Mastodawn

What's the state of #matrix, #xmpp and #IRC as far as #screenReader -accessible clients are concerned? Desktop (Windows, Mac) and mobile (iOS, Android).

Hoping for some input, please feel free to boost. As far as I know:

Matrix does not have a lightweight, fully accessible client for desktop, but one could be modified, such as #gomuks. On mobile, Element has scrolling issues, which is unacceptable for large rooms.

XMPP has accessible desktop clients (I used to run #Adium on the Mac), also #WeeChat. No idea about mobile.

IRC is perhaps the one which everything supports on desktop, from #MirandaIM through Weechat to the old Freedom Chat, which I could probably rewrite if I had to. Also not sure about mobile, but it would definitely need push notifications, because we can't expect people to stay constantly online on the go. #a11y #accessibility

André Polykanine Mar 2, 2025

@erion for Matrix it's all crap for desktop and web, at least what I tested. For Jabber/XMPP try Miranda NG. I would write a Matrix plugin for that, but I'm not a C++ guru yet, unfortunately.

Jamie Teh Mar 2, 2025

@erion IRC is problematic on mobile unless you use something like IRCCloud to stay connected and get push notifications.

Erion Mar 2, 2025

@jcsteh Thanks. Yep, that was also an issue a few years ago. so it seems there's no change.

zrzz Mar 3, 2025

@erion @jcsteh Actually there has been quite a bit of progress, Goguma (mobile IRC client) is probably the best representation of this.

https://codeberg.org/emersion/goguma/src/branch/master/doc/notifications.md

You'd need a modern IRC server that has direct support for webpush. I believe Ergo is the only option at the moment.

Failing that the IRCv3 chathistory feature is the next best thing but this requires periodic poling.

And for older servers you'd have to use a bouncer. Soju is a good option for that since it supports webpush.

goguma/doc/notifications.md at master

goguma - An IRC client for mobile devices

Codeberg.org

Erion Mar 3, 2025

@zrzz @jcsteh Do you know if this support screen readers? It looks perfect at a cursory glance.

Ergo would be my first option as far as a server's concerned, it has some pretty amazing features out of the box.

zrzz Mar 3, 2025

@erion Basic Android TalkBack seems to work but I can't judge how it is in practice. The app is developed using Flutter so I imagine it works about as well as other Flutter apps do. I also see a couple of places in the code that seems to tweak various labels for screenreaders.

The author @emersion would be able to confirm.

Erion Mar 3, 2025

@zrzz @emersion Huge thanks for taking the time to check, based on this, it seems quite promising, at least the author is aware of screen reader users which is always a plus.

I can't test it as I don't have an Android-based device myself, but this is a good start.

Simon Ser Mar 3, 2025

@erion @zrzz Jean Thomas has spent some time tweaking Goguma for screen readers indeed (he also maintains the iOS port)

modulux Mar 2, 2025

@erion Thunderbird is an option for that. It supports IRC, Matrix (not fully) and XMPP (I think also not fully). The text chat parts of it work fine though. Except IRC lacks ignore capability (this is really bad if you get targeted by trolls). Accessibility is decent.

Hypra Mar 2, 2025

@pitermach @erion I mainly use #weechat as an accessible client for #irc and I also use, throught it, #bitlbee to access other protocols.

Hypra Mar 2, 2025

@erion @pitermach these are CLI tools, but interesting. #bitlbee can also be used to make protocols accessible, through #pidgin app

methuselah Mar 3, 2025

@erion for desktop you have Gajim and dino(windows i guess too) as well.

Zvonimir Stanecic Mar 3, 2025

@menelion @erion On windows you can use mozillla thunderbird for all thinks matrix. Haven't tested it, but will very soon.

Peter Vágner Mar 3, 2025

@asael @menelion @erion I'm using elementX on android and for text chatting And voice messages I find it working well for me.
Onlinux desktop there is fractal. Which will hopefully becomes accessible enough on windows as well when GTK4 accessibility matures in one of the upcoming 4.18+ versions.
For XMPP the onlydecent and accessible client app is conversations on android.
Others are either not verry screen reader accessible or are lacking in features.

Zvonimir Stanecic Mar 3, 2025

@pvagner @menelion @erion zeah, and it is accessible and verz minimalistic. I am talking about element x.

André Polykanine Mar 3, 2025

@pvagner @erion @asael What about Miranda NG for XMPP on Windows?

Zvonimir Stanecic Mar 3, 2025

@menelion @pvagner @erion It works when it comes to text chatting.