Hi all,

What are Tern Rich Text boxes, and can screen readers (i.e., Jaws and 
NVDA) read them? If so, are there any tips for working with them?

A group of blind translators has been working with a company about 
making some software accessible. The program is called Fluency. We've 
been discussing a translator's questions, trying to figure out whether 
his concerns can be solve by an end user workaround or a change to the 
software.

In a nutshell, the software presents information in several dynamic 
windows or panes. Some of us work directly in the dynamic panes. This is 
fine on more powerful computers, but on slower laptops, things are slow 
and buggy. The developers have added an accessibility view, which puts 
the text of the panes in a nice stable,, easy-to-work-with environment 
for reading, but the translator needs to go into the dynamic panes to 
actually write and edit.

The translator with the concerns contacted the developers. The reply he 
received is at the end of this message. It mentions Tern Rich Text 
boxes--hence, my questions about them.

Thanks for any wisdom.

Ciao

Fluency doesn't send any text to the screen reader programs, it just 
allows screen readers to pull information from accessibility windows. 
Within this
type of text window, there are many formats. The Accessibility View 
Window, which allows individual words to be read when highlighted, is a 
regular Windows
Rich Text box, which the screen reader programs can read just fine. The 
translation window, however, is a Tern Rich Text box, which JAWS/NVDA 
apparently
don't read correctly.

Since making the translation window into the Windows Rich Text box is 
out of the question on this version of Fluency, since it would require a 
complete
redesign of the entire program, we cannot make that change at this time.

I would definitely recommend getting in touch with JAWS/NVDA and asking 
if they can make their programs compatible with Tern Rich Text boxes, 
which would
open doors for working with a lot of other tools that also use this format.


    VICUG-L is the Visually Impaired Computer User Group List.
Archived on the World Wide Web at
    http://listserv.icors.org/archives/vicug-l.html
    Signoff: [log in to unmask]
    Subscribe: [log in to unmask]