Hi Silpa; Below are tips from several people on the use / navigation of combo boxes.
A combo box to a sighted user appears as a drop down list that all of the entries appear when they click on the box. they then move the mouse to the entry they want and click again. The box then collapses and the selected entry is shown. In JAWS, first you need to press Enter in the combo box to enter forms mode. Then press Alt down arrow to have the entire list open or "drop down". Use the down and up arrows to select the entry you want. Then press Alt up arrow to close the combo box. Sometimes, a page is designed to change immediately based on their selection as soon as the value is selected. This is a problem for JAWS users in that if you just arrow down through the selection, the page will update immediately on a selection that is probably not desired. To prevent this, you absolutely need to use Alt down arrow to open the list and Alt up arrow to close the combo box. The page will update at this point on these dynamic pages. Don Marang Hello everyone, > I was on a web site and I wanted to register, so I hit f for forms > mode. I landed in a combo box, and I needed to select something. > Jaws said use your up or down arrow keys to make a selection. As > soon as I hit my down arrow key to look at my choices I went back > out of forms moad. How can I make my selection in the combo box if > I'm always taken back out of forms mode? I'm running jaws 9, IE7, > and windows XP home edition. If anyone could help me out with this > I would really appreciate it! Thanks in advance! > Take care, > Lisa Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] Making a selection in a combo box Hi, You never went into forms mode, actually. The f and shift f take you to the next and previous form control. When you are on a control you want to use, press enter. Derek Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] Making a selection in a combo box Hi, Lisa. Try hitting insert control home to take you to the first form field. Then hit enter to go into forms mode. If you're in a combo box, open the list box with alt down arrow. Once you made your selection, hit alt up arrow to close the list box. That should highlight your selection. I did that today on the Albertsons web site. Hope this helps. Rosemarie Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] Making a selection in a combo box Sometimes you need to use the combination of Alt and down arrow to open a list in a combo box. Blessings, Tom Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] Making a selection in a combo box Lisa, another lister provided the following instructions when I asked awhile ago: The way I always try to deal with combo boxes, is to first enter Forms Mode, then alt+DownArrow to open them. Then make your selection by arrowing to it as quickly as possible, (some combo boxes are javascripted so that you are only given a small amount of time - the item is highlighted, then the form thinks you've selected what you've highlighted and automatically moves you to the next stage. Marilyn Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] Making a selection in a combo box Hi Lisa, In addition to what has already been said, in my experience, I find it best, after you've used the alt+arrow keys to open the combo box, then arrowed down to your selection, and, upon reaching your choice, it's best to close the combo box with alt+up arrow, as this will complete the selection, and, I'm assuming, will refresh the page to reflect your selection. At that point, once the page refreshes, you can simply press the letter C key for the combo box, and Jaws will take you straight to the combo box, assuming that it's the only one on the page, if it isn't, you can just keep pressing the letter C until you get to the combo box you just made the selection in and continue filling out the form at that point. I do this because sometimes the author of the webpage doesn't take us into account, and the fact that we have to arrow through the selections so we can hear what they are, so if we press tab to go to the next form field, the combo box will sometimes not make the change we want, and stay on the original selection, at which point, we have to go back to the combo box, and redo the selection. This way, I know it's made properly and I'm not putting my fate in the hands of someone who failed to take us blind folks into account. Smile. Victor From: Lisa Belville Try opening it by first turning forms mode on and then using Alt plus down arrow. You should hear something about the combo box being open. Now arrow down to the choice you want. If it's the type of combo box I'm thinking of, you can just press tab to move away from that box and it should open the page with whatever choice you selected. Constipated accountants work it out with a pencil. Lisa Belville missktlab1...@verizon.net From: Hans Pauli Sundstein Hi Dale, and any one on list, that has trubble's with the combo boxes. I have visited the webpage that you linked to, and have tryed out the combo boxes there, and there are two different ways to work, whether you are using Jaws 10 - 11, or earlyer version's. Well, if someone have disabled the autoforms mode in Jaws 10 - 11, than it work's just as in the earlyer version's. So let me begin with the older versions: When getting to a combobox, press enter, to activate the forms mode. Than press alt+down arrow to open the listbox, and then arrow down through the combobox. You can also use first letter to jump to a particular letter, and than use the arrow key's to find what you are searching for. Now press alt+up arrow, to close the listbox, and often the webpage automatically click's here, otherwise, tab to a button that can be named go or search or something else, and press enter here. On webpage's where there are multiple of comboboxes, you sirtainly need's to make your selection's in any one, before selecting the go/search ... button. When you have activated the form's mode in the earlyer version's of Jaws, you only can tab through the fields on the page, and if you want to read anything of the text information between the field's, you must press the pc cursor bbutton, to leave the forms mode, and come back to the virtual cursor. When you then again meet's a combobox, you must again activate the forms mode, by pressing enter. In Jaws 10 - 11 there are an automatic forms mode, that gives a sound, when the cursor are placed on a combobox. Here just press spacebar, to select the combobox, and than alt+down arrow, and just continue as described above. When there are pressed alt+up arrow to close the listbox, the combobox automatically are left, and you can continue to arrow down the page, or tab, just as you want your self. I hope that this advice can be helpful to someone. Hans Pauli. Hope these tips have helped. Take care. Mike ----- Original Message ----- From: "Silpa Mallipeddi" <silpa.samartha...@gmail.com> To: <blind-computing@jaws-users.com> Sent: Tuesday, July 06, 2010 2:48 AM Subject: [Blind-Computing] Using combo boxes with Jaws Hi All: I would like to know if we navigate combo boxes by pressing only the down arrow key or Alt + down arrow keys after entering into forms mode. I would also like to know the appropriate reasons for different kinds of behavior. Or does it vary even with the versions of Jaws? Thanks and regards, Silpa. For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/
