kde accessibility

[Isabel Ruffell]

Hi,


If you need the screenreader in order to turn the screenreader on, this 
is a bit of a problem!


One workaround is to use the run command (Alt F2 or Alt Space, I think, 
on KDE?) and type orca and hit enter. Then you can use the approach 
described below to make the setting permanent.


This is clearly unsatisfactory. Surely, there should be some 
standardisation for turning on the screenreader across different 
environments.


I've got to say that I find both major environments have issues for the 
sight-impaired, particularly when it comes to system settings, key 
bindings and endless dialog frustration. KDE still has some big gaps 
too: okular and konsole became unusable for me when I started using a 
screenreader, and I think that is still the case?


Best,


Isabel




On 18/12/2025 14:10, Jeremy Whiting wrote:
> Oh, I forgot to mention you also need to click the "Apply" button 
> since system settings don't take effect until you apply them.
>
> On Thu, Dec 18, 2025 at 7:10 AM Jeremy Whiting 
> <jeremypwhiting at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>     Hello,
>
>     On plasma the trick is to open System Settings, then go to
>     Accessibility, then Screen Reader, then click "Enable Screen Reader"
>
>     That should get you going. I'm unfortunately unsure if there's
>     global keyboard combination you can use to do that.
>
>     BR,
>     Jeremy Whiting
>
>     On Wed, Dec 17, 2025 at 8:35 PM Nguyễn Ngọc Tiến
>     <ntienchelsea at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>         hi all users, this is my first question in the mailing list,
>         today i have a question with orca screenReader accessibility
>         with kde plasma, i installed kali linux and choose kde plasma
>         when select desktop environment, but when installation
>         finished, i can not turn on orca, i tried to press super+alt+s
>         many times, but orca does not speech anything. my question is:
>         does kde support orca screenReader?
>
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