[stylist] composing blogs

Wed May 8 02:16:03 UTC 2013

Donna,
Okay, so, how do I find the toolbar?

-----Original Message----- 
From: Donna Hill
Sent: Tuesday, May 07, 2013 9:23 PM
To: 'Writer's Division Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [stylist] composing blogs

Ashley,
Look at the toolbar and write down the special hotkeys for bold, italics,
center. I think they all start with the alt key not the control key that
you're used to in Word. As for headings, I don't know any other way to do
them except with the code. My suggestion is that you bold and center them in
the visual editor and then go to the text editor just to do headings. Leave
a blank line before the heading  and add <h2> at the beginning and </h2> at
the end. Don't leave spaces between the code and the name of the heading.
This gives you a heading level 2 heading. Your Post or Page title is heading
level 1, and the search engines look for key words in heading level 2.
Here's how the code should look:

<h2>This is a new Heading</h2>
Now I'm starting the text under the new heading.

<h2>Second Heading</h2>
Here's some more text for the second heading.

You will probably notice code in the text editor at the beginning of the
headings, because you've already boldfaced and centered them. The important
thing is to add the heading tags at the very beginning and at the very end,
leaving all other code as is.

You won't have to do any other code, and don't change anything else. The
spacing between heading and text in the text editor will look different than
in the visual editor.

Other than that, you could try Googling "Word Press, creating headings" and
see what you find. If I ever run across anything, I'll post it.
HTH,
Donna
-----Original Message-----
From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Ashley
Bramlett
Sent: Tuesday, May 07, 2013 5:41 PM
To: Writer's Division Mailing List
Subject: Re: [stylist] composing blogs

Donna,
Thanks. I realize the difference between pages and posts. Maybe I did not
make myself clear.
What I want is my homepage with the entries on it to stay there. I want to
add pages where I'll copy and paste in various posts.
I want these to have titles on them.

A IT friend explained the default, As you said, he told me the default is
the visual editor and the text editor is html based where you write in the
codes.
He told me what to click on to create a new page.
I understand that. Page links appear at the top of the blog's homepage.
Here is the issue.

How can I create headings? How can I create bold text?
All I can do is tab to links. Acording to this IT sighted friend, jaws
skipped right over those on mouse over links to bold, italic, etc items.
I'm not sure if there is a way to get to these items with the keyboard.

I know a little html from a intro class, but I'd rather use the basic
interface, not struggle to write html syntax, if at all possible.
I know the jaws quick hot key commands don't work on the blog when on the
dashboard.
Only tab works. But hopefully there are other shortcut keys built into
wordpress.

Ashley
-----Original Message-----
From: Donna Hill
Sent: Friday, May 03, 2013 1:52 PM
To: 'Writer's Division Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [stylist] composing blogs

Ashley,
Word Press is not nearly as accessible as it once was, but there are work
arounds. First, read through their Help and Tutorials and get some idea of
what is going on. You use Page and Post interchangeably in this note, but
they are two separate things.

Also, If you want a homepage that stays put like mine at:
DonnaWHill.com
(which is a Word Press hosted site) You need to select "Static Homepage"
which is somewhere under settings. You create a "Page" entitled Home and
another entitled "Post" and when you select the static homepage option, you
will be asked which of your pages you wish to use as the homepage and which
for the posts -- there isn't anything on the Posts page; it's more like a
big folder for your blog posts. You can still blog, and links to your blog
entries will appear on the homepage, but you have plenty of room to put
whatever you want on there. This is explained well in the tutorials and
works fine with Jaws.

Since  WP doesn't use Headings to separate the major sections of the
Dashboard, I went through the whole page by downarrowing and then adding
Jaws Bookmarks to important things like: all pages, all posts, media,
settings and so on -- whatever it seems like you might want to find quickly.
I also tend to use Firefox, but IE9 is just about as good for most things.

