Whilst not disagreeing with David, it might help to be aware of 'linearisation' at a more basic level.
When using a screen reader, you effectively have a 1 dimensional interface, because only one thing can be read out at a time. A visual interface is (generally) 2 dimensional, because it is presented in two dimensions, and the person can scan quickly between different areas. The way windows based screen readers generally work (especially for web sites) is to going through the page in source code order. I believe this applies to most applications and dialogs as well. VO has taken a slightly different approach. You can simply hit VO-right and go through everything linearly (in applications). However, when there are columns of items, you can also go down, giving a kind of 2 dimensional access. Try it in the system preferences, and you should be able to work out what the grid is like. Web sites are a tricky aspect of this method, as you could easily get completely different content ordering depending on whether you go down or across. You could also miss things, especially in complex forms. Try a web site you know well that has multiple columns (e.g. the wiki), and try going though the whole page with down, then start again and use right. It might be tricky to help out a friend with JAWs, they are stuck with the source order ;) Kind regards, -Alastair
