[blindlaw] Update on Jaws and Track Changes

Gerard Sadlier gerard.sadlier at gmail.com
Tue Dec 18 22:56:33 UTC 2018


Laura

You are absolutely right. Track changes is so important a feature and
it cannot safely be used with JAWS. It is a critical part of
commercial practice.

Kind regards

Ger

On 12/18/18, Richard Welch via BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Dear all,
>
> I have enjoyed this lively thread. I would point out that many people who
> are blind using jaws in education are at a disadvantage with these issues
> especially when faced with multiple revisions or edits from their faculty
> members trying to get them on the right track when it comes to papers and
> the like and Freedom scientific’s inability or unwillingness ultimately to
> provide a product that works the way they say it does Versus reality is
> problematic at best. A good example of the problems that have been
> consistent over the years has been that of spellchecking and incompatibility
> issues with this consistently working with the JAWS screen reader. I have
> been a little bit amused with the 2010 comments, in light of the reality we
> live in, and the desire of many professionals to collaborate.
>
> All my best,
>
> Richard Welch
> J.D. Candidate, mslaw.edu
>
> Best,
>
> Richard Welch
> ricwelch at gmail.com
> 781-367-4964
> Please consider connecting on LinkedIn
> linkedin.com/in/richard-welch-258310b
>
> ________________________________
> From: BlindLaw <blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org> on behalf of Laura Wolk via
> BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, December 18, 2018 3:07 PM
> To: Blind Law Mailing List
> Cc: Laura Wolk; Steve Jacobson
> Subject: Re: [blindlaw] Update on Jaws and Track Changes
>
> Dear Steve,
>
> I really appreciate your response and all of the points it raises.
> Rest assured I had a very long talk with a Freedom Scientific
> representative about exactly what engendered my original post to this
> list. Whether he plans to pass that on, I have no idea. But I did it
> for the precise reasons you expressed, and I think that doing it in
> person is essential compared to over email so that they can tell how
> deeply problematic the situation is.
>
> That being said, I think that blind people have a responsibility to
> step up and help each other out, even if we aren't specifically
> relying on a buggy aspect of jaws. You are absolutely correct that
> companies must prioritize the bugs that impact the most users, but the
> sad fact is that, right now, this will likely mean that the bugs that
> matter
> most to those who are using their technology to access education or a
> profession will be farther down the list. It's also the sad fact that
> the more that these bugs exist, the fewer people will be able to
> actually **access** that same education and professional
> opportunities. So yes, I suspect that of all blind users of Jaws,
> there are not terribly many that use track changes. Of those, there
> are fewer still who heavily edit, or incorporate multiple streams of
> edits. And of those, how many use Braille displays? But we all
> understand that track changes are necessary to be gainfully employed
> in 2018, to be a member of a law review, to co-author a paper with a
> professor, etc, etc. We can look beyond ourselves and our own
> circumstances and throw our hat into the ring to say, this
> **is** important. This does need to be fixed, even if I only use
> this feature sporadically or I used to use it in school but don't
> right now, etc. etc.
>
> For instance, I had no idea about the bug with insert+F. I use that
> feature constantly, many times a day. I imagine most other lawyers
> who are peer reviewing or editing their own work do also. But even if
> I didn't, I understand the importance of needing to reliably access
> that information to produce work on par with a sighted peer, and I
> gladly would have called up and pointed it out and asked for change if
> I could replicate it. If we communicate with each other more, we can
> be a larger collective force, even if what we require differs
> according to our professional experiences.
>
> So, in that spirit, I would like to say that the three things that
> hinder my ability to be a productive lawyer, to do the same work in
> the same amount of time as my sighted peers without needing to
> self-edit my billables, yada yada, are the following
> 1. Track change issue rehashed ad nauseam here.
> 2. The fact that, although I have been reporting this since 2016, Jaws
> is still incredibly slow in footnotes, will not let you select
> multiple words of text without starting to unselect those same words