In terms of pasting in your posts ... There are 3 options. When you open a
new page or post there's a toolbar with stuff like bold and italics, and I
think it's just above it, but they are definitely links, you have "visual"
and "text." They refer to two separate ways of editing. Visual is a WYSIWYG
(What you see is what you get) editor and "Text is an html editor which has
the code visible. If you see anything like "<p></p>, you know you're in the
text editor. In the visual editor, you can make changes like creating lists,
boldfacing, etc., but you need to write down the hotkeys from the toolbar.
You select the passage you want to do something to and then use the hotkey.
I think you are asking though about navigation -- using Jaws keyboard
shortcuts like"l" for list "I" for item, and so on.  I don't think this
works in an editable field other than within Word; I've never had the
occasion to try, so I could be wrong.

Personally, I am more comfortable with the text editor, but I learned html
when I was writing for Suite 101. I prefer editing in Word and then copying.
The visual editor, which I tried several times, does seem a bit squirlly. I
remember not being able to confirm that a passage was boldfaced or centered,
which is clearly marked in the text editor.

Now, about that third option. You can e-mail your posts. There are options
under settings where you can generate your own private e-mail addresses (one
for posts, the other for media). Once you find it, it works very nicely with
Jaws. There are "short codes" which you can add to your e-mail to do a bunch
of things like put it in a draft, wait and post it in an hour, etc. That
stuff is explained well in the tutorials.  Again, that's for "Posts" not
"Pages," which you have to create online -- at least I've never found a way
to do it.

Some of the other problems are that the "Leave a Reply" form is extremely
difficult for Jaws and Window Eyes users, especially if they are not signed
in to WP. That changed when they "improved" their site. But, the "Comments"
form, which you create under settings, is accessible. I have a note on my
homepage about the accessible comments/contact form, and there is a link to
it in two locations on every page -- at least, I think I got them all done.

Posting photos is a huge headache without a little extra knowledge. Header
images, featured images and your profile image are in a bizarre shape --much
wider than high. WP has preformatted header images you can use (again it's
somewhere under settings), and that goes on your homepage and every other
post or page unless you specify a Featured image for that page. I chose
apple blossoms or something like that for the header image and I don't use
Featured images. There are no alt tags for them, and Jaws says something
like "Banner landmark."

Including a photo within the body of a page or post, which is a very nice
touch, is a nightmare without some extra knowledge and planning. The
solution I found isn't even discussed, because it's easy enough for mouse
users to define the cursor position and then move to the Add Media button.

There's a button on the toolbar which just says "img" but it has a hotkey
(alt+n or m" can't remember. You focus Jaws where you want to place the
photo and hit the hotkey. It opens a dialog in which you have to provide the
URL of your image and assign an alt tag.

This can only happen if you upload the photo to your Media Library first,
and then find the URL and copy it to a document that you can get to. The
biggest problem is learning that they don't mean "permalink" which is right
under the name of the photo. It's way down in the file about the photo, past
where you think it ends. Also, just because you assign an alt tag in the
photo's file doesn't mean WP knows about it in this dialog. It doesn't.

BTW, what theme are you using? I'm using 2010. I know someone who uses Koi,
but I tried it and it didn't seem to have as many options. I set 2010 to
display using the full page instead of having a narrower column with widgets
on the one side.
HTH,
Donna

-----Original Message-----
From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Ashley
Bramlett
Sent: Friday, May 03, 2013 3:54 AM
To: Writer's Division Mailing List
Subject: [stylist] composing blogs

Hi all,

I wanted to know which blog sites are accessible. Is wordpress still
acessible?
I'm trying to use it and it seems to me that when attempting to upload text
by pasting it in, jaws does not read the text and the quick navigation keys
of B for button or l for list don't work. You can only tab to the elements
you need.

Also, how do you create a new page within wordpress? By default when ever
you select new post from dashboard, it puts it in your home page. I'm not
sure how to change that.

Thanks.
Ashley
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