August 2011 - Blind-sysadmins - lists.hodgsonfamily.org

Telephony systems
by Andrew Hodgson 14 Nov '12

14 Nov '12

Hi all, Our current Call Manager 4.x servers are creaking under their age, and we are looking at replacing this either with a new Cisco telephony system or a completely new system altogether. The system has to use IP as the connection to the handsets, as we don't want to add in more cables. Has anyone any experience in deploying a new Call manager setup, or a similar telephony system, and how was the accessibility? Thanks. Andrew.

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let's talk Backup Exec
by Ryan Shugart 21 Dec '11

21 Dec '11

Hey everyone: I just got a promotion at work, and with the goodness of a promotion comes more responsibilities. I'm now in charge of our backup infrastructure. We run Backup Exec 12.5, and have 16 or so media servers in various branch offices around the world. While Backup Exec used to be very accessible, over the last two versions accessibility seems to have gone into something of a decline, I already use scripts just to read the main table of jobs, and might need more just to get around the scheduling window so I can actually schedule a job. I'd consider the rest of the program accessible but clunky, tabbing doesn't always bring you where you think it will, on some screens tab order seems to be dynamic. Backup Exec also has an odd way of bringing up alert windows and grabbing your focus, even when you tell it specifically not to. While clunkyness is OK on one server, when you have fifteen individual servers to manage and no way to do it in a centralized fashion clunkyness is less acceptable. This is also less than a quarter of my new responsibilities as well. The current admin has the remote desktop console setup with all the Backup Exec servers in his favorites, stays logged into each server with a Backup Exec window open, and flicks from screen to screen and can easily glance at the output from each job. For us screen reader users, that doesn't work well. I've already got e-mail alerts set up and am using some Outlook rules to sort failure jobs out from successes, but was wondering if there's anything else I can be doing? I'd think people in really large environments with hundreds of media servers aren't logging into each server on a daily basis, so there has to be better ways to handle this. Any ideas? Thanks. Ryan

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How to perform fully unattended Windows 7 installation
by Mgr. Janusz Chmiel 09 Nov '11

09 Nov '11

Good morning, I would like to inform You about excellent program, which is able to modifi Windows7 CD so it can be used for performing fully unattended installation. The name of The program for creating fully unattended bootable Windows 7 iso images is RT 7 Lite This program can be really used for creating fully unattended Windows 7 installations. Drivers can be integrated while using this program. I AM recommending all visually impaired users to use latest awailable Supernova screen reader for using this program. Because Supernova is able to automatically report The name of editable fields while using RT 7 Lit. The program is even offering The feature to copy customized Windows7 installation to USB flashdisk and program is making this flashdisk bootable, It can even format this flash drive. The created flash disk can be used even for performing fully unattended installations if user is running Windows XP and user is running The installer inside this operating system with his favourite screen reader. Bootable flashdisk and bootable DVD can be ofcourse used also for performing unattended installation if harddrive is empty and user is booting from The bootable DVD or USB flashdisk. The disadvantage of this procedure is, that some older computers are requiring user to load some harddrive drivers, so for example, i have been able to perform unattended installation of Windows 7 Ultimate edition only, if i have been executed The installer from running Windows XP. After reboot, installer worked fully automatically. The issue is, that eventhough Windows7 is containing many sound drivers, in some cases, one integrated sound chip can be recognized by using two drivers and The sound chip is not working properly, so NVDA or other screen readers can not be used. I have been using IBM Thinkpat model 2668 for this test. Te name of integrated sound cart is Soundmax integrated digital audio. I had to please my sighted mother to choose The right sound cart, drivers are included for this sound chip in The WIndows7, but user must choose The right detected cart. If somebody of us would like to perform fully unattended installation of Windows 2000, 2003, XP, I AM strongly recommending YOu to use The excellent program Windows Unattended CD creator. Do not be afraid, eventhough it is signed as A BETA application, is working excellently. Please also do not forget, that installer of WIndows XP is automatically browsing The floppy drives for finding The diskette with file winnt.sif extension. If installer will find The required file, installer can work in The fully unattended mode by using original not customized WIndows XP installation CD. Ofcourse, winnt.sif must contain required lines of text to instruct The installer how to work in fully unattended mode. The only issue is, that user can not automatically install required drivers, because installer anticipants, that The driver folder $OEM$ will be located on The installation media. So installing drivers can be performed only, if user will use customized WIndows XP media. There is also Nlite application, which is integrating The drivers to The .cab files. -- Mgr. Janusz Chmiel

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windows or or bart's pe with sound and screen reader support
by Kathryn Jedynak 01 Sep '11

01 Sep '11

Hello Everyone: Has anyone tried implementing sound and screen reader support into either the open source bart's pe or the windows pe? Kathryn

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windows or or bart's pe with sound and screen reader support
by Kathryn Jedynak 30 Aug '11

30 Aug '11

Hello Everyone: Has anyone tried implementing sound and screen reader support into either the open source bart's pe or the windows pe? Kathryn

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Configuring an FTP Server
by Barry Toner 29 Aug '11

