[gui-talk] Fwd: Accessibility of OpenOffice.org under Windows

[Steve Pattison]

 From:    Dane Trethowan grtdane at internode.on.net
 To:      VIP-L list vip-l at freelists.org

Hi!

Since I posted my earlier message regarding exporting to and embossing
Braille with Openoffice.org I've been playing with it using the NVDA
screen reader - to my knowledge this Screen reader is the only one
thus far which enables accessibility to Openoffice.org under windows?
Please someone correct me if I'm wrong -.

So far I've played with little of this extensive suite but from what
I've seen the accessibility is utterly superb, I've been using the
Word Processor and the first thing I noticed is the excellent help
tips which are spoken when you navigate through functions and options
in the menu system, the process works a little like Voiceover on the
Mac announcing help tips after an item has been spoken, I think
somewhere you can control the behaviour of this function but I'm yet
to discover that <smile>.

The responsiveness I get with Openoffice.org and NVDA is incredible and
performance of Openoffice.org is a blast, operations complete with
blinding speed.

No, haven't done much in the word processor yet but I was easily able
to type a document and select a numbering style for a portion of text
within that document.  Unfortunately at this time I've not been able
to get the spell checking facility to announce the miss-spelt word but
perhaps I need to have another cup of tea and a further read of the
NVDA documentation, the suggestions list and the various buttons to
manipulate the spell checker are easy to find and access.

Setting up accessibility for Openoffice.org is a little tricky, you
first need to be sure you have the latest Java installed on your
system - Java Runtime Environment -, you then need to install
Openoffice.org itself which can be found at http://www.openoffice.org
and then you need to install Java Access Bridge.

Finally you need to enable assistive accessibility from the
accessibility options within Openoffice.org and you'll need sight or
good skill with your mouse controls in your Screen Reader to get to
this option but it can be done as I did it.  There's a registry patch
available but I couldn't work out how to download it.

I found the NVDA web site extremely helpful, there's an article on
Applications which you should read, it gives details on how to install
Openoffice.org and the various components you'll need providing links
to them so you can download them.

I'll post more as I continue to explore.

Dane Trethowan
grtdane at internode.on.net

Mobile:/SMS +614571201
Twitter: Http://www.twitter.com/grtdane
MSN: grtdane at dane-trethowan.net
skype: grtdane12

Regards Steve
Email:  srp at internode.on.net
MSN Messenger:  internetuser383 at hotmail.com
Skype:  steve1963
Twitter:  steve9782