kronos and visually impaired

[Pouyakhoshgoo]

Sorry i dont know why its been posted 200 times!!!

[dfibraio]

Within PCG Tools I also have been asked to make some small changes for visually impaired people ... it was about putting texts in a special command to convert to text (where a separate application could speak it).

Also I have been asked again for something similar but I did not get a reaction back (on a facebook forum).

I doubt Korg will ever spend too much time into this (since it is not really there core business), so probably the best way is to go for an external program (as you say, preferably with sysex).

If you have advice what to change in PCG Tools for visually impaired people, let me know to check if I can change it (in an easy way).

Hi. This sounds great. I do not own any krog products other than the rk100s right now, so not easy to test this. I may be able to get a hold of a Kronos from a friend to test anything if something is tangible to test.

[danatkorg]

2. Korg or somebody else design an accessible editor/librarian that will allow us to import libraries to the Kronos, configure set list mode, edit and organize patches and combis, and other settings through the editor/librarian program on a mac running voiceover screen reader or a windows pc running a third party screen reading application.

Have you tried the existing editor/librarian? If so, in what ways did it fail to be accessible?

[dfibraio]

2. Korg or somebody else design an accessible editor/librarian that will allow us to import libraries to the Kronos, configure set list mode, edit and organize patches and combis, and other settings through the editor/librarian program on a mac running voiceover screen reader or a windows pc running a third party screen reading application.

Have you tried the existing editor/librarian? If so, in what ways did it fail to be accessible?

Just the person I was hoping to hear from.

I have not tried the kronos specific editor since I don't yet own a Kronos. However, I have tried your other editors, like the M3 editor, the Radias editor and most recently the editor for the RK100s. The way your editors are designed, all the controls are drawn graphically on the screen which my screen reading program cannot see at all. there is also no keyboard support, i.e. using the computer keyboard to tab to different controls and using arrows or other ways to modify the settings. To my screen reading software, the screen is completely blank. I may be able to see the menus, possibly. I can with the RK100S editor. But everything else is not visible. I have not tried the kronos editor on the MAC, but if it is anything like the editor for the M3, the mac's screen reader also sees nothing at all.

Like I said, I do not own a kronos, but a friend of mine has a Kronos 61 key and I may be able to borrow it and try it out with the editor, but just from experience with previous editors for Korg gear, I am sure I know what I'll find.

Dan, I'm willing to work with Korg in any capacity to help make products accessible, not just the Kronos. If there is anything you can do to help in this situation, let's open a dialogue.

[MinorKey]

Hello, Damon.
I know it's an old thread, but I just have to ask: Do I understand you correctly that the Nord Stage and Lead come with accessible editors? If so, how do they (I mean the editors) compare to the Yamaha ones in terms of accessibility?
- Can one tweak all the parameters of a patch? Is it possible to create splits and layers and so on?
I'm a blind person my self, I'm not a pro by any means but I too have become increasingly frustrated by the lack of accessible synth editors. I don't mind if the board itself is largely inaccessible as long as I can browse the presets without assistance from a sighted person, but when it comes to software editors, it's an entirely different topic.
I got a used Motif XF6 in August this year, I'm very happy with it, because I now finally have a synth which I can edit without help. Apart from it I also have an M3 and an M50, which I'm selling. I have no plans to get rid of the M3 at this point, but that can change in the future. I don't want to buy any new gear right now as I spent some 2000 euros on the XF (it came with a one GB flashboard and a bag + I purchased all the editors for it), but it would be nice to have 2 accessible boards instead of one in a year or two (assuming I manage to save enough money). I was looking at the Integra-7 the other day, I found an editor for it, but that one seems inaccessible as well. I have found ChangeIt, a nicely accessible editor for the Korg 01W and Roland JV and 15 series, but those are too vintage for me. Not to mention that some of these are quite expensive - the 15-5080 (the only one I'd really consider) is still around 500-600 bucks on Ebay. One can get newer and better-sounding boards for that money in my opinion.
I don't mean to whine, but I think it's pretty sad that blind keyboardists only have a handfull of options when it comes to accessible synth editors. On the one hand I understand that blind users are a very small group, but on the other hand I think that it's disappointing that software accessibility is still such a big issue in the year 2017 (soon). The technology is there. Many application development frameworks come with accessibility features built in, there are official guidelines published by Microsoft and Apple and yet there are so many inaccessible apps. I understand it on one level. Making an inaccessible app accessible may be harder than writing an accessible one from scratch. I know that everyone is trying to cut down on expenses, but one would think that a good programmer wants their program to be good in every possible way (including code optimization and accessibility).
Sorry for the rant.
Many thanks and have a nice day.

