a
sound card is detected.

Granted, I ask for help instead of including the missing drivers into
the initrd! ;^)

--
John Doe

Samuel Thibault

2024-09-14 18:30:02 UTC

Post by Samuel Thibault
It's the espeakup-udeb finish-install, it does its tweaks if a speech
language was set with espeakup/voice. You can preseed
espeakup/voice
that does indeed trigger the finish-install tweaks.

This is clearly a viable alternative, the only downside that I can see
is that I would need to know if a sound card is detected or not to know
what install method I should use.

I don't see why?

Since you preseed everything, you don't need to enable speakup at all.
You just need to preseed espeakup/voice=en to get the installed system
tweaking.

Samuel

john doe

2024-09-15 08:30:01 UTC