> again, and does not announce the number of the footnote you are in.
> (note: every single time I raise this issue, I'm told by the FS rep
> that they "don't use footnotes much," so they're "not terribly
> familiar with what you mean." Inexcusable.
> 3. The fact that the Braille display raises dots 7-8 for all footnoted
> text, making them even more difficult to read.
>
> Again, I'm not disagreeing with you, Steve. Your points are all
> valid. I'm just calling on the community to examine whether we've
> ever been negatively impacted by FS's refusal to deal with this issue
> in a substantial way and, if so, to take five minutes to voice our
> discontent. Now, I have to end this, as my Jaws has crashed.
>
> Laura
>
> On 12/18/18, Steve Jacobson via BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>> Laura,
>>
>> First, I share some of your frustrations with the state of technology
>> today.
>> I am not a lawyer, and I do not use Microsoft Word at the level of
>> sophistication that you and others here probably use it. However, I do
>> work
>> as a volunteer as part of my responsibilities as an officer in the
>> National
>> Federation of the Blind in Computer Science to try to get problems
>> resolved
>> when we are aware of them.
>>
>> If this is an issue that a number of people are facing, it is essential
>> that
>> it be reported to Freedom Scientific. Yes, I realize that they were VFO
>> and
>> are not Vispero, but the Freedom Scientific name still works for email
>> and
>> web site access. There isn't much that they will be able to do, though,
>> without an example document.
>>
>> While I think it is reasonable to expect that when a number is given that
>> the number should be accurate, it helps to know exactly how it impacts
>> people when it is wrong. It seems unlikely that you are counting
>> revisions
>> and then stopping when you reach the number of revisions that JAWS
>> provided,
>> so it will help prioritize this bug to understand the real impact on you.
>> The cold hard facts are that the day of releasing any software when it is
>> close to being free of bugs is gone and is probably not returning soon. I
>> am not talking about JAWS specifically, but am including Microsoft Office
>> itself and all software companies. As a person who has been programming
>> and
>> working in the Information Technology field for forty years, I hate that
>> this is the case, but my dislike of the situation is not going to change
>> anything. The result is that companies like Vispero are forced to
>> prioritize the bugs they correct and knowing the impact on you is part of
>> that process. If this isn't an issue that is bothering a lot of people,
>> it
>> would make sense to try to find out why others are not bothered, and how
>> others are dealing with this. I have reported, as has the NFB, a bug in
>> Microsoft Word that can incorrectly report the color of the current text
>> in
>> Word as Black on Black or "Default Color" without providing the correct
>> information. Yet, that bug remains because it isn't something that
>> bothers
>> most people, apparently. For some reason, it is something I must use more
>> than most people, or perhaps I am particularly crabby about it.
>>
>> Finally, and this is not a criticism of NVDA, but one can't assume that
>> NVDA
>> is handling this correctly without trying the same document. . . There is
>> a possibility that the problem is with a value returned by Microsoft, for
>> example, and that could affect both screen readers. Even then, there is
>> so
>> much constant change in Microsoft Word that it could even be the case
>> that
>> it has already been addressed in a version of Word that is not commonly
>> in
>> use yet.
>>
>> If people on this list find this particular error to be important, it is
>> essential that someone produce or provide a sample document that shows
>> this
>> error so others can investigate it and help bring the problem to the
>> attention of the correct people. It also helps if those using JAWS bring
>> this to the attention of Freedom Scientific as paying customers, but they
>> will need an example to have any chance of resolving the issue. Also,
>> sharing how others work around this problem is a realistic short term
>> solution.
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Steve Jacobson
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Laura Wolk <laura.wolk at gmail.com>
>> Sent: Tuesday, December 18, 2018 4:55 AM
>> To: Blind Law Mailing List <blindlaw at nfbnet.org>
>> Cc: Rahul Bajaj <rahul.bajaj1038 at gmail.com>; Steve Jacobson
>> <steve.jacobson at visi.com>
>> Subject: Re: [blindlaw] Update on Jaws and Track Changes
