FLORENCE: A simple virtual keyboard for Gnome ********************************************* http://florence.sourceforge.net Florence is an extensible scalable virtual keyboard for GNOME. You need it if you can't use a real keyboard either because of a handicap, disease, broken keyboard or tablet PC but you can use a pointing device. If you can't use a pointing device, there is gok: http://www.gok.ca/ Florence stays out of your way when you don't need it. It appears on the screen only when you need it. There is an auto-click functionality To help people having difficulties to use the click button. DEPENDANCIES ************ * gtk >= 2.10 * (optional) cspi >= 1.0 * libgconf >= 2.0 * libglade >= 2.0 * libxml >= 2.0 * cairo * librsvg * gettext * intltool >= 0.23 * (optional) gnome-doc-utils * (optional) libnotify * (optional) libxtst QUICK INSTALL ************* * Make sure you have all the dependancies installed. Mandriva: $ su # urpmi gcc make libxml2-dev libgconf2-dev libglade2-devel at-spi-devel \ libcairo-devel gnome-doc-utils librsvg2-devel gettext libnotify libxtst6-devel \ intltool Debian/Ubuntu: $ sudo apt-get install build-essential libxml2-dev libgconf2-dev libglade2-dev \ libatspi-dev librsvg2-dev gnome-doc-utils libcairo2-dev gettext libnotify-dev \ libxtst-dev intltool * Open a terminal and type (don't type the $ or #): $ ./configure --prefix=/usr $ make $ su # make install (for ubuntu, replace the last two commands with "sudo make install") UNINSTALL ********* $ su # make uninstall (for ubuntu, "sudo make uninstall") QUICK USAGE *********** Florence can be launched by the applications menu (under Accessibility). The icon in the systray indicates Florence is running. Click on the icon to make the keyboard appear/disappear. If Florence is not in "always on screen" mode, it will appear when you click on an editable widget (like the address bar in epiphany or the text area in a text editor). When you click on an uneditable widget, Florence will disappear. If you don't like this behaviour, you can switch to normal virtual keyboard always on screen: right click on the Florence notification icon, choose the preferences menu and check the 'Always on screen' button. Auto-click timeout is configurable on the preferences window. It is set in milliseconds. When the mouse is over for more than the auto-click timeout, the key is automatically pressed. Set auto-click to 0 to deactivate it. GET HELP ******** Please read Florence manual with yelp: $ yelp "ghelp:florence" If you still need help, use the sourceforge forum at https://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?forum_id=784280, or email me at f.agrech@gmail.com CONTRIBUTE ********** Email me at f.agrech@gmail.com RUNNING FLORENCE WITHOUT GNOME ****************************** This works on any desktop. Tested on XFCE and WindowMaker. You need to start the at-spi redistry daemon at session startup: Start at-spi registry daemon before Florence (at session startup): Gentoo: $ /usr/libexec/at-spi-registryd & Mandriva: $ /usr/lib/at-spi-registryd & Some distro may put the at-spi-registryd command elsewhere. Use the find command to find out where your distro put at-spi-registryd: find /usr -name at-spi-registryd Adapt according to the result. GNOME does start the daemon automatically if it is configured with the gnome-at-property dialog. If your DE is XDG compliant (like XFCE), Florence should be accessible via the menu. Anyway, starting florence from the command line will always work. If you don't have a systray, you can install pksystray. You can also access the preferences dialog with: $ florence --config RUNNING FLORENCE ON KDE *********************** Florence can work on KDE, provided you install all the dependancies (including GTK and the at-spi registry daemon). You must start the at-spi registry daemon at session startup (at-spi-registryd). QT3 applications don't support at-spi yet. You can still use Florence on screen, but the keyboard won't detect QT editable widgets. This makes Florence unusable in hidden mode on KDE3, unless you don't use QT applications, but that is highly unlikely on KDE. Always uncheck the "auto-hide" box (in preferences dialog) on KDE3. If you are not going to use auto-hide mode, you can as well compile florence without at-spi and save some disk space: use the --without-at-spi configure option.