29 Aug '11

Hi Folks, I haven't done this in about 4 years, and am coming a bit unstuck. I could really do with some thoughts on the below. Where I'm coming from... When i ran an FTP server back in the day, I was using XP with it's, (cauf, cauf), Firewall, Eset NOD32 AV, ServU FTP Server and a Linksys WRT 54G. How life seemed much more simple... Now, the box I'm going to use for the Server has Windows 7, a Draytek Router and File Zilla Server. It also has Windows Firewall & Eset Smart Security. I've installed FS Server and created a test account. I've set my Desktop up with a Static IP on the LAN. Giving the Drayteks IP as the Gateway, and the DNS Server it specified. Connection to other machines on the LAN and out to the Internet is fine. I cant' get a connection into my FTP Server. I've read here, http://www.draytek.co.uk/support/kb_vigor_portforwarding.html how to "Open a port" on the Draytek. I specified the IP for the box the Servers running on. Applied the setting,and confirmed it was in the Port Forwarding table, with start and end ports of 21. I temporarily turned off both Windows Firewall & esets Firewall, then went to, http://ftptest.net/ To test the connection from outside the LAN. It's still timing out, and the Servers showing no attempts in the log. It's not getting through somewhere... I did spy something in FZs' FAQ here http://goo.gl/mlydm regarding Passive Mode. I didnt' understand if this was absolutely necessary. It's been a long time and I remember people could connect using (Active, used to be the default mode), or Passive in their client. The above article, talks about settings in FZ, sticking it to an IP and custum port between 5000 and 5100. It doesn't mention if I did this if I'd then also need to open these ports on my router. FYI, File Zilla reports that it is Online and not Locked. NB. I will more than likely leave Windows Firewall disabled and figure out how to create a rule in Esets Firewall for the server once I confirm it's coming through the draytek, i'll worry about the software stuff. Also, I'm going to use something like a Dynamic DNS client once I've got the connection working. The ISP, I seriously doubt would happily hand out a Static IPv4 address to me these days. Any thoughts of what to try next? Cheers, Barry.

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Configuring an FTP Server
by Barry Toner 25 Aug '11

25 Aug '11

Hi Folks, I haven't done this in about 4 years, and am coming a bit unstuck. I could really do with some thoughts on the below. Where I'm coming from... When i ran an FTP server back in the day, I was using XP with it's, (cauf, cauf), Firewall, Eset NOD32 AV, ServU FTP Server and a Linksys WRT 54G. How life seemed much more simple... Now, the box I'm going to use for the Server has Windows 7, a Draytek Router and File Zilla Server. It also has Windows Firewall & Eset Smart Security. I've installed FS Server and created a test account. I've set my Desktop up with a Static IP on the LAN. Giving the Drayteks IP as the Gateway, and the DNS Server it specified. Connection to other machines on the LAN and out to the Internet is fine. I cant' get a connection into my FTP Server. I've read here, http://www.draytek.co.uk/support/kb_vigor_portforwarding.html how to "Open a port" on the Draytek. I specified the IP for the box the Servers running on. Applied the setting,and confirmed it was in the Port Forwarding table, with start and end ports of 21. I temporarily turned off both Windows Firewall & esets Firewall, then went to, http://ftptest.net/ To test the connection from outside the LAN. It's still timing out, and the Servers showing no attempts in the log. It's not getting through somewhere... I did spy something in FZs' FAQ here http://goo.gl/mlydm regarding Passive Mode. I didnt' understand if this was absolutely necessary. It's been a long time and I remember people could connect using (Active, used to be the default mode), or Passive in their client. The above article, talks about settings in FZ, sticking it to an IP and custum port between 5000 and 5100. It doesn't mention if I did this if I'd then also need to open these ports on my router. FYI, File Zilla reports that it is Online and not Locked. NB. I will more than likely leave Windows Firewall disabled and figure out how to create a rule in Esets Firewall for the server once I confirm it's coming through the draytek, i'll worry about the software stuff. Also, I'm going to use something like a Dynamic DNS client once I've got the connection working. The ISP, I seriously doubt would happily hand out a Static IPv4 address to me these days. Any thoughts of what to try next? Cheers, Barry.

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Accessible system deployment software and accessible remote control software
by Kathryn Jedynak 16 Aug '11

16 Aug '11

Hello everyone: My name is Kathryn and I recently started working in a desktop support position. I am wondering if there are any system deployment software that is screen reader friendly. Our company looked at acronus deployment suite but this is not very accessible. Also, is there any remote control software that is accessible besides rim from Serotek? Best, Kathryn

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Accessible system deployment software and accessible remote control software
by Kathryn Jedynak 16 Aug '11

16 Aug '11

Hello everyone: My name is Kathryn and I recently started working in a desktop support position. I am wondering if there are any system deployment software that is screen reader friendly. Our company looked at acronus deployment suite but this is not very accessible. Also, is there any remote control software that is accessible besides rim from Serotek? Best, Kathryn

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NVDA remote to windows 7
by David Mehler 13 Aug '11

13 Aug '11

Hello, I've got a Dell Inspiron Desktop 64 bit running Windows 7 home Premium. It's got NVDA 2010.2 on it and it is several hundred miles away from me. That's the back story, bad news is this box is having a problem that I need to remote to to correct. I'm wondering if I can do this NVDA to NVDA also any machine I would use from this end is only 32 bit. Some urgency! I would appreciate any suggestions. Thanks. Dave.

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