An "hide the accessibility button" extension could be written, but beyond that we don't have any plans to make it optional. We want there to be a standard way to get to all these features on every desktop. We definitely see many of these features as being useful for the "general public"
 
 - Trying to use a laptop at the beach in bright sunshine - turn on high contrast
 - Showing something on your computer to a older friend with not so good vision - use Zoom or Large Text

Why not? There is a gconf key to disable the keyboard indicator (org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.keyboard). We should have one, if only to stay coherent; and it doesn't hurt having one anyway.

s/gconf/dconf/ I guess :)

@Owen: Your use case are valid, but happens maybe once per year at most (I actually never needed them in my life). Definitely not something you want to be shown all the time. It can be moved to a settings dialog. Of course it's nice to have in the panel for people who needs it, so a dconf key turned to FALSE by default seems a good choice.

*** Bug 643436 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 644332 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 649286 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Could we please get a gsettings key for this at least?

I understand and appreciate on-by-default but it is the only item in the menu bar that is not used by me or I believe a majority of users.

It is beyond me how this bug ended up resolved as WONTFIX...

Try a Google search for "hide accessibility icon gnome shell" (or variants) and you'll be amazed how common this request is.

Most of the pages talk about either commenting out a line in a file installed from package (which is going to be overwritten on next update) or installing an extension.  An extension.  To turn hide a part of existing UI.  Doesn't that sound odd to anyone else but me?

What most people would want I believe is a checkbox under "Universal Access Settings" that would hide (or show) the icon in the top bar.  No extensions, no messing with the system files, no googling for solution to such a trivial thing, no wasted time.

--
Regards,
Alex

*** Bug 666451 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Since I see no other way to express my voice: I also vote for adding at least a configuration setting.

I personally do not understand why the devs want to dictate that we must have the icon.

 - Trying to use a laptop at the beach in bright sunshine - turn on high
contrast
 - Showing something on your computer to a older friend with not so good vision
- use Zoom or Large Text

:) hehe try to figure out better arguments

it's the "new wave of heroes", my way or the highway philosophy, 

I've already took my steps away from this.

I also don't understand why this is WONTFIX.

It is reasonable for users to want an option to be able to disable a feature, even if as a developer it is your favorite feature and one that you worked on for months.

Are you seriously claiming that because users might be "Trying to use a laptop at the beach" that you can't provide the option to disable a rarely used menu icon that clutters up the visual space?

This bug report is the most concise explanation of everything that is wrong with gnome3.

(In reply to comment #12)
> I also don't understand why this is WONTFIX.
> 
> It is reasonable for users to want an option to be able to disable a feature,
> even if as a developer it is your favorite feature and one that you worked on
> for months.
Yeah, and when people want to disable the clock, we have to add an option for that? What about people that don't use Bluetooth (my case), or sound, or battery?

> Are you seriously claiming that because users might be "Trying to use a laptop
> at the beach" that you can't provide the option to disable a rarely used menu
> icon that clutters up the visual space?
Are you seriously claiming that a very small icon in your top bar which may even be useful to you one day hurts you so bad that you waste your time ranting on a closed report? Come on, the Shell is much less cluttered than the old panel, you can afford one icon there. Are you afraid people think you're disabled?

You can write an extension if you really suffer from the current situation...

(In reply to comment #13)
> You can write an extension if you really suffer from the current situation...

The extension exists actually, so all it takes is going to extensions.gnome.org and installing it ...

I did not realize that the clock could not be easily disabled, or moved.

I now understand.

>
> Are you seriously claiming that a very small icon in your top bar which may
> even be useful to you one day hurts you so bad that you waste your time ranting
> on a closed report? Come on, the Shell is much less cluttered than the old
> panel, you can afford one icon there. Are you afraid people think you're
> disabled?

You didn't try running it on a netbook, did you?

The default set of icons/clock takes *half* of the horizontal space in
the top panel and it looks really cluttered.  If I could hide this
icon and also hide battery (unless it's discharging or otherwise might
need my attention) that would be really cool.

> You can write an extension if you really suffer from the current situation...

An extension to *disable* a feature?  Give me a break.

(In reply to comment #12)
> This bug report is the most concise explanation of everything that is wrong
> with gnome3.

(In reply to comment #16)
> An extension to *disable* a feature?  Give me a break.

Such comments add no value to the bugreport. Please don't add any more.


Thanks,
-- GNOME bugmasters

Could at least a boolean setting in org.gnome.desktop.interface be implemented which can be altered via gsetttings or dconf-editor?

The workaround currently available for GNOME3 3.6 requires one to alter /usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/sessionMode.js Implementing such a boolean setting will also eliminate the requests for extra extensions or make it easier for people to develop extensions by themselves.