@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

ppatel

@ppatel@mstdn.social

I am a blind technologist, humanist, a voracious devourer of books, speaker, writer, and a thinker, who finds himself championing #accessibility for fun and necessity. I'm currently exploring the complex world of AR and VR worlds to find best ways to achieve full accessibility for disabled people.

Oh and give me your fun book recommendations: be it nonfiction, science fiction and fantasy, romance, mystery, and more.

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ppatel, to books
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

I'm fascinated by this new book.

Neil J. Young, "Coming Out Republican: A History of the Gay Right"

aardrian, to Buffalo
@aardrian@toot.cafe avatar

A few days ago I went to see “Hades Town”. My first foray into Broadway shows. Spectacular set, lighting, production, singing, etc. I struggled to understand it all (I am terrible picking out lyrics), but didn’t matter most of the time. Was surprised ’s Ani Difranco was in it, that’s how disconnected I am.

ppatel,
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

@aardrian I loved that show. Defranco was one of the first creators and in the original cast for a bit I think.

ppatel, to random
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

Sources detail how Senate Commerce Committee chair Maria Cantwell, who recently proposed a privacy bill, has undermined privacy negotiations for years.

https://wapo.st/3JhWpt7

lynnskyi, to books

On a more cheerful note, yesterday, I decided to reread the Wilderness books by sara Donati. There are nine in total, counting the later Waverly Place books. Of those, I've read five, so I'm beginning at the beginning and will read them in order, this time.

Also I'm reading a second book by Brianna Madia called "Never Leave the Dogs Behind." It's quite a sad book, but I read her first book, and this is a follow-up to that.

ppatel,
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

@Pawpower @lynnskyi I'm thoroughly enjoying reading these books. I am hooked.

ppatel, to random
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

Just in case some of you had the misconception that Iran was attacking Israel because they care for Palestine, let me correct that. Iran and Israel's relationship is complicated and it could be serving Russian interests as well. Remember that nuclear deal that Trump tanked? It may be coming back to bite us. So those of you attacking Biden for supporting Israel without considering these complicated factors need a bit of a reality lesson.

ppatel, to random
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

Thanks to @simon's example, I managed to convert my 2009 Macbook Pro into a working Linux machine that has speech and Braille configured out of the box. I need to customize it but it's working. The only thing that the installer wasn't able to get was the Wireless driver. I accidentally also didn't install the SSH server. I'll need to get that setup.

ppatel,
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

Now the question is whether I really want to learn Orca all over again. I'd rather stick with command line. But, It's inevitable that I'll need to learn it.

LifeTimeCooking, to vegetarian
@LifeTimeCooking@mastodon.au avatar

I got the dish made today that I wanted to make, and oh my goodness it was kinda exceptional.

I made Indian Coriander leaves and Mint chutney, and then Date chutney. Meanwhile par-boiled potatoes were roasting till crispy.

The potatoes were drizzled with yoghurt, the two chutneys and garam masala. Then they were topped with coriander leaves, diced carrots, cucumber, tomatoes, red capsicum, onion, radishes, pomegranate kernels and beans sprouts (that I made yesterday).

Finally, a sprinkling of chaat masala and lots of thin sev.

The tastes of Indian street food, and so many textures and flavours. Plus the roasted potatoes were uber uber good.

Chutneys and the Roasted Aloo Chaat from by .

ppatel,
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

@LifeTimeCooking Do you follow any of the Indian vegan bloggers? None of them are here on Masto but their sites are quite good.

KaraLG84, to random
@KaraLG84@dragonscave.space avatar

Because of a VoiceOver bug when using Mona where it likes to select the next or previous post to the one I want to do something with, I end up sometimes favouriting or boosting posts I didn't mean to. I usually catch it doing it though but there's bound to be one I miss.

ppatel,
@ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

@KaraLG84 I've been mostly able to avoid this bug by configuring my three-finger left/right gestures in Mona preferences to fav and boost.

pootriarch, (edited ) to lemmy
@pootriarch@eldritch.cafe avatar

deleted_by_author

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    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @fastfinge @pootriarch Thanks for the correction. I'm going to keep my boost up so that people can follow this thread.

