One area that could use improving is accessibility. My limited testing has revealed some major failings that make LB5 unusable by people with various disabilities. But also, it appears that any software written with LB 5 will suffer from the same problems.
I'll update this topic as testing proceeds.
Issue 1: Screen reader inaccessibility
Severity: Major
OSes: Windows, likely Linux, likely Mac OS
Steps to reproduce:
- On Windows 10, you can use Narrator. Press Ctrl+Windows+Enter to activate or deactivate it.
- Start the LB 5 alpha.
- Press Alt+F to open the File menu and use the arrow keys to move around the various menu items.
You will find that almost no text is read out by Narrator.
Screen readers are used primarily by people with blindness or visual impairments, but are also used by those with severe dyslexia.
Issue 2: Hard-coded double-click interval
Severity: Moderate
OSes: Linux, others unlikely
Carl has admitted as much. He stated that this was set to 200 ms in the first few alphas, and later raised to 400 ms.
This new setting is an improvement. However, it still could exclude anyone with poor muscle control who might need more than 400 ms to double-click.
I did some research on the likely cause. I read that Linux has no single location for this and other similar settings.
Each GUI framework has its own settings. Qt has "qt.conf" and GTK has "gtkrc".
Since LB 5 is using neither of these GUI frameworks, maybe it should use a centrally located configuration file where these settings could be changed. Or it could just use the settings from one of the existing config files.