- Package:
- src:live-build
- Source:
- src:live-build
- Submitter:
- Date:
- 2025-11-10 13:33:01 UTC
- Severity:
- normal
- Tags:
Hello, While trying to reproduce the issue met in Bug#1111121, I noticed that in the installation of installation from the live image, when running /usr/lib/finish-install.d/06espeakup, apt is missing the espeakup.deb package on the iso image. It would be really useful to have it on the live iso image, so that speech synthesis can work on the installed system on the console too. Samuel
Samuel Thibault, le sam. 30 août 2025 02:27:02 +0200, a ecrit: And we also miss the brltty, brltty-x11 and xbrlapi packages for Braille to work after reboot. Samuel
Hello Samuel, Can you describe in a bit more detail what you were doing and what you were expecting? This is my guess: * You downloaded the latest GNOME live image for trixie (or ...) from PLACE_URL_HERE * You used the Debian installer (Start installer with speech synthesis) * Did you answer some questions with non-default values in the installer? * What kind of computer/qemu did you use? BIOS/UEFI? With/Without network card? * After the installation finished, how can I see/hear that everything works as intended? With kind regards, Roland Clobus
Hello Samuel, Can you describe in a bit more detail what you were doing and what you were expecting? This is my guess: * You downloaded the latest GNOME live image for trixie (or ...) from PLACE_URL_HERE * You used the Debian installer (Start installer with speech synthesis) * Did you answer some questions with non-default values in the installer? * What kind of computer/qemu did you use? BIOS/UEFI? With/Without network card? * After the installation finished, how can I see/hear that everything works as intended? With kind regards, Roland Clobus
Hello, In practice, the issue is most probably related to #1113698 (debian-live-13.0.0-amd64-gnome.iso: d-i installs a nearly empty 'sources.list'). With a network mirror, the installation from the live image will be able to fetch espeakup from the internet. That being said, being able to properly install from the live CD without network access would be really useful for blind users. http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/archive/13.0.0/amd64/iso-cd/debian-13.0.0-amd64-netinst.iso Yes, the speech synthesis choice in the boot menu. Just default answers. qemu without any particular option beyond -device ac97 to have a sound card. dpkg -l espeakup brltty will be enough. Samuel
Hello, In practice, the issue is most probably related to #1113698 (debian-live-13.0.0-amd64-gnome.iso: d-i installs a nearly empty 'sources.list'). With a network mirror, the installation from the live image will be able to fetch espeakup from the internet. That being said, being able to properly install from the live CD without network access would be really useful for blind users. http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/archive/13.0.0/amd64/iso-cd/debian-13.0.0-amd64-netinst.iso Yes, the speech synthesis choice in the boot menu. Just default answers. qemu without any particular option beyond -device ac97 to have a sound card. dpkg -l espeakup brltty will be enough. Samuel
Hello, In practice, the issue is most probably related to #1113698 (debian-live-13.0.0-amd64-gnome.iso: d-i installs a nearly empty 'sources.list'). With a network mirror, the installation from the live image will be able to fetch espeakup from the internet. That being said, being able to properly install from the live CD without network access would be really useful for blind users. http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/archive/13.0.0/amd64/iso-cd/debian-13.0.0-amd64-netinst.iso Yes, the speech synthesis choice in the boot menu. Just default answers. qemu without any particular option beyond -device ac97 to have a sound card. dpkg -l espeakup brltty will be enough. Samuel
Hello Samuel, anything from the internet while installing. I've used the 13.1 image, since last weekend the point release was made: https://get.debian.org/images/release/current-live/amd64/iso-hybrid/debian-live-13.1.0-amd64-gnome.iso I did an installation with network available and ended up with espeakup installed, but not brltty. Already on the login screen the computer spoke, so that's good. My qemu settings did not configure a braille reader, so I guess that it is OK to have an installation without brltty? (Or should that be installed anyway, independent of the devices that were detected during the installation?) I also did a second installation, this time without a network card in the qemu environment. I was stuck at the 'choose-mirror' stage, until I found out that I could use '<' to take a step back (and then accept an installation without mirrors). Here the speech was working fine as well after reboot. However, I have 'xbrlapi' installed. Is that a successor/substitute for 'brltty'? With kind regards, Roland
