Hi Everyone--
Here are my thoughts. There really isn't a problem with having spoken
instructions differing from visual instructions; that's essentially what
happens with properly coded html pages and screen readers. Screen
readers provide context for people who can't see, such as the shape and
purpose of tables, level and hierarchy of headings, relationships
between labels and form inputs, etc. Although it could be argued that
these visual aspects are evident to persons who can view the page and
are not instructions per se, this seems to me a very fine splitting of
hairs. Ultimately, we're trying to make it possible for persons with and
without disabilities to use fluid components, which often represent
something novel. I think it's particularly important to have
instructions when tools are unfamiliar and/or don't behave in expected
ways, especially in the brave new world Fluid is entering--where there
really isn't a roadmap or history to reference.
So, descriptions like:
"To move an item: Turn off virtual cursor (insert + z). Select item
using the arrow keys or i, j, k or m. Move an image by pressing control
+ i, j, k, or m or the arrow keys. Read an image by pressing Enter"
or some such, make sense to me for screen reader users, since they will
be encountering something new and unexpected. To Allison's point, I
think it should be hidden, since it would be confusing to non-screen
reader users.
I don't recall encountering a conflict with control + arrow keys with
the virtual cursor turned off, but I'll check.
Mike
Allison Bloodworth wrote:
Hi Anastasia,
What do the instructions say currently? It seems to me that a
reference to the "virtual cursor" could be very confusing to
non-screen reader users. It also seems that if there were a way to
give JAWS users info about *only* the set of keystrokes they could
use, it would be best to do that and minimize their cognitive load.
Cheers,
Allison
On Dec 11, 2008, at 12:53 PM, Anastasia Cheetham wrote:
FLUID-1821 suggests some improvements to the Image Reorderer
instructions for screen reader users - for example, the instructions
that they need to turn off virtual cursor.
In trying to implement these improvements, however, some questions
came to mind that I'm not sure how to deal with.
Here's the source of the conundrum:
We first implemented the keyboard movement using Ctrl + arrow keys.
We soon found that this key combination was already 'taken' by JAWS
for another purpose, so we found an unused combination: Ctrl + i, j,
k or m. Now, the Image Reorderer will work with either of these sets
of keys.
The instructions that are both displayed and spoken describe both of
these keysets. However, JAWS users can't use whichever set they like
- only the letter version will work for them. Also, it could be
argued that non-screen reader users don't really need to be told to
turn virtual cursor off.
So: should the spoken instructions be different than the visual
instructions? Is this a good idea? A bad idea?
Thoughts from screen reader users? Thoughts from interaction
designers? Thoughts from people who have thoughts on the issue?
--Anastasia Cheetham [email protected]
Software Designer, Fluid Project http://fluidproject.org
Adaptive Technology Resource Centre / University of Toronto
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Allison Bloodworth
Senior User Interaction Designer
Educational Technology Services
University of California, Berkeley
(415) 377-8243
[email protected]
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org:Michigan State University;Usability & Accessibility Center
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email;internet:[email protected]
title:Assistant Director
tel;work:5173538977
tel;fax:5174329541
url:http://usability.msu.edu
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