Hi all: I have recently uploaded more files to the speakup ftp site at ftp.braille.uwo.ca. I finally got around to putting up working (I hope) copies of the Slackware 7.0 scsi.s boot disks with Speakup 7.0 built in. Since I only have a DoubleTalk PC, I could not actually test the disks to make sure they work with all the synthesizers, however, I did get the propper messages from Speakup showing that it is trying to communicate with the various synthesizers. If you are thinking of trying Slackware out, read on. If not, you can probably skip the remainder of this message. Let me mention one thing I like about using this installation as outlined below. In many cases, the installation lets you use the kernel from the boot disk as your default kernel. This means that you may be able to install Slackware and have your system boot up talking from the start. You don't have to worry about getting the system talking again after installation. There may be some exceptions to this as will be outlined below. Kirk: You have my permission to copy this message and use it as a README file for the above-mentioned files. I may want to re-write it later, but, it should do for now. Just to review: The Slackware boot disks in the original distribution are designed for specific hardware. The ones I've uploaded and tested (to the best of my ability) so far are the bare.i and scsi.s disks. The disks are grouped in similarly named subdirectories on the Speakup ftp site under /pub/speakup/disks/slackware. The bare.i disk images are in a subdirectory called "bare-i". I retained Joshua Lambert's naming conventions using the file extention to denote which speech synthesizer is supported by the disk images. The extentions are as follows: .dt: DoubleTalk PC .lt: Serial LiteTalk .apc: Accent PC .asa: Accent SA .spo: Speakout So, for example, if you wanted to get the bare.i boot disk image for the DoubleTalk pc, you'd look in the bare-i directory and get the file called "bare-i.dt". The same is true for the scsi.s images. They're contained in a directory called "scsi-s". Again, for example, if you wanted to get the scsi.s boot disk image for the Accent PC, you'd look in the scsi-s directory and get the file called "scsi-s.apc". Installation is pretty easy, but, there are a few things you need to be aware of. Here are the basic steps for installing Slackware 7.0 with these images: First, we assume that you have either downloaded the Slackware 7.0 installation files (from ftp.freesoftware.com under /pub/linux/slackware/slackware-7.0) or that you have a Slackware 7.0 CD-Rom set. Next, download one of the boot disk images as explained above which corresponds most with your particular hardware and speech synthesizer configuration. Next, if you don't have one of the root disk images from Slackware, you can download either the "color.gz", "text.gz" or the "umsdos.gz" disk images from the Speakup FTP site. Look in /pub/speakup/disks/slackware. Note that even though these filenames end in .gz, you shouldn't uncompress them as the boot disk will take care of that when it loads the image into a ramdisk later. After you've downloaded the disk images, you'll need to use Rawrite to write the disk images onto floppies. You'll need 2 formatted 1.44-MB floppies. Note that if you are already running under Linux, you can use the dd command to accomplish the same thing. If you don't have the program "rawrite.exe", you can get it off the Slackware CD-Rom or from just about any of the Linux distributions. Rawrite works best under pure DOS. You may be able to run it in a DOS box under Windows 95/98, but, it may run more slowly. Next, make sure you have all the required files mentioned above. It will probably be easier if all the needed files are together in one directory. Let's use the DoubleTalk pc as an example of the steps needed. If you are using another synthesizer, just substitute the appropriate file name for the boot disk image. Let's assume you've done all of this. Here's where you should be so far. You should have the files "bare-i.dt", "color.gz" (or one of the other root disk images) and "rawrite.exe" in their own directory. Note that, depending upon which synthesizer and root disk images you chose, the file names may be slightly different. Next, insert a formatted 1.44-Mb floppy in drive A: and, at a DOS prompt, type: rawrite bare-i.dt a: You may need to silence your speech synthesizer during this process for best results (and to keep it from talking your ears off). If all goes well, you should now have a working Slackware boot disk with a Speakup enabled kernel. Remove the disk and write-protect it. Next, insert the second disk in drive A: and type: rawrite color.gz a: After this is done, you should now have a root disk that will take you through the setup process. As always, remove this disk and write-protect it also. Now, it's time to try booting up. Place the newly created boot disk in your A: drive and reboot. If all goes well, you should hear your drive working for a couple seconds and the Slackware welcome message should be displayed on your screen (no speech yet). You should have a "Boot:" prompt on your screen. Here is where you would pass any parameters on to the kernel or to speakup (to tell it which port your synthesizer is on). Since I do not have any of the serial synthesizers mentioned, I am not sure of the exact parameter you would type, however, someone on the Speakup mailing list should be able to be of some assistance. If you do have any parameters to pass on, type them and press Enter (Return). If you do not have any parameters to enter, simply press Enter. The screen should show that the kernel is being loaded into the Ramdisk and you should hear your disk drive working for about half a minute. If all goes well, you should hear your synthesizer talking with various status messages about the kernel and hardware that has been detected. At the end of all this information, you should get a prompt something like: VFS: Insert root disk to be loaded into Ramdisk and press Enter. Remove the boot disk you made and insert the root disk. After you press Enter, you should hear a message something like: VFS: Compressed image found at block 0 After your disk works for a while, you should get the Welcome message from Slackware and a "Slackware Login:" prompt. Type "root" (without the quotes) and press Enter. You should get a "#" message like: Linux 2.2.13 and some other information on how to get started at the bottom of this, you should have a "#" prompt (although Speakup may not speak the "#" (Number Sign) symbol. Next, you can type: fdisk or cfdisk to partition your drives (if necessary). If you've done this, you can just type: setup at the "#" prompt and the setup screens will be displayed. Depending upon which root disk you're using (color.gz or text.gz) the menus will work a little differently. For the first time installation, the "text.gz" root disk may prove a little easier to work with since it presents numbered menus instead of menus that are navigated with the arrow keys. I have used the "color.gz" disk, but, it is a little tricky to work with some times. For my first-time talking Slackware install, I used the "text.gz" disk image since I wasn't familiar with all the steps needed. Now, a couple of warnings: Make sure you skip the step to remap your keyboard. All the root disk images should offer this option. If you do remap your keyboard, the Speakup keystrokes will no longer work. During formatting of the hard-drive, you may wish to hit Enter on the numeric keypad to silence speech until this process is completed. Again, if you don't, speakup will talk your ears off and it may take a long time for things to finish. After you've finished the section on installing software, you'll be asked to select a kernel. By default, Slackware will ask you to use the kernel from your boot disk. If you've made it this far with the kernel on the boot disk, this is probably a good idea. That way, after you exit installation and reboot, your system should come up talking from the get-go. Again, you may need to pass parameters to the kernel at boot time if you're using a serial synthesizer. This is only a basic outline on how to install Slackware with the bare.i and scsi.s Speakup-enabled images. More information is available in the various files accompanying the Slackware distribution. Also, don't hesitate to write to the Speakup mailing list and we'll try to give all the help we can. Hope this helps, and, have fun!
