Linux accessibility support

Linux accessibility support

This release adds Linux x86-64 support to the accessible BizHawk fork, based on BizHawk 2.11.2.

• Orca can read standard menus, dialogs, and the Lua Console through the bundled AT-SPI bridge.
• Frame waits continue answering accessibility requests, fixing the screen-reader lag in the first Linux test build.
• Lua speech prefers Orca, with Speech Dispatcher as fallback. Speech calls keep answering Orca accessibility queries, preventing connection timeouts and UI blocking. Existing game scripts need no changes.
• Reading and navigating the Lua Console output no longer crashes on text-formatting queries.
• Temporary speech-backend diagnostics have been removed.
• The Lua Console exposes script names, status, and paths in a standard list.
• The 58 shortcuts cleared in the Windows v1.1 release are now cleared in source defaults. Packaging checks prevent their accidental restoration. Existing user bindings are preserved.
• Nintendo DS JIT is enabled by default, matching v1.1.

Run on Linux

The archive has no outer wrapper directory: EmuHawk.exe, EmuHawkMono.sh, dll, and the other application folders are directly at its root, matching the Windows package layout. The Lua folder is included but empty; install your game scripts separately.

Extract into your chosen installation folder, start Orca, and run ./EmuHawkMono.sh. Add --luaconsole to open the Lua Console at startup.

Built and tested on CachyOS x86-64 with Mono 6.12. Arch/CachyOS runtime dependencies:

sudo pacman -S --needed mono libgdiplus openal lua54 gtk3 at-spi2-core glibmm-2.68 speech-dispatcher lsb-release

See the included README-accessibility-linux.md for setup and build instructions. The archive includes accessibility-library licenses and corresponding modified sources.

Validation and limits

Amethyst tested the build with Orca and confirmed responsive menus, working game speech, and Lua Console output navigation without crashes. Automated checks cover keyboard navigation, dialogs, control states, Lua script selection and status, output formatting and selection, speech ordering and accessibility callbacks, shutdown, and the protected defaults.

The updated Linux package contains the approved fixes, rebuilt after removal of temporary diagnostics. The final packaged build passes the isolated accessibility and speech regression tests without loading a game or contacting the user’s screen reader.

Some custom-painted advanced tools, including TAS grids, still lack accessible rows. Other Linux distributions have not been tested. This release supplies a Linux build; the existing Windows download remains available under v1.1.

Updated Linux asset source: signed commit b073caa.

optimized DS support

This updates the default config to enable JIT for Nintendo DS by default, meaning you get better performance

accessibility UI

fixes the emulator UI to be accessible with screen readers