[Trainer-Talk] Regarding Heading Level Navigation Changes in JAWS 2019

[Brad Snyder]

How is this feature toggled on/off?

- Brad -




On May 3, 2019, at 20:53, David Goldfield via Trainer-Talk <trainer-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:

Hi.

On April 30 Freedom Scientific released an update to JAWS 2019 with what I consider to be a welcome change and one which may have been implemented due partially to my suggesting it on the Leasey discussion group.

Leasey, as some of you may know from previous messages I've written, is a third-party add-on which adds extra commands and features to JAWS. I requested a feature for Leasey which would optionally remove the restriction in heading navigation.

Essentially, you know that you can press the letter H or shift-H to move to the next or previous heading on a Web page or in a Word document, respectively (when the virtual cursor has been enabled.) Headings can have up to six levels for various subheadings, referred to as heading level 1, heading level 2, etc. You can press the numbers 1-6 to jump to an individual heading level. However, there was a restriction imposed with this type of navigation where you could only navigate to that level in the current section.

This is a bit difficult to explain but I'll try to provide an example. Suppose a Web page starts with a level 1 heading, which might contain the page's title. Below that is a level 2 heading beginning with a section, followed by several level 3 headings which are subsections of the article. Imagine that, following this, is a level 2 heading, followed by a level 3 heading and then ending with a level 4 heading. If my virtual cursor was at the very top of the page, you would think that entering the number 4 would move the cursor to the beginning of the first level 4 heading. This is what would happen if you did this with NVDA but JAWS would say "no level 4 headings in this section." I would first need to navigate to the level 2 heading containing the level 4 subheading before I could press the number 4 to move to the level 4 heading. If you feel that this is just way too much to process suffice it to say that you could not always press any number to move to that particular heading in all cases. NVDA didn't care about this. With NVDA you could press any heading level number and, assuming that the heading existed on the page, you would always be taken there. I was quite spoiled by this when I used NVDA as my primary screen reader and I never understood why FS chose to impose this restriction on JAWS users.

Since Leasey is known for adding some really neat features not found in JAWS I wrote a message on the Leasey email discussion list and asked Brian Hartgen, one of the program's developers, if he might consider adding a feature which would, as an option, allow this restriction to be removed.

Here is a part of a recent message from Brian, from the Leasey discussion group.


"You will also notice that the new jaws 2019 update has the ability for a user to go straight to the heading of his or her choosing, even if it is not in the current HTML section. That suggestion was made on this particular list, and I pushed really hard for it to be done, so I’m hoping people find it useful."


I have no doubt that others may have suggested this to FS and so I'm not saying that my suggestion was what got the feature implemented. However, I believe that I was the first to ask for it on the Leasey list since I bought the program last November. Other list members agreed that this was a good idea and Brian, unknown to me, engaged in quite a bit of advocacy to push for the feature to be added. It is now available in the April 2019 update for JAWS 2019 and I am absolutely thrilled to have the ability to navigate in this manner. I have already publicly thanked Brian Hartgen for his advocacy in getting the feature added, which is something that he did not have to do. I'm positively thrilled that this restriction in heading navigation can now be disabled, as an option, for users who want that type of freedom.


--
David Goldfield, Assistive Technology Specialist WWW.David-Goldfield.Com<http://WWW.David-Goldfield.Com>
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