    Jage, to random

    Suno seems to do better with pop/dance/techno. Udio does theatrical. Here's an inspirational song about a guide dog, or maybe not.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @Jage I love how the chorus is not syncing.

    spaciath, to random
    @spaciath@dragonscave.space avatar

    players of stardew. Assume I have never played before and just bought it from steam. What are my next steps? I don't remember anything at all.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @blindbat84 @spaciath And, if you have some time, take a listen to the recent sessions that Liam Urven has done on YouTube.

    jcsteh, to random

    In today's episode of stupid shit that company websites regularly do, custom date pickers that don't allow you to type a date, with picker inaccessibility as an extra bonus. This particular picker on the Chubb insurance claim portal is extra special. It has a read-only <input> for the date field which aria-owns the date picker pop-up. And sure, you give me a 20 minute timeout, 19.9 minutes of which I will spend working around your inaccessible bullshit because of your utter fucking incompetence. What's fucking new.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @KaraLG84 @jcsteh It's those damn visual people. Why do things easily when you can click a bunch of things?

    weirdwriter, to random

    I had no idea Apple hated libraries this much! I stopped all my streaming subscriptions, got an external DVD drive, and exclusively watch audio described movies from the library via DVDs because they have the AD track on them. This will prevent libraries from getting it. ‘Killers of the Flower Moon' Not Getting Physical Media Release — World of Reel https://www.worldofreel.com/blog/2024/4/13/killers-of-the-flower-moon-not-getting-physical-media-release

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @weirdwriter I bet libraries aren't even a consideration. It's purely a business move that's aimed to maximize streaming revenues and not much else. If there is physical media, then they'd find that people are copying and storing the film for their own use.

    ppatel, to random
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    A huge salad and a veggie rice for a simple dinner.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @lynnskyi It's a great meal for the time when you're feeling absolutely lazy. Veggie rice was simple to make and salad is just a bunch of things thrown together.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @Pawpower @lynnskyi I think white rice does that for a lot of people. I use brown or wild rice a lot of times. I also end up mixing things like Quinoa, various dals or beans to the mix when using white rice. I also have lots of veggies in there most times.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @Pawpower @lynnskyi Jasmin rice does tend to be more starchy. I use it on occasion. It's fantastic with Chinese or Thai. I use Basmati for some Indian dishes. I substitute brown whenever I can get away with. There are times when I just throw in the veggies along with rice and whatever spices I feel like that day. It's too bad you can't do beans For me, they're a good source of protein and adds fantastic flavors.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @Pawpower @lynnskyi One of the most frequently used recipes in the Gujarat region, from which I hail, is something called Khichdi. It's basically bunch of veggies thrown together in a mixture of rice and dals with a masala specially created for that dish. Veggies vary from simple onions, potatoes and tomatoes to being much more exotic. The masala combined with turmeric and garlic makes this a delicious combination.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @lynnskyi @Pawpower I find that brown rice goes with things like saucy things because you need to chew it more. Ad some onions to the rice when cooking so that the flavor is better. If possible, cook it in veggie broth. Since you eat chicken, you can also cook it in chicken broth. The flavor is much better.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @lynnskyi @Pawpower Ah. Unfortunately, there's no real solution to that problem.

    ppatel, to random
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    Dear Uber,

    "Your uncle can come to you" isn't the incentive you think it is.

    dotsonapage, to random

    Happy Friday Mastodoners!! All's relatively well here. The Mets are winning, I found some super-comfy sandals after wandering through DSW for nearly 2 hours, and we're finally getting the lovely spring weather I've been waiting for. Also, to those of you who've been singing the praises of Sara Donati's books over the past week, you have another convert. Started The Gilded Hour this morning and love it, and Anna and Sophie, so much!!

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @dotsonapage I recommend you start with the Wilderness series first.

    simon, to random

    Have been trying to install Debian on a 2012 Mac Mini, which is otherwise stuck on Catalina and not especially useful as a Mac. Whether I boot the net installer or the DVD, I can't seem to get the speech synthesis option to work. As soon as I select it, the screen goes black and the installer never returns. Seems to happen whether I have a USB soundcard connected or not. I'll probably try connecting a Braille display and see if it gets autodetected, but this is not a great start.

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @simon Thanks much. I suspect getting that USB drive to boot will take some trial and error since the boot menu doesn't talk. But shouldn't be too bad. Are you duel booting or did you get rid of your Mac OS completely?

    ppatel,
    @ppatel@mstdn.social avatar

    @simon Mine was stuck on El Cap. I ended up installing on top. It's chugging away with the installation right now. It's getting everything it needs from one of the mirrors. We'll see how things go once the installation is done. I'll probably just need to fiddle with the wireless driver. Otherwise, it seemed to get everything else.

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