Hello, Roland Clobus, le lun. 08 sept. 2025 17:46:24 +0200, a ecrit: Not, it's normally only installed when a braille device was used during the installer. No, it's just a helper for brltty under X. Samuel
Roland Clobus, le lun. 08 sept. 2025 17:46:24 +0200, a ecrit: But you are talking about speech in the graphical environment (the orca package), not speech in the text console (the espeakup package). Samuel
Hello Samuel, I need more information. I've tried to reproduce the issue: * I've used the latest GNOME live image from https://get.debian.org/images/release/current-live/amd64/iso-hybrid/debian-live-13.1.0-amd64-gnome.iso in qemu with UEFI secure boot * In the GRUB boot menu, press 's' * For location, I used 'Europe/Germany' with en_US.UTF-8 locale * I've used my apt-cacher-ng as proxy * After rebooting, the screen reader works in gdm and after logging in * Switch to tty3 (Ctrl-Alt-F3) * Log in as root * The output of `dpkg -l espeakup brltty` is: un brltty ii espeakup 1:0.90-17 * The outout of `ps -edalf | grep espeakup` shows /usr/bin/espeakup --default-voice=en * I hear no speech -> could this be the issue that pipewire in the GUI environment and the text console cannot work together properly? In /var/log/installer/syslog I have the following entries (I've filtered for espeakup and brltty): Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: (process:674): sh: missing ] Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: (process:674): sh: missing ] Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: INFO: Menu item 'brltty-udeb' selected Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: INFO: Menu item 'espeakup-udeb' selected Sep 27 09:42:07 main-menu[663]: (process:2168): sh: missing ] Sep 27 09:49:07 finish-install: info: Running /usr/lib/finish-install.d/06espeakup Sep 27 09:49:11 finish-install: info: Running /usr/lib/finish-install.d/07brltty Attached is the full installer syslog which contains some more warning/error messages. With kind regards, Roland Clobus
Hello Samuel, I need more information. I've tried to reproduce the issue: * I've used the latest GNOME live image from https://get.debian.org/images/release/current-live/amd64/iso-hybrid/debian-live-13.1.0-amd64-gnome.iso in qemu with UEFI secure boot * In the GRUB boot menu, press 's' * For location, I used 'Europe/Germany' with en_US.UTF-8 locale * I've used my apt-cacher-ng as proxy * After rebooting, the screen reader works in gdm and after logging in * Switch to tty3 (Ctrl-Alt-F3) * Log in as root * The output of `dpkg -l espeakup brltty` is: un brltty ii espeakup 1:0.90-17 * The outout of `ps -edalf | grep espeakup` shows /usr/bin/espeakup --default-voice=en * I hear no speech -> could this be the issue that pipewire in the GUI environment and the text console cannot work together properly? In /var/log/installer/syslog I have the following entries (I've filtered for espeakup and brltty): Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: (process:674): sh: missing ] Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: (process:674): sh: missing ] Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: INFO: Menu item 'brltty-udeb' selected Sep 27 09:42:04 main-menu[663]: INFO: Menu item 'espeakup-udeb' selected Sep 27 09:42:07 main-menu[663]: (process:2168): sh: missing ] Sep 27 09:49:07 finish-install: info: Running /usr/lib/finish-install.d/06espeakup Sep 27 09:49:11 finish-install: info: Running /usr/lib/finish-install.d/07brltty Attached is the full installer syslog which contains some more warning/error messages. With kind regards, Roland Clobus
Hello, Roland Clobus, le sam. 27 sept. 2025 12:39:05 +0200, a ecrit: related to #1113698 which was making network mirrors not available. With a network mirror, that does work, indeed. But without network access, espeakup will not be installed since the deb is not on the ISO image. Unless booting the installer with a braille device connected, brltty will not be installed indeed. If you want to try it with an emulated device, it's documented : https://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/Accessibility But again, with a network mirror enabled, things will already work, it's when network access is not available that brltty will not be installed since the .deb is not available on the live ISO image. Yes, that's a separate issue, not related to the live images. Samuel
