Hi all, Many thanks for your helpful responses.
Esther, thanks for the detail on navigating with the mouse - that was going to be my next question. I have a couple of follow up questions on your post if that's ok. Firstly, if I have mouse keys enabled, are there any settings I need to change in order to get Voiceover to read items under the mouse as I navigate? I took from your post that there might be, but wasn't sure. Secondly, when I turn mouse keys on in Accessibility under System Preferences, VO spacebar ceases to work, and I wondered why this might be. I know you said that mouse keys could create conflicts on laptops, but I don't have numpad commander enabled. I was able to rectify the situation by using the trackpad to unstick the setting, and have just set up the option key as a toggle. Thanks for any help. Cheers, Ed On 29 Jul 2013, at 22:54, Esther <mori...@mac.com> wrote: > Hi Ed, > > To add to what Teresa said, when you use VO-Space this is a > VoiceOver-specifc software shortcut that means "perform the default action" > for a given situation -- which could be to click on an element. > VO-Shift-Space is another VoiceOver specific software shortcut for clicking > your mouse cursor. Pressing the return key will return the default > selections in dialog windows, and is hardware-based and does not rely on > whether you are using VoiceOver, but it doesn't have an effect when you are > supposed to click with a mouse or trackpad on a web page element. > > I usually distinguish between "hardware clicks" and "software clicks". > Hardware clicks (with TrackPad, Mouse, or with the Mouse Keys accessibility > solution) work everywhere. VoiceOver-specific software keyclicks may work if > an application is accessible, but otherwise may not work. > > The other part of clicking on a web element such as a clickable element is > making sure that your mouse cursor is actually on the element in question. > (This is really annoying, because in some cases I have to change my cursor > tracking preferences under VoiceOVer Utility to either "Mouse Cursor follows > VoiceOver Cursor" or "Mouse Cursor moves VoiceOver Cursor" in order for > things to work in environments of transitioning accessibility, such as in the > iCloud or old Mobile Me web pages, or when iTunes or Automator was first > being made accessible). However, in most instances you only need to make > sure, after routing your mouse cursor to your VoiceOver cursor, that you > issue a "hardware click". > > Since I don't use a mouse with my Mac laptops, I usually click on elements > using Mouse Keys. If you are using a full size keyboard with NumPad > Commander turned on, you can alternatively use the NumPad Commander shortcut > to click (I think this is Control+"5" on the numeric keypad if you use the > default settings, but you should check this). And if you use the TrackPad > you should turn off TrackPad Commander and make sure that you press down hard > enough to register a click. > > You should not have both Mouse Keys and NumPad Commander turned on at the > same time, because they lead to conflicting key definitions. (On a laptop, > this can make some of your keys completely unusable until you sort this.) > > Mouse Keys is an accessibility solution for people with motion disabilities > that make it difficult for them to move a mouse precisely to a link or form > control where they need to click or activate or enter text. VoiceOver users > can use Mouse Keys in a couple of settings: 1) to click on elements like your > clickable links where there are accessibility issues in the setup or > application that prevent the VoiceOver shortcuts from working correctly and > 2) to move the mouse cursor to screen locations independently of VoiceOver's > navigation. Again, case 2 is an accessibility problem area. It may be that > player controls can be activated by clicking on them, but the controls are > not exposed to VoiceOver, so you can't move there independently. However, if > you can move your mouse cursor to that position, and click, you can activate > the controls. If you set up VoiceOver to announce what's under the mouse as > you move over the controls navigating with Mouse Keys, you can find out where > the controls are and then click them. Usually, you use external clues for > the position of the controls so you're not exploring randomly. Once your > know where they are relative to a screen element that VoiceOver can see, you > can navigate there again knowing the offsets. > > Hope this sketchy explanation works. On extended keyboards, the Mouse Keys > are the 9 number keys of the numeric keypad, with the central "5" key acting > as the current position of the mouse that can be clicked. Pressing the > number keys around that position moves the mouse one screen pixel in that > direction (left, right, up, down, or diagonally). So if you press the "4" > key to the left of the "5", you move the mouse 1 pixel to the left. Press > the "6" key and move to the right. Press the "8" key and move up, etc. > > On a laptop the mouse keys are where the embedded numeric keypad used to be: > the keys below the "7 8 9" keys on the right side of the keyboard, with "7 8 > 9" on the top row corresponding to "7 8 9" on the numeric keypad, "u i o" > for "4 5 6", and "j k l" for "1 2 3". So the "i" key is in the central > position of the "5" key on the numeric keypad, and you click by pressing this > key when Mouse Keys are turned on. > > You can set up turning Mouse Keys on and off with 5 presses of the Option > key. Go to the Accessibility under System Preferences with Option+F5, and in > the Mouse & Trackpad pane check the box for "Press the Option key five times > to turn Mouse Keys off and on", then close the window with Command+W. > > So, route your mouse cursor to your VoiceOver cursor, turn Mouse Keys on, > click, and then turn Mouse keys off. > This may be set up to click with Fn+"i" on a laptop under Mountain Lion, > though just pressing "i" will work in Lion. > > HTH. Cheers, > > Esther > > > On 29 Jul 2013, at 11:06, Teresa Cochran wrote: > >> Clickable elements can be very tricky, depending on how the web designer has >> implemented Javascript. For example, on the concertwindow.com site, There >> are several elements on the front page that rarely do anything when clicked. >> I find that i have to try various methods on different sites, including >> VO-shift-space, turn on mouse keys and do a num-pad-5, or use the trackpad. >> Sometimes just VO-space works. The nice thing about mouse keys is that they >> are actual mouse clicks and are not dependent on VO. Neither is the trackpad >> when trackpad commander is turned off. >> >> HtH, >> Teresa >> On Jul 29, 2013, at 1:42 PM, Maria and Joe Chapman <bubbygirl1...@gmail.com> >> wrote: >> >>> HI. try routing the mouse to the vo cursor with vo command f 5 and doing a >>> vo shift space twice to double click the mouse. >>> >>> >>> Maria and Joe Chapman >>> bubbygirl1...@gmail.com >>> >>> >>> >>> On 30/07/2013, at 6:37 AM, Edward Green <ergreen1...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>>> Hi, >>>> >>>> Apologies if this seems like a silly question, but if Voiceover announces >>>> that something is clickable on a web page, in OSX how do I click/activate >>>> it? I've tried VO space as well as return, but haven't had any joy. >>>> >>>> Many thanks, >>>> >>>> Ed >>>> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "MacVisionaries" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
