Actually they are at revision 1314 and I dont find it slow when moving around windows at all. At the present time the virtual buffer code is being rewritten in C++ and the speed of browsing the internet has vastly improved. since their first release of the 0.5 release. Keep in mind also that NVDA has only existed for about a year now so no it won't be able to do everything that Jaws can do, but it is a scriptable screen reader and improvements are literally being made to it everyday. It can also surprise you in a few areas, for example if you have a computer with more than one soundcard you can choose what sound card you want speech to come through. Yes, there is a way that you can make Jaws do this to but most everyday users don't want to have to hack Jaws to make that happen. Also I find that NVDA works much faster than Jaws when reading documents in adobe reader 8. Also as I said before it gives the people that are not able to afford Jaws, Window Eyes, Hal a way to use there computer that is far better than Narrator. It reads Windows Live Messenger, works with skype 3, even reads the extra information that Jaws seems to skip over in the Skype option dialog that can give a new user of Skype an idea of what all of those options do. The E Speak tts voice that it uses has also been made into an integrated dll and that allows a person to burn NVDA to a cd and set it up to auto run when the cd is inserted and you have a screen reader on any computer. Nothing even needs to be installed on the computer itself, it can all run off of the cd or even a thumb drive if you so choose. That to me is a very nice feature when working on a sighted persons computer, I don't have to install anything screen reader related on their computer at all, not even a video intercept driver like you do with the thumb drive version of Jaws. It does also work with Windows Vista, it has the same problem that the big 3 have with the security dialogs, but that is more the fault of Microsoft's implementation and not the screen readers themselves. NVDA does do more than what I have written here but the rest is for the curious to find out. Just so you know, the main focus of the work being done on the virtual buffer code is actually being done for the Firefox browser but work will also start on IE at some point too. I am not actually sure if NVDA has been translated into Romanian but either the wiki article for NVDA or someone on the NVDA email list should be able to either help to get it translated or someone may come along that will submit a translation. Actually I just checked the language list in E Speak and it does speak in Romanian, still not sure if the NVDA interface has been translated but it may have been. Just checked that to, and it doesn't look like it has been but, it can be. Hey yeah I know, E Speak is not the best tts engine out there but it isn't too bad for a open source project that is done by one guy. The E Speak engine in fact does have a ton of settings that can be customized from with in NVDA, different languages, 15 different variants, pitch control, speed and something Jaws Eloquence can't do, volume control. They have also used a feature that the Mac screen reader has where the control key to stop speech actually just pauses speech and you can press it again to resume it. Or if you do something else then speech carries on just like any screen reader would. Not a feature that I really care much for but their are certain circumstansces when it would be nice, like if you got a phone call in the middle of reading something you just press the control key to pause reading and when done press it again to start where you left it. Yes it also has an option to change the modifyer key for laptops. In fact you can choose to have the insert key on the six pack as the modifier key, caps lock, the insert on the num pad, or even all three if you want. Can you change the modifier key to any key you want to? Yes but to do that you will have to change the key by modifying the default.kbd file. With that file, if you don't want insert b to be the combo that reads a dialog box then just change it to what you want to. And on and on and on but you get the idea.
JohnPG search for all of your Jaws scripts at http://www.blindcrawler.com/Also be sure to check out Blind Crawler's Legend of the Green Dragon server at http://www.blindcrawler.com/lotg/
There will be more to come from Blind Crawler very soon. Administrator: John Greer Blind Crawler.com----- Original Message ----- From: "Octavian Rasnita" <orasnita@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Friday, November 02, 2007 12:41 AM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open Komodo
Do you know a better screen reader than Jaws? I have also tried Window Eyes, but it is horrible. NVDA is very slow responsive. I have tried also Baum's Virgo, but I don't even want to talk about it.We don't have too many choices, and at least I am not able to make a better screen reader, so yes, I can say I cannot do anything in this field.Octavian----- Original Message ----- From: "John Greer" <jpgreer17@xxxxxxxxxxx>To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 11:32 PM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open KomodoI wasn't lumping all companies in together. Yes there are those companies that do care. Mozilla being one of them, but the problem is, the one's that don't care give the bad rap for all the others. My point was and has always been if you don't find one company willing to help, try not to get that attitude of no one cares, and if you need it bad enough, don't sit back and wait for someone else to do it but get in there and do it yourself if need be. What I do see with a company like Mozilla and other open source companies is a willingness to make things work for as many people as they can. The biggest problem though