Just to correct myself on one point, the hotkey for the keyboard layout
rotor in Windows, is standard set to ALT-Shift. Sorry for the inconvenience
my mistyping might have caused for anyone.
----- Original Message -----
From: "David" <[email protected]>
To: "M and L Dorn" <[email protected]>; "Katherine Moss"
<[email protected]>; "GW Info List Post" <[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 27, 2012 11:08 AM
Subject: Re: Recommended Laptops
What you describe with the Shift-Number key combinations, simply doesn't
sound like a manufacturer problem. To me, like to a couple of others who
already have responded, it sounds more likely, that your Windows had been
set up for a different keyboard layout. This, you can choose under the
control panel, on any Windows flavor. On my current system, for one thing,
I have Windows set up to run two different keyboard layouts. One for
English, and one for my local language.
To explain just a bit of the root of the trouble here experienced, let me
do it this way. In English, you have 26 characters in your alphabet. In
Scandinavia, they have 29, although Norway and Denmark have the same three
extra characters - whilst Swedish has three similar characters, but
slightly different in the look. Then there is a handful of specialized
characters in German, and French people have their handful. We haven't
mentioned Icelandic - which I do hold have something like 31 characters in
their alphabet. And, if you happen to speak Spanish, you would be dizy to
know about all the accentuated characters they are dealing with. Well,
don't let us even touch the different languages of Asia.
For a strict English user, none of these characters would make any sense.
Neither will you want them to interfere with your writing. When I switch
to my local keyboard layout, the three keys you normally will use for the
symbols Semi-Colon, Apostrophe and Left-Bracket - are all turned into
local or national letters. Why do they do this? Well, first of all, there
is no other way of reaching these characters, but to have them on some
keys on the keyboard. And, the nature of the touch-typing system, is that
the most commonly used characters of a language, should be right at your
fingertips. Meaning, that you shouldn't have to make finger-breaking
key-combinations, so as to type the alpha-numerics of your language. This
means, that with my local layout activated, I can reach the three extra
national characters, with my right-hand little-finger. Convenient for me;
totally useless for you.
Microsoft, who delivers Windows in a number of localized versions, has
realized the need for this kind of keyboard localization. And, due to the
fact, that people may want to run their Windows in one language mainly,
yet have the capability to switch to another language and keyboard layout
at random, the functionality has been built-in with all versions of
Windows. My guess is, that even if you ordered a computer in the USA, and
it was all set up in English, it still could be prepared for things like
Spanish or French - due to both these languages commonly being used even
in North-America. Have a trip just cross that boarder in the North, and
get yourself a day in Canada. You will immediately be presented with the
challenges of no less than TWO officially recognized languages: English
and French. Specially so, in the case you are travelling in the Eastern
part of the country. The main point here though is, that likely your
computer came all prepared to handle a few different keyboard layouts. By
standard, you switch between each keyboard layout, with a hotkey, which
works as a rotor between all the keyboard layouts you have defined. The
key-combination for the rotor, is the Control- and Shift-keys pressed and
released simultaneously, without any other keys involved. A nice thing
about the newer versions of WE in this regard, is that it even announces
which keyboard layout is active at any time, when you hit that hotkey.
Even if your laptop came with everything set up in English, chances are
that you somehow have hit the hotkey by accident, and thereby switched the
keyboard layout. And, if you now called tech support for the computer,
chances are pretty high, that the tech person you spoke to, would have no
real clue about the problem. That is, unless he normally are doing such
switching between layouts. If you are not in the need of anything but
English, I suggest for everyone -regardless of Windows version, or
computer model - to go to the control panel of Windows itself. Here, you
wil find a choice, reading something about Regional Settings. Open this
one, and check the different tabs of the screen. In one of them, you can
add on, or delete any keyboard layouts, in the rotor. Delete any layouts
you won't need, thereby eliminating the risk of accidentially switching
between different layouts.