By way of quick introduction. My name is Damon. I am a totally blind keyboard player for about 36 years. I have owned more gear than I care to admit, mostly as experiments to see if the keyboard would work well for me with my visual disability. Lots of gear, sadly, has not. My keyboard rig is currently a mess of Motif xs7, Nord stage 2 compact, roland fa06, oberheim matrix 1000, nord lead a1r and a recently acquired waldorf blowfeld, and alesis vortex and korg rk100s. However, I have lusted after a kronos since its introduction. Sadly, much like my Triton Extreme, M3 and Krome, I had to give up and sell, due to not being able to manage with the touch screen and not having an accessible editor. With my motif and nord stage and lead, I can use my computer, running a screen reading program to access editor/librarian software to accomplish much of what I need to do. With the Nords, the interface is tactile friendly and I only need the sound manager to load in new sounds or move patches around for live performance needs.

With the exception of the nords, I'd sell everything if I knew the Kronos would work for me. Sadly, it is not easy to get a dialogue with Korg going, but I thought maybe if I posted here, some Kronos user may have some enterprising ideas, and maybe even the product manager might read this as well, since I see he posts here. here are some thoughts.

Three possible solutions come to mind. One would be to implement into the Kronos a text to speech system similar to Apple's VoiceOver that works in the Ipad or Iphone. Some issues with that beyond obvious development costs to add a screen reader into a keyboard would be how to get the text to speech system to be heard. Speech could theoretically be routed out of the headphone jack, but that may not work well in live situations.

The more practical solution would be for somebody to develop an editor/librarian that would interface to the kronos the way the current Korg editor does, probably using various sys-x commands, but making the editor friendly to a screen reading program. What this would do for me at least is to allow me to do all my programming at home on my mac using voice over or a pc using a third party screen reading package under windows to do all my sound and combi design and put things into set list mode for live performance. Since the kronos control surface has enough ways to switch sounds through the number pad or whatever, I am not so worried about having to tweak sounds outside of the machine, much like what I do with the Motif now. But when at home, hooked up to my PC or MAC I can do all my heavy lifting there with speech feedback. This would require no work on Korg's part other than to make their editor/librarian speech friendly or for a third party programmer to design an editor with tons of keyboard shortcuts, an effective way of tabbing through the controls and a way to make those controls visible to a screen reading application.

Alternatively, and I have thought this even since the Trinity, Korg can maybe build in ways to edit values that aren't exclusive to the touch screen, either through an attached qwerty keyboard where we can tab through options on each page or on the control surface itself. As long as we have a way to map out each screen, either in a notepad or word document, we can count tabs on each screen to get to the options we want to change and then use the normal means to edit it.

These are just some ideas. I know building a screen reader into Kronos is a far fetched idea, but Korg has done amazing things and I thought this may be something for them to try. Options 2 and 3 are more realistic, I think and option 2 may be the easiest to achieve if I can find a programmer to do the work and of course, get my hands on a kronos myself.

I know this post is already long, so let me end with this. I've spent much of my adult life in various states of creativity. At this point in time, due to the headache of fighting with partially inaccessible gear at best, I am losing the desire to play. Every time I sit down at a Kronos, just playing through the presets, I come up with a lot of possibilities for songs and the thought of having one keyboard that can do everything I need it to do regardless of whether it is a cover band doing classic rock, prog rock or originals, the board would be the same. Sadly, what stops me is a visual limitation and that can be overcome if Korg or somebody outside of Korg with knowledge to design an editor/librarian program that would work with us would take up the challenge. There is a guy who wrote an editor/librarian for the Yamaha motif and he took special care to make his editor screen reader friendly. I know it can be done and that is why after browsing through this forum, I decided to post here and ask if somebody, Korg or an outside third party, could take up the challenge. I, and I am sure other blind people, would greatly appreciate this. I know for myself, it would really make my musical life far less complicated.

[MinorKey]

Hello, Damon.
I know it's an old thread, but I just have to ask: Do I understand you correctly that the Nord Stage and Lead come with accessible editors? If so, how do they (I mean the editors) compare to the Yamaha ones in terms of accessibility?
- Can one tweak all the parameters of a patch? Is it possible to create splits and layers and so on?
I'm a blind person my self, I'm not a pro by any means but I too have become increasingly frustrated by the lack of accessible synth editors. I don't mind if the board itself is largely inaccessible as long as I can browse the presets without assistance from a sighted person, but when it comes to software editors, it's an entirely different topic.
I got a used Motif XF6 in August this year, I'm very happy with it, because I now finally have a synth which I can edit without help. Apart from it I also have an M3 and an M50, which I'm selling. I have no plans to get rid of the M3 at this point, but that can change in the future. I don't want to buy any new gear right now as I spent some 2000 euros on the XF (it came with a one GB flashboard and a bag + I purchased all the editors for it), but it would be nice to have 2 accessible boards instead of one in a year or two (assuming I manage to save enough money). I was looking at the Integra-7 the other day, I found an editor for it, but that one seems inaccessible as well. I have found ChangeIt, a nicely accessible editor for the Korg 01W and Roland JV and 15 series, but those are too vintage for me. Not to mention that some of these are quite expensive - the 15-5080 (the only one I'd really consider) is still around 500-600 bucks on Ebay. One can get newer and better-sounding boards for that money in my opinion.
I don't mean to whine, but I think it's pretty sad that blind keyboardists only have a handfull of options when it comes to accessible synth editors. On the one hand I understand that blind users are a very small group, but on the other hand I think that it's disappointing that software accessibility is still such a big issue in the year 2017 (soon). The technology is there. Many application development frameworks come with accessibility features built in, there are official guidelines published by Microsoft and Apple and yet there are so many inaccessible apps. I understand it on one level. Making an inaccessible app accessible may be harder than writing an accessible one from scratch. I know that everyone is trying to cut down on expenses, but one would think that a good programmer wants their program to be good in every possible way (including code optimization and accessibility).
Sorry for the rant.
Many thanks and have a nice day.