Hello, Roland Clobus, le sam. 27 sept. 2025 12:39:05 +0200, a ecrit: related to #1113698 which was making network mirrors not available. With a network mirror, that does work, indeed. But without network access, espeakup will not be installed since the deb is not on the ISO image. Unless booting the installer with a braille device connected, brltty will not be installed indeed. If you want to try it with an emulated device, it's documented : https://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/Accessibility But again, with a network mirror enabled, things will already work, it's when network access is not available that brltty will not be installed since the .deb is not available on the live ISO image. Yes, that's a separate issue, not related to the live images. Samuel
Hello, Roland Clobus, le sam. 27 sept. 2025 12:39:05 +0200, a ecrit: related to #1113698 which was making network mirrors not available. With a network mirror, that does work, indeed. But without network access, espeakup will not be installed since the deb is not on the ISO image. Unless booting the installer with a braille device connected, brltty will not be installed indeed. If you want to try it with an emulated device, it's documented : https://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/Accessibility But again, with a network mirror enabled, things will already work, it's when network access is not available that brltty will not be installed since the .deb is not available on the live ISO image. Yes, that's a separate issue, not related to the live images. Samuel
Hello, Bug #1112485 in live-build reported by you has been fixed in the Git repository and is awaiting an upload. You can see the commit message below and you can check the diff of the fix at: https://salsa.debian.org/live-team/live-build/-/commit/7ed41a1a0561c089b12615298ce91981fb6b1980 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ rebuild: Allow offline installation with speech enabled in the installed system (Closes: #1112485) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ (this message was generated automatically) -- Greetings https://bugs.debian.org/1112485
clone 1112485 -1 tags 1112485 -moreinfo retitle -1 live-build: support brltty after offline installation submitter -1 sthibault@debian.org severity -1 wishlist thanks Hello Samuel, Thanks, that was the missing information. I've prepared a MR which fixes this issue [1]. This fix will also become available for the 13.2 point release of trixie. I've split this bug report into 2 parts, the new bug number will address the brltty part of this issue. And regarding pipewire, I've seen #1115893, so that's covered already. This bug report is then only about having speech during offline installation of a live image. I've tested with a local GNOME, Mate and standard image. All of them will have espeakup installed in the installed system when performing an offline installation. For the standard image, since it does not have pipewire, the speech worked in the console. With kind regards, Roland Clobus [1] https://salsa.debian.org/live-team/live-build/-/merge_requests/441
Hello Samuel, I'm struggling to run brltty properly. As I understand it, there are 2 scenarios: * Running brltty on the host, while running the Debian installer in qemu * Running brltty on the installed live system, which was installed without network cards available. I'm looking at the documentation: https://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/Accessibility * brltty is (nowadays?) not found in /sbin, but in /usr/bin * Starting brltty as a non-root user (roland): $ brltty -b xw -x no -A auth=none,host=127.0.0.1:1 BRLTTY 6.8 rev BRLTTY-6.8 [https://brltty.app/] brltty: can't isolate namespaces brltty: executing as the invoking user: roland brltty: can't set supplementary groups brltty: group not joined: 0(root) brltty: group not joined: 5(tty) brltty: group not joined: 20(dialout) brltty: group not joined: 133(input) brltty: required capability not granted: cap_sys_admin (for injecting input characters typed on a braille device) brltty: required capability not granted: cap_sys_tty_config (for playing alert tunes via the built-in PC speaker) brltty: required capability not granted: cap_mknod (for creating needed but missing special device files) Do I need additional group memberships to make this work properly, or should I run as root? The