[blindLaw] Terrible lag when using spellcheck in word with JAWS

Sun Jul 23 12:25:56 UTC 2023

Thanks Brian and Graham! I think alt-f7 will work well. I will likely turn grammar check off  for more efficiency.

Warmly,

Maura

> On Jul 22, 2023, at 5:37 PM, Brian Unitt via BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> I just tested my system and don't get any lag. I also tried Graham's alternatives which I didn't know about, and they work great as well. You probably know already that it is very important to be using the 365 version of Word to get best results with JAWS. Best of luck.
> 
> Brian C. Unitt
> Certified Specialist in Appellate Law
> By the State Bar of California
> 
> Law Office of Brian C. Unitt
> 6185 Magnolia Ave, PMB 40
> Riverside, CA 92506 
> P: 951-682-7030
> E: brianunitt at holsteinlaw.com
> 
> NOTICE:  This communication is intended for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain attorney/client information that is privileged, confidential and exempt from disclosure under applicable law.  If the reader of this communication is not the intended recipient or the employee or agent responsible for delivering this communication to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited.  If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by reply email or by telephone and immediately delete this communication and all its attachments.
> 
> Confidentiality Disclaimer 
> This email is confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual(s) to whom it is addressed. The information contained in this message may be privileged and confidential and protected from disclosure. 
> If you are not the author's intended recipient, be advised that you have received this email in error and that any use, dissemination, forwarding, printing, or copying of this email is strictly prohibited. If you have received this email in error please delete all copies, both electronic and printed, and contact the author immediately
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: BlindLaw <blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Graham Hardy via BlindLaw
> Sent: Saturday, July 22, 2023 11:24 AM
> To: 'Blind Law Mailing List' <blindlaw at nfbnet.org>
> Cc: graham.hardy at gmail.com
> Subject: Re: [blindLaw] Terrible lag when using spellcheck in word with JAWS
> 
> I do find that in recent versions of Word the traditional spell checker, normally accessed with F7, has become incredibly inefficient for everyday use. I haven't tried it recently, so I'm not sure if that is the use case you're referring to when you say there is a lag. There are a few alternatives. One is that, in JAWS, with the navigation quick key layer enabled with JAWSKey+Z, you can press M and Shift+M to move among the spelling errors in your document. I will say that, in large documents, I've known this command to take a few seconds to find the next or previous error, which I also find irritating. Again, you might be referring to this when you say there is a lag. When you use that command to find a spelling error, the cursor is positioned at the beginning of the word detected as an error and you can usually get spelling suggestions by pressing the Applications key. The last is a word shortcut, Alt+F7. I tend to like this as it is the quickest at finding the next error. When you use this method, you will land on a menu of suggestions with various other options. Again, this is similar to but less cluttered than the user interface in the F7 editor. The nice thing is that you can press Escape once you land on an error, whereupon you are back in the main document window with the text of the error selected.
> 
> I haven't investigated other word processors but you could try LibreOffice and see how that is.
> 
> By way of encouragement, shortly before writing the bar exam, I installed a JAWS update which caused JAWS to stop reading in Word except with a limited set of editing keys. I had not saved the installer for the previous build and couldn't get technical support to agree to give me access to an earlier version, so I, too, had to install and use LibreOffice. Needless to say I can understand the stress of that inefficiency in the process!
> 
> Graham
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: BlindLaw <blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Maura Kutnyak via BlindLaw
> Sent: Saturday, July 22, 2023 5:47 AM
> To: blindlaw at nfbnet.org
> Cc: Maura Kutnyak <maurakutnyak at gmail.com>
> Subject: [blindLaw] Terrible lag when using spellcheck in word with JAWS
> 
> Hi folks,
> 
> Has anyone else encountered a lag in spellcheck when using jaws? I find that the editor pain is generally a bit finicky but recently, it’s gotten infuriatingly slow. This is especially upsetting for me with the bar exam next week.
> 
> Does anyone know of a software fix that won’t interfere with my ability to use the materials provided by the New York board? Everything they’re giving me is formatted in word. But perhaps there is a different text editing program I could use for composing answers and editing, where the spellcheck feature is much more simple?
> 
> I’m not happy to be thinking about these issues right now. I in advertently fell down this rabbit hole when my husband performed some updates that Dell proposed on my laptop, which essentially broke it. So now I’ve had to transfer to a different device where the lag actually crashed jaws once. 
> 
> Now, a brief rant, why exactly do blind people have to source  their own helpdesk/assemble a ragtag team of IT experts, to troubleshoot these types of things? Shouldn’t the assistive tech be carefully designed so that it works with ubiquitous software such as the office sweet?  Or is it the hardware that I should be railing against?
> 
> Finally, I’ve already tinkered with NVDA a bit, and it seems to lag less, but it still does slow down over time.
> 
> Thanks very much for any time or brain Power you have to share.
> 
> Warmly,
> 
> Maura
> _______________________________________________
> BlindLaw mailing list
> BlindLaw at nfbnet.org
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindlaw_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for BlindLaw:
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindlaw_nfbnet.org/graham.hardy%40gmail.com
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> BlindLaw mailing list
> BlindLaw at nfbnet.org
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindlaw_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for BlindLaw:
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindlaw_nfbnet.org/brianunitt%40holsteinlaw.com
> _______________________________________________
> BlindLaw mailing list
> BlindLaw at nfbnet.org
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindlaw_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for BlindLaw:
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindlaw_nfbnet.org/maurakutnyak%40gmail.com