After all of this explanation, let me just add on two extra pieces of
information. Switching keyboard layout, definately does change the
behavior of the Shif-Number combinations. And, due to your description of
the problem you faced, it simply leads me to believe, the keyboard layout
had been switched. Secondly
, the challenges of differennt keyboard layouts, is causing one big
problem even in Window-Eyes itself. And this one may mainly go to the
Staff members, but it still ties in here. As we have already illustrated
in the above, the left bracket-key, has been replaced by a national
character, in many Non-English layouts. This means, that also the
Right-Bracket-key, used to quickly go to the end of Table or List in
Browse Mode, has also been replaced. For you English users, it is easy to
hit the Right-Bracket, followed by a T, for instance, to go to the end of
a Table in Internet Explorer. But for me, I have to press Alt-Ctrl-9, to
get the Right-Bracket symbol. And, that particular hotkey of WE, CANNOT be
user redefined, for some strange reason. So staff members, if you are
reading this message, I strongly recommend, the Right-Bracket hotkey be
user definable as well as the rest of the keystrokes used in browse mode
or any other functionality of the screen reader. Well, just an extra note,
for the sake of simplicity. :)
----- Original Message -----
From: "M and L Dorn" <[email protected]>
To: "Katherine Moss" <[email protected]>; "GW Info List Post"
<[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 27, 2012 5:35 AM
Subject: Re: Recommended Laptops
No, it was the fault of the Lenovo key assignments. It did not give me 1
thru 0 or, with shift, things like dollar sign and parenthesis. It gave
me things like circumflex A and other foreighn to English special
characters. If I have to remap a bunch of keys on a brand new computer,
it's not the right computer for me.
TTFN,
Marilyn
On 11/26/2012 6:08 PM, Katherine Moss wrote:
Marilyn, support was next to useless on the foreign symbols thing
because the row above qwerty is the number row! It starts with the
tilde key, then 1,2,3,4, and so on till you get zero, dash, and then
equals. Adding shift to these gives you different symbols such as
parentheses, dollar signs, and so on. It was not the fault of
Window-Eyes at all.
-----Original Message-----
From: M and L Dorn [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, November 26, 2012 2:24 PM
To: Chao, Matthew (DOC); GW Info List Post
Subject: Re: Recommended Laptops
I went through this very thing in September. I bought a Lenovo laptop,
and it had so many weird key assignments, such as getting foreign
characters instead of numbers and symbols on the row above querty, that
I took it back. Lenovo's tech support was worse than useless. I
\\\\\\\\bought an HP and had some of the same troubles, but to a lesser
extent. I took it back. I purchased a Dell by calling them and telling
them what I wanted. I had avoided them initially, even though my last
one that is 7 years old was a Dell, because I thought they would be so
much more money. As it turned out, they had what I needed for $65 less
than I paid for the HP. I'd check out Dell first to see what price you
can get. If it's not out of line with what you can afford, go for it.
If not, then check out the one you want elsewhere carefully to be sure
the numpad works for WE navigation and commands and that the keys type
what they are supposed to. Also on the Lenovo, there was some special
Lenovo window that interfered with everything and was always in the
Alt-Tab cycle. You couldn't close it or delete it. Lenovo tech support
had never heard of it, nor could they find out anything to explain it to
me.
TTFN,
Marilyn
On 11/26/2012 5:55 AM, Chao, Matthew (DOC) wrote:
Hi, Folks. I'm in the process of possibly ordering a new laptop, as I
haven't bought a new one in the past seven years, and want to get a
Windows 7-equipped laptop before everyone goes to Windows 8. Can
anyone recommend a good laptop or ultrabook that works well with WE
7.5.4.1, has Windows 7 Professional, is of high quality, and has
minimal bloatware? I've seen posts that, for example, raise problems
with Lenovos and some Dells. Please advise, as I need to make a
decision relatively quickly. Thanks in advance.--Matthew Chao
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