brltty window has the content 'no screen', both in regular letters and in braille. I ran the following command for the installation (installer with speech synthesis): BRLAPI_HOST=127.0.0.1:1 kvm -usbdevice braille -cdrom debian-live-13.1.0-amd64-gnome.iso -hda scratch_hd.qcow2 -m 8192 -boot d -device ac97 -net none While running this, I get many lines with: baum: brlapi__enterTtyMode: Can't determine tty number And after the installation has finished: BRLAPI_HOST=127.0.0.1:1 kvm -usbdevice braille -hda scratch_hd.qcow2 -m 8192 -device ac97 -net none I've then enable networking and installed brltty-x11. Within the installed system, lsusb shows the braille device: Bus 001 Device 002: ID 0403:fe72 Future Technology Devices International, Ltd QEMU USB BAUM BRAILLE So unfortunately, I'm unable to test braille support at this moment. With kind regards, Roland
Hello Samuel, The deadline for the next point release is getting closer. I would like to have the brltty support in place (I've also added this as a possible task for the Outreachy candidates) It's easy to add the package into the live image, I will do that if you say it is sufficient. But I'm still struggling with a local test to see whether everything works. I'm hesitant to add new functionality that cannot be tested :-) With kind regards, Roland Clobus
Hello, Roland Clobus, le lun. 03 nov. 2025 09:43:03 +0100, a ecrit: Yes, having the .deb available is all the installer needs. Having the .deb on the image won't hurt anyway, and other people will be able to test the point-release image. Thanks, Samuel
Hello, Roland Clobus, le mar. 04 nov. 2025 10:48:39 +0100, a ecrit: Yes, as I explained in a previous mail: “ Unless booting the installer with a braille device connected, brltty will not be installed indeed. If you want to try it with an emulated device, it's documented : https://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/Accessibility ” Samuel
Hello Samuel,
I've made a local test and added brltty to the live image ('standard').
After installation with the speech installer (in a VM without network
access), the installed system still has no 'brltty' package installed.
I've run 'apt-get install brltty' and the installation works, all
dependent packages are available on the CDROM.
The code from 07brltty
(https://sources.debian.org/src/brltty/6.8-3/debian/brltty-udeb.prebaseconfig)
suggests that the Braille reader should have been activated before the
package will be installed.
So the package is present, but I'm not able to test in any way (which I
would like to be, since that can be automated in openQA and then be
guaranteed to be working for all future releases of netinst and live
images).
With kind regards,
Roland Clobus
I've merged [1] and brltty will be available during an offline installation. This feature will be available for the 13.2 point release. I've been able to test that 'apt-get install brltty' installs without error after an offline installation, but have still not managed to get a working Braille test environment, so I don't know yet whether it will be automatically installed when a Braille reader has been detected during the installation. I'm really sorry that we have to go full circle [2], but the instructions on that Wiki page appear to be outdated. Is there some minor step that I'm missing? With kind regards, Roland Clobus [1] https://salsa.debian.org/live-team/live-build/-/merge_requests/446 [2] https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1116525#92
Hello, Roland Clobus, le mer. 05 nov. 2025 19:59:20 +0100, a ecrit: As a reminder, bug reporters are *not* Cc-ed when you mail only nnn@bugs.debian.org, so I never got that mail... It's not two scenarios, it's the two things that are needed. The first one is just a braille device emulator, while the second one is the normal brltty, that will connect to the first through the usb emulation. That's all just harmless warnings. That's expected since we passed -x no to say we don't want a screen reader. That's the real issue. Which terminal did you run it in? I now notice that gnome-terminal doesn't expose WINDOWID any more :((( You can circumvent it by passing
Hello Samuel, Thanks for the updated instructions. I've seen the Braille output in an xterm window now, both during the installation and while running the installed system. The fix is MR 446: https://salsa.debian.org/live-team/live-build/-/merge_requests/446 The fix has been merged and is in time for the 13.2 point release (next weekend). Next task for me: automate this in openQA With kind regards, Roland