By way of quick introduction. My name is Damon. I am a totally blind keyboard player for about 36 years. I have owned more gear than I care to admit, mostly as experiments to see if the keyboard would work well for me with my visual disability. Lots of gear, sadly, has not. My keyboard rig is currently a mess of Motif xs7, Nord stage 2 compact, roland fa06, oberheim matrix 1000, nord lead a1r and a recently acquired waldorf blowfeld, and alesis vortex and korg rk100s. However, I have lusted after a kronos since its introduction. Sadly, much like my Triton Extreme, M3 and Krome, I had to give up and sell, due to not being able to manage with the touch screen and not having an accessible editor. With my motif and nord stage and lead, I can use my computer, running a screen reading program to access editor/librarian software to accomplish much of what I need to do. With the Nords, the interface is tactile friendly and I only need the sound manager to load in new sounds or move patches around for live performance needs.

With the exception of the nords, I'd sell everything if I knew the Kronos would work for me. Sadly, it is not easy to get a dialogue with Korg going, but I thought maybe if I posted here, some Kronos user may have some enterprising ideas, and maybe even the product manager might read this as well, since I see he posts here. here are some thoughts.

Three possible solutions come to mind. One would be to implement into the Kronos a text to speech system similar to Apple's VoiceOver that works in the Ipad or Iphone. Some issues with that beyond obvious development costs to add a screen reader into a keyboard would be how to get the text to speech system to be heard. Speech could theoretically be routed out of the headphone jack, but that may not work well in live situations.

The more practical solution would be for somebody to develop an editor/librarian that would interface to the kronos the way the current Korg editor does, probably using various sys-x commands, but making the editor friendly to a screen reading program. What this would do for me at least is to allow me to do all my programming at home on my mac using voice over or a pc using a third party screen reading package under windows to do all my sound and combi design and put things into set list mode for live performance. Since the kronos control surface has enough ways to switch sounds through the number pad or whatever, I am not so worried about having to tweak sounds outside of the machine, much like what I do with the Motif now. But when at home, hooked up to my PC or MAC I can do all my heavy lifting there with speech feedback. This would require no work on Korg's part other than to make their editor/librarian speech friendly or for a third party programmer to design an editor with tons of keyboard shortcuts, an effective way of tabbing through the controls and a way to make those controls visible to a screen reading application.

Alternatively, and I have thought this even since the Trinity, Korg can maybe build in ways to edit values that aren't exclusive to the touch screen, either through an attached qwerty keyboard where we can tab through options on each page or on the control surface itself. As long as we have a way to map out each screen, either in a notepad or word document, we can count tabs on each screen to get to the options we want to change and then use the normal means to edit it.

These are just some ideas. I know building a screen reader into Kronos is a far fetched idea, but Korg has done amazing things and I thought this may be something for them to try. Options 2 and 3 are more realistic, I think and option 2 may be the easiest to achieve if I can find a programmer to do the work and of course, get my hands on a kronos myself.

I know this post is already long, so let me end with this. I've spent much of my adult life in various states of creativity. At this point in time, due to the headache of fighting with partially inaccessible gear at best, I am losing the desire to play. Every time I sit down at a Kronos, just playing through the presets, I come up with a lot of possibilities for songs and the thought of having one keyboard that can do everything I need it to do regardless of whether it is a cover band doing classic rock, prog rock or originals, the board would be the same. Sadly, what stops me is a visual limitation and that can be overcome if Korg or somebody outside of Korg with knowledge to design an editor/librarian program that would work with us would take up the challenge. There is a guy who wrote an editor/librarian for the Yamaha motif and he took special care to make his editor screen reader friendly. I know it can be done and that is why after browsing through this forum, I decided to post here and ask if somebody, Korg or an outside third party, could take up the challenge. I, and I am sure other blind people, would greatly appreciate this. I know for myself, it would really make my musical life far less complicated.