[BRLTTY] Several comments about brltty on the Mac running snow leopard (10.6.7)

[Cheryl Homiak]

I am writing this post to make some comments about running brltty on the Mac in the terminal using screen-4.0.1 with the patch provided with brltty. I am using an Intel Mac mini and running mac OSX 10.6.7, the latest version of Snow Leopard. I also have both fink and macports on my system. I am wanting to comment on the following:

1. A problem with configuring brltty ;
2. Options I have to disable when configuring in order to compile brltty;
3. starting brltty automatically.

Let me first say, however, that I haven't tried to compile screen for a long time so I don't know if it works. I had problems with this a couple of years ago so have just been transfering the same screen executable from machine to machine. Eventually I should probably try this again.

Problem with configuring brltty 

I and others have posted regarding this problem before, but I will attach a file showing the output of ./configure.. This happens if I try to install brltty with either /sw/bin or /opt/local (fink and macports directories) are at the beginning of my path when trying to run the configure. Since I have been unable to track down the problem and install whatever missing packages may be causing it, my present fix is to change my path so that /bin and /usr/bin are at the beginning of my path. There are various ways of doing this but the simples way of doing it for temporary purposes is to make a .profile file in your home directory and use an export line with the path in the order you wish. If there is an initial line in that file also for the fink path, uncomment that line before trying to configure brltty. Then do:

source .profile
before starting to install or update brltty or at least before running the ./configure. You may or may not have to restart terminal for the path change to take place. When you reboot, your path will revert to its normal state or you can source .profile.mac if there is one in your home directory.

Note that if i've already successfully configured, then change my path back to its normal order, then run ./configure without running ./autogen (though one has to run ./autogen obviously if there is a svn update), ./configure remains successful. But as soon as ./autogen is run, then the ./configure will fail unless the path is changed as I described above. That probably goes without saying, but I'm mentioning it just in case somebody tries to replicate my problem without first running ./autogen on a system where the ./configure has already been successful.

2. Options I had to disable when configuring in order for brltty to compile successfully

I found that I had to use --disable-icu and --disable-api during the configure for the compilation to work. This is probably due to something I'm missing on my system.

3. Starting brltty automatically

I actually have succeeded in getting brltty to start automatically when I boot. However, you may have mixed results on this for the following reason:
according to the explanation I read, even if you try to put the login items in order, once item 1 launches item 2 will launch and then item 3 will launch, and so on. There is no waiting for one item to complete before the next one launches. Since screen must start before brltty, this means that if brltty tries to launch before screen finishes, brltty won't work. However, right now this is working for me.

Some instructions and pointers are appropriate here.

First of all, you may find that directories such as /bin and /usr/bin and /opt don't show up in the browser when you try to add them to login items. There is a command you can type in terminal to make these folders visible and navigable in finder but they still won't show up in System Preferences in User Accounts > Loggin Items > Add login items. I think this is a change in Snow leopard because these used to show in Login Items on my machine. However, you can still add them to Login Items using finder.

To have your Unix files show up in finder, type this line in terminal:

defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles YES
and then hit enter. You will then have to relaunch Finder for the change to take effect, either by rebooting or by using force Quit Applications (cmd-option-esc).

Having completed this step, go into Finder and open folders until you come to the folder where your screen-4.0.1 executable is stored or where your screenstart script is stored. I have a screenstart script so that I can start Screen with keystrokes for changing windows different than the default ones. When you reach this file in Finder, do cmd-shift-t to add the file to the dock. Then go to the dock and do ctrl-option-shift on the screen or screenstart item to open the context menu and under options hit enter on "start at login". After that you can remove the item from the dock or leave it there, whichever you choose.

Do the same process to add brltty to the dock and then have it start at login. If you do this with screen first and then with brltty, the items will at least be listed in the right order so startup of brltty has a chance of working.

When you reboot your machine, eventually brltty will come up on your display, but then you will see "screen initializing" on your braille display and you will think this didn't work. But wait till everything loads and cmd-tab to terminal. You will see a bash prompt on your braille display but when you type you won't see any characters with brltty. This is because you are not in the right terminal window. Do cmd-accent through the terminal windows until you find the one that says screen-4.0.1 and you should find that brltty shows what you type in this window and brltty works normally. You can close the extra (at least apparently extra) window in terminal but don't close the one that shows your machinename (or says your machinename) when you hit enter. Brltty is now starting up consistently at startup for me but I'm not guaranteeing anything for anybody else or even for myself as upgrades come.

Hope this helps somebody.


-- 
Cheryl

May the words of my mouth
and the meditation of my heart
be acceptable to You, Lord,
my rock and my Redeemer.
(Psalm 19:14 HCSB)



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