[nfbcs] Practical Tips for Improving a Blind Person's Productivity on Computers
Doug Lee via nfbcs
nfbcs at nfbnet.org
Wed May 14 22:02:28 UTC 2014
This is not so much a tip as a general concept, but...
I have for years been somewhat famous for my use of telephone pickup
coils as a means of monitoring otherwise obscure computer and other
electronic activity. Recently, while dealing with a most bothersome
and disabling mess on my laptop, I learned how to use a mixture of
this tactic and some memorization, fueled by initial sighted
assistance in a few places, to wind my way independently through a
system recovery process. I posted an audio demonstration of this
process at
http://www.dlee.org/lt2.mp3
This 26-minute audio file covers the following concepts:
- Use of FaceTime and Skype with video for remote assistance with
screens (brief discussion).
- The general principal of the coil-and-amp monitoring approach.
- A summary of things you can do with this in Windows.
- A demonstration of the items mentioned (most of the file).
The demo shows how I could use the coil sounds to
- Known when to hit F8 to interrupt the boot process and whether it worked.
- Learn some specific types of machine activity on your particular
computer, such as normal versus abnormal boot sequences.
- Detect the arrival of expected user prompt screens in a process.
- Log in safely regardless of whether the input boxes are
prepopulated.
- Verify whether a DOS-style command prompt has appeared when wanted.
- Determine whether a specific file exists.
- Determine whether a file copy or rename succeeded.
Of course, such computer use with absolutely zero access to printed
output has its limits; and though not planned (and not edited later),
the demo concludes with a demonstration of this fact as well. :-)
I mention this in the recording but will also say it here: Sounds from
one computer will not necessarily equal those from another; you have
to learn what to expect from a specific machine by listening at times
when you know what is happening. Also, it should go without saying
that a reader is a safer assistant in many speechless cases than a
coil of wire; but I present my experiences for those who often find
readers lacking, as well as, of course, for those who are just curious
to hear what sorts of squeaks, squawks, and old-style sci fi noises
can emanate from such a direct audio translation of a
computer-generated EM field.
Do with all this as you like. :-)
On Wed, May 14, 2014 at 04:26:39PM -0500, NFBCS mailing list wrote:
Thanks Gary. That is what I am looking for.
Regards
Louis Maher
Phone 713-444-7838
E-mail ljmaher at swbell.net
-----Original Message-----
From: nfbcs [mailto:nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Gary Wunder via
nfbcs
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2014 9:03 AM
To: 'NFB in Computer Science Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [nfbcs] Practical Tips for Improving a Blind Person's
Productivity on Computers
To go directly to a website without first going to your home page, use the
run command and type the name of your website: www.nfb.org
-----Original Message-----
From: nfbcs [mailto:nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Louis Maher
Sent: Wednesday, May 07, 2014 5:33 AM
To: NFB in computer science; 'Discussion of the Graphical User Interface,
GUI Talk Mailing List'; Orca List
Subject: [nfbcs] Practical Tips for Improving a Blind Person's Productivity
on Computers
Hello,
During the summer NFB national convention in Orlando Florida, the NFB in
Computer Science will hold a meeting. In this meeting, we will have about a
30 minute discussion on "Practical Tips for Improving a Blind Person's
Productivity on Computers". I have attached an initial list of these tips.
I would invite others to add their own tips to this list. Better yet,
others could present their tips in person during the meeting, and receive
their own one-minute of fame.
I have separated this list into Windows, iOS, and Linux. Please send me
your suggestions. We are looking for an appropriate web location to display
this list.
I have also pasted the current list after my signature.
Thanks for your consideration.
Regards
Louis Maher
Phone 713-444-7838
E-mail ljmaher at swbell.net
----
Practical Tips for Improving a Blind Person's Productivity on Computers
----
Windows Computers
Place a shortcut to the favorites on your desktop.
Go to C:\Users\userID\Favorites, click the right mouse button, and select
send to, and select desktop. You can then access your favorites with
Windows Explorer.
If you have a Braille display, Control+alt+tab allows you to feel and hear
the window you are on. Good for selecting another Window in high noise
environments.
If you are using JAWS, JAWS key + f10 shows all your sessions in alphabetic
order. To go to a session, arrow down to your choice, and hit enter.
To save attachments in an Outlook message: arrow up to the top line in the
body of the text message, shift + tab to the attachment box, hit control + a
to select all the attachments, hit control + c to copy all the attachments
into the clipboard, in Windows Explorer, move to wherever you want the files
to be stored, and hit control + v.
If you have a file, and you want to Copy its path into the clipboard, select
the file in Windows Explorer, hit shift + applications, and hit the "copy as
path" option.
For adobe, when controls disappear, you can still use the keystrokes like
control+shift+s for save as, and control+p for print.
To reliably start the Surface Pro Two with Windows 8.1: push the power
button for half a second, count to fifteen seconds, hit windows + enter to
bring up narrator, hit tab to get to the password field, fill in the
password and hit enter. I have JAWS set to load automatically after the
login process. JAWS does not come up for me reliably in the login dialog.
Windows + enter starts and stops Narrator. Narrator is much improved in
Windows 8. Start the surface Pro Two with narrator.
To put the Surface Pro Two to sleep, exit JAWS, start Narrator (windows +
enter), go to the desktop (windows + m), alt + f4, and pick the sleep
option. Use Narrator for the wake-up process.
Map a SharePoint Website to a Disk Drive
To establish a link to a SharePoint site through Windows Explorer, go to the
SharePoint website, hit alt+d for the address field, starting from the end
of the address, delete all of the address until you get to the website just
above the SharePoint site in question, hit enter which opens the website
containing a link to your SharePoint page, tab down until you are on your
SharePoint link, click the right mouse button (which is the context menu),
hit the copy shortcut option, hit Windows + e to go to Windows Explorer,
hit shift + tab to bring you to the left side of the screen (in tree view)
and land on computer (which is my PC in Windows 8), click the right mouse
button, arrow down to Map Network drive, hit enter, paste the SharePoint
shortcut name into the folder field, hit shift + tab and select a drive,
tab to "reconnect at startup and check it, tab to finish.
Now when you want to read or add documents to your SharePoint site, hit
Windows + e for Windows Explorer, hit shift + tab to go to the tree view,
arrow down to the appropriate disk drive, and your SharePoint documentation
will appear in a Windows Explorer dialog. You can open, copy, and delete
files just like any Windows Explorer dialog.
----
iOS Machines
Read Anna Dresner's book, "Getting Started with the iPhone and iOS 7, An
Introduction for Blind Users" from the National Braille Press (npb.org) as
an introduction to the iPhone.
For the focus 14: chord k turns keyboard help on, chord b turns help off.
This 14 cell Braille display works well with the iPhone.
-----
Linux Machines
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--
Doug Lee dgl at dlee.org http://www.dlee.org
SSB BART Group doug.lee at ssbbartgroup.com http://www.ssbbartgroup.com
"The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do
what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with
them while they do it."--Theodore Roosevelt
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