Some observations on using Inform 7 with VoiceOver

I finally bought my apple macintosh computer. It is a Mac book with 1 GB memory and a 2.0 ghz processor. After getting to know the OS a little bit, I finally installed Inform 7. Downloading the inform application itself was rather difficult however, as the inform site isn’t all that accessible with VoiceOver. On the hole, though, web browsing is fairly accessible using it, indeed, this blog entry was written on the mac.

Back to I7, it is relatively accessible out of the box, but for the totally blind user, it is best to release your game first and then launch it directly in “Zoom” and play it from within there to test it.

In terms of accessing it with VoiceOver, it is reccomended to not attempt to use the scheme tab, as Andrew hasn’t yet included any accessibility features. He acerts that there are difficulties at present doing this, because apparently, his tools crash when attempting to implement them.

The source tab works perfectly, and switching between both the left and right pains is easy to do with Command + 1 and command + 2 respectively.

I will gladly work with Andrew on improving the access to the environment, but as it stands now, it is already usable.

Floatpoint

I finally got round to completing Emily Short’s Floatpoint. As a game it really demonstrates some of the nicer things in Inform 7, most notably, the use of dynamic tables and relations.

My favourite part of the game is the built in task management system. She has implemented a virtual PDA that gives you progress on the various activities you have done and have yet to complete.

I reccomend it to those who don’t like difficult puzzles. You can get it directly from the IF Archive at http://mirror.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/competition2006/glulx/floatpoint/Floatpoint.zblorb

A windows interpreter recommendation

I’d like to take some time to reccomend a really good Zcode and Glulx interpreter by SPAG editor Jimmy Maher. It can naturally play Z3, z5 and z8 games, glulx games and any ZCode game that uses cover art in blorb archives

It worked fine on all the games I tried including Emily’s Floatpoint, wich was written in Glulx using Inform 7.

Here are some suggestions on making it more accessible for the blind:

1. Go into options, select fonts, then set it to use “Currier new” rather than the usual fixed width font. This will stop screen readers from chopping off the ends of lines.
2. Remember to keep the main window maximised. I only say this because even though i’d configured the shortcut to run Filfre maximised, it still needs to be done when opening new games.

On the hole though it is highly reccomended. You can get it from Jimmy’s official site or directly from http://home.grandecom.net/~maher/filfre/filfre097.msi

Inform 7 on a Mac

Hi folks,

I have decided to take the plunge and buy a Mac Minny with 1 GB of memory. As many blind users will already know, Mac OSX comes with VoiceOver wich will of course make it relatively accessible.

Regarding using VoiceOver with Inform 7, in principle it should work. It is a native OSX app, using the proper design tools and sutch. Naturally I will post my findings.