[blindkid] Window Eyes vs. Jaws

[Heather Field]

Hello,
To be absolutely honest, people usually have their preferences which are 
purely personal. They usually make statements to support their preference. 
There's not much difference between the two although "followers" get very 
passionate about their preference. Often statements are made which are 
mostly inaccurate or, at best, coloured by personal preference.

In truth, Window-eyes has been ahead of Jaws in releasing its updates with 
new operating systems twice now before the Jaws people did so. They also 
have produced the new Skype app which is revolutionising people's access to 
the use of Skype.
So, it isn't true that one is superior to the other, though fans of one or 
the other would like to convince you to the contrary. Jaws was earlier on 
the market than Window-eyes so lots of people use the word Jaws as a generic 
term for a screen-reader.

The area where Window-eyes really does vastly outshine Jaws is in tech 
support. You can always get a person on the phone, immediately, and they'll 
work with you to resolve your problem; sometimes over several days till it's 
solved. This is invaluable for teachers and is great for young users who can 
learn at an early age how to work with a live tech support person and begin 
to take responsibility for solving their own access problems.

In my opinion, if your daughter is using Window-eyes I would not change her. 
There's nothing really to be gained accept experience with another 
screen-reader. she can get that any time. In the meantime, next time there's 
a tech question try having your daughter talk with tech support for herself. 
If you want to give her a wider experience, try downloading the free 
screen-reader NVDA which can be loaded onto any computer from a thumb drive. 
this means that, for example, the computer at the local library is 
accessible to her as soon as she loads up her portable screen-reader. This 
is a practical widening of screen-reader experience.
www.nvda-project.org/

Incidentally, I'm not affiliated with either company and I'm not a computer 
guru either. However, as an educator, I have seen little advantage in 
switching children between screen-readers.

Regards,
Heather
-----Original Message----- 
From: dhammelia at aol.com
Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2012 8:52 AM
To: blindkid at nfbnet.org
Subject: Re: [blindkid] Window Eyes vs. Jaws


Jaws is the preferred system for work applications as it keeps up with 
changes in Microsoft Office and other business related applications.

For more casual use I believe Window Eyes is perfectly adequate.

David Hammel



-----Original Message-----
From: hpscheffer <hpscheffer at aol.com>
To: blindkid <blindkid at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Thu, Mar 15, 2012 8:28 am
Subject: [blindkid] Window Eyes vs. Jaws


Hi all, is there a "better" one of these two? My daughter has had Window 
Eyes
or the longest time and I'm wondering if we should may be change to Jaws. 
Does
nyone know a simple comparison? Don't tell me changing her now would be 
hard,
hat is absolutely not an issue, she can do it. I just like to know what one
oes compared to the other.
hanks so much,
eidi
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