>>
>> I've reached out to NVDA folks and heard that in theory it works. But I
>> don't know if they are working with files as large/with as many edits as
>> I'm
>> talking about. The problem is that I can't test a work doc on my home PC,
>> and I'll need to get permission to download NVDA at work. So if anyone
>> could assist with confirming or denying that it's better, I'd appreciate
>> it.
>> I truly believe the NFB has to throw its clout behind this--how can a
>> professional function in any aspect of society in this day without
>> reliable
>> recourse to track changes? We can't all keep spare machines from 2005
>> around, what with the cost and firms having this funny hang-up about
>> security breaches and all.
>>
>> On 12/18/18, Rahul Bajaj via BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>> Steve, many of us reached out to Freedom Scientific about this and the
>>> somewhat improved, albeit imperfect, system that we now have is the
>>> product of that exercise.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> Rahul<div id="DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2"><br /> <table
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>>>
>>> On 18/12/2018, Steve Jacobson via BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>>> Has anyone verified if NVDA provides more accurate feedback? Also,
>>>> is anyone in communication with JAWS on this? I am sorry if this was
>>>> stated earlier. However, if NVDA handles this aspect correctly, then
>>>> one can definitely lean on JAWS. Ideally, the problem should be
>>>> described to JAWS and a document exhibiting the problem should be
>>>> attached as well.
>>>>
>>>> Best regards,
>>>>
>>>> Steve Jacobson
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: BlindLaw <blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Laura Wolk
>>>> via BlindLaw
>>>> Sent: Monday, December 17, 2018 8:25 PM
>>>> To: tim at timeldermusic.com
>>>> Cc: Laura Wolk <laura.wolk at gmail.com>; Blind Law Mailing List
>>>> <blindlaw at nfbnet.org>
>>>> Subject: Re: [blindlaw] Update on Jaws and Track Changes
>>>>
>>>> Nope. Not an option. And though 2010 didn't crash nearly as much as
>>>> the newer versions, it still couldn't handle documents with more than
>>>> a hundred or so revisions. Which, you know, is basically every round
>>>> of editing a brief or large filing of any kind. Using 2010 was my
>>>> work-around for 6 years. But I'm really getting fed up. It'd be great
>>>> if we all colectively could put pressure on Jaws to actually give us
>>>> the tools we need to succeed and be on equal footing with our peers.
>>>>
>>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>>>
>>>>> On Dec 17, 2018, at 8:05 PM, <tim at timeldermusic.com>
>>>> <tim at timeldermusic.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Track changes in newly created Word documents still work reliably in
>>>> Office 2010 if using an older machine for this kind of task is an
>>>> option.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: Laura Wolk <laura.wolk at gmail.com>
>>>>> Sent: Saturday, December 15, 2018 11:22 AM
>>>>> To: Blind Law Mailing List <blindlaw at nfbnet.org>
>>>>> Subject: [blindlaw] Update on Jaws and Track Changes
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm providing an update to this topic, as it generated a lot of
>>>>> traffic
>>>> and I'd love to spare another lawyer the risk of relying on this
>>>> $1,000 disappointment to his professional detriment.
>>>>>
>>>>> Jaws still does not announce the correct number of revisions.
>>>>> Instead, after taking up to 30 or 45 seconds sometimes, it will
>>>>> announce a
>>>> much larger number that still isn't always accurate. This is
>>>> actually worse than when it simply said there were no revisions to
>>>> display, since we all knew that was incorrect. now it gives the
>>>> false sense of security that you have, in fact, looked at every
>>>> revision when there could be a hundred more that are not displaying
>>>> that you haven't reviewed. note that though this isn't a terrible
>>>> inconvenience when you are integrating all changes into one draft
>>>> from only one document, it is a huge problem if you are receiving
>>>> multiple streams of edits from multiple sources that you are trying
>>>> to accept/reject and then compile into one final draft. So be
>>>> forewarned, Jaws is sstill failing abysmally at providing us with the
>>>> elementary tools needed in 2018 to maintain "Job access."
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
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>>
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