is many blind people because they have been programmed to rely on the state or on companies like FS don't even know what open source software is nor what it can mean for the blind community. The reference to big companies was referring to the companies that don't care simply because they don't see that the focus of the blind community is beginning to shift. It was not meant as a reference to the companies that do actually get it. Also, keep in mind that some blind people, it is a hard sell because if it doesn't work perfectly for them with the very first time they try a beta, many will piss and moan about it forever instead of giving it the time it needs to develop. Basically, yeah there are those blind people that have learned to stomp their feet and sit back and cry about something until they get what they want because they have learned that if they cry loud enough someone will do it for them. I am trying my best to change that particular outlook on life by putting in front of them alternatives, and giving them the choice to either take it or just continue to cry and see what happens for them. JohnPG search for all of your Jaws scripts at http://www.blindcrawler.com/ Also be sure to check out Blind Crawler's Legend of the Green Dragon server at http://www.blindcrawler.com/lotg/There will be more to come from Blind Crawler very soon. Administrator: John Greer Blind Crawler.com----- Original Message ----- From: "Aaron Leventhal" <aaronlev@xxxxxxxxxxx>To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 4:05 PM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open KomodoSorry, I don't quite think it's fair to say big software companies don't care about this group. I work at IBM and on Mozilla, and there have been a lot of resources spent on accessibility. I see other companies, such as Sun, also stepping up. Look at the work on Firefox, IAccessible2, Linux accessibility, Web 2.0 accessibility, etc. It's common sense that we can't afford to spend our resources to make accessibility work on a screen reader version that has limited support for MSAA. This doesn't mean we want people to have to spend money on their AT. I'm not saying there aren't mistakes or the credit should be given carte blanche, but let's be a little more positive toward the folks working on this!- Aaron John Greer wrote:Well of course they are going to come out with newer software every year, that is just the way business works. So we that can't afford to spend the money have to find alternatives, such as I have with learning how to Jaws script and finding another screen reader that does what I need it to. Now we can either sit back and complain that the big software companies don't care about us, because everyone already knows that , or we can find work arounds for the things that no longer work for us. Me personally I don't have time to sit back, complain and hope someone fixes it, so I get my hands dirty and try to fix it myself so I can move on with my life. As I said earlier, IE 7 did not work out of the box with Jaws 6 so, I tried a little hack and copied the scripts for IE 6 into a jss for IE 7 and presto, IE 7 worked. It may even be possible to get Jaws 6 to work with Firefox in that same way, don't know,, haven't tried it. But when it comes time for me to need it? Am I going to sit back and wait for someone to fix it? Nope, time to get down to scripting again for me. It comes down to the old saying, if you want something done, the best way is to do it yourself because if not many times you get left behind. JohnPG search for all of your Jaws scripts at http://www.blindcrawler.com/ Also be sure to check out Blind Crawler's Legend of the Green Dragon server at http://www.blindcrawler.com/lotg/There will be more to come from Blind Crawler very soon. Administrator: John Greer Blind Crawler.com----- Original Message ----- From: "Octavian Rasnita" <orasnita@xxxxxxxxx>To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 2:02 PM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open KomodoOh yes, and that reason sound something like that they don't care about those who need to use older versions of some software, especially that the software industry need to promote new software to be bought.Octavian----- Original Message ----- From: "John Greer" <jpgreer17@xxxxxxxxxxx>To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 8:38 PM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open KomodoIt is mainly for the same reasons that Windows Live Messenger or IE 7 don't work with Jaws 6 and below. Now yes it is possible to get IE 7 to work with Jaws 6 but not without a bit of a hack job. JohnPG search for all of your Jaws scripts at http://www.blindcrawler.com/ Also be sure to check out Blind Crawler's Legend of the Green Dragon server at http://www.blindcrawler.com/lotg/There will be more to come from Blind Crawler very soon. Administrator: John Greer Blind Crawler.com----- Original Message ----- From: "Octavian Rasnita" <orasnita@xxxxxxxxx>To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 12:14 PM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open KomodoIf other programs can work well with older versions of Jaws, why Commodo wouldn't be able to do the same? The WX simple widgets can be accessed well, the Win32 API the same, Java SWT the same...Octavian----- Original Message ----- From: "Aaron Leventhal" <aaronlev@xxxxxxxxxxx>To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 6:06 PM Subject: Re: Next steps on Open KomodoOctavian,If we fix any bugs that are apparent with JAWS 9, then it should work all the way back as far as JAWS 7.1 or JAWS 8. We need a version of JAWS that utilizes MSAA well. Really old versions of JAWS have bugs that get in the way.- Aaron __________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind
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