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Thread: Numbers and JAWS
Number of posts in this thread: 6 (In chronological order)
From: Todd Clarke
Date: Mon, Nov 03 2003 4:46PM
Subject: Numbers and JAWS
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Hi all,
I'm a newbie to accessibility in HTML and I am currently helping a bank
create a JAWS friendly site. I have a couple of questions I hope someone can
answer.
I am displaying an account number in a formatted behaviour, ie 1234 1234
1234 1234 but I was hoping to get JAWS to read each digit as opposed to 4
numbers. Does Anyone know of any tags, attributes or tricks to help with this?
We are supporting JAWS 4.5 so CCS 2 audible styles are not a possible solution
unfortunately.
My second question is if there is any way to make a reader interperet
currency figures such as $123.00 as "one hundered and twenty three dollars"
instead of "dollar one hundered and twenty three"? Any assistance anyone could
provide would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Todd.
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From: Jared Smith
Date: Mon, Nov 03 2003 6:23PM
Subject: Re: Numbers and JAWS
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Todd-
Short of aural style sheets, which are not a possibility (will they
ever be?), I can't think of an easy way to do this. However, this
brings up a question I have often thought about. Do you ever need to change
the default behavior of the screen reader to so it speaks in a manner
that most of us would consider normal?
If a screen reader has always spoken "dollar one hundred" for $100,
then changing that default behavior through some workaround or hack
may be more difficult or confusing to a user than letting the browser
perform the way it always has. Sure, some things should be clarified,
such as some (not all) acronyms and and abbreviations, but if a
workaround on your site is presenting content in a way other than
what the user is expecting and has experienced on all of other pages,
then wouldn't this be worse than letting the user decipher the
information the way they are used to.
Just a thought.
Jared Smith
WebAIM (Web Accessibility In Mind)
Center for Persons with Disabilities
Utah State University
***************
On Monday, November 03, 2003 you sent:
TC> Hi all,
TC> I'm a newbie to accessibility in HTML and I am currently helping a bank
TC> create a JAWS friendly site. I have a couple of questions I hope someone can
TC> answer.
TC> I am displaying an account number in a formatted behaviour, ie 1234 1234
TC> 1234 1234 but I was hoping to get JAWS to read each digit as opposed to 4
TC> numbers. Does Anyone know of any tags, attributes or tricks to help with this?
TC> We are supporting JAWS 4.5 so CCS 2 audible styles are not a possible solution
TC> unfortunately.
TC> My second question is if there is any way to make a reader interperet
TC> currency figures such as $123.00 as "one hundered and twenty three dollars"
TC> instead of "dollar one hundered and twenty three"? Any assistance anyone could
TC> provide would be greatly appreciated.
TC> Thanks
TC> Todd.
TC> ----
TC> To subscribe, unsubscribe, suspend, or view list archives,
TC> visit http://www.webaim.org/discussion/
***************
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From: Darold Lindquist
Date: Tue, Nov 04 2003 5:07AM
Subject: Re: Numbers and JAWS
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Todd,
My advice would be to leave the numbers as they are intended to be
displayed visually. Screen reader users can adjust the spoken format of
numbers from within JAWS or whatever screen reader to suit their individual
preferences. In JAWS, these selections can be found in the configuration
manager under text processing. Setting number processing to single digits
will provide the spoken sequence you are looking to achieve, but this may
not be the preferred format of the user. The speaking of the $ symbol can
also be toggled here. These settings can be applied as either a global
setting or differently for specific applications.
Darold
At 06:39 PM 11/3/2003, you wrote:
>Hi all,
> I'm a newbie to accessibility in HTML and I am currently helping a bank
>create a JAWS friendly site. I have a couple of questions I hope someone can
>answer.
> I am displaying an account number in a formatted behaviour, ie 1234 1234
>1234 1234 but I was hoping to get JAWS to read each digit as opposed to 4
>numbers. Does Anyone know of any tags, attributes or tricks to help with this?
>We are supporting JAWS 4.5 so CCS 2 audible styles are not a possible solution
>unfortunately.
> My second question is if there is any way to make a reader interperet
>currency figures such as $123.00 as "one hundered and twenty three dollars"
>instead of "dollar one hundered and twenty three"? Any assistance anyone could
>provide would be greatly appre
From: Tim Harshbarger
Date: Tue, Nov 04 2003 5:52AM
Subject: RE: Numbers and JAWS
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Todd,
One of the things I learned first about accessibility is the relationship
between the user agent and the content. You are providing content through a
web site or application. Sometimes, how the user agent (such as a browser
or screen reader) presents the content just exactly as you want it to do.
However, other times it does not. That can be due to a bug in how the user
agent interprets the content or it can be a problem with how the content was
created.
However, user agents (like screen readers) are highly configurable. Because
of that, what you might hear testing with a screen reader or what you might
hear when someone else is using the screen reader will not necessarily be
the same as what the customers will hear.
I think the key here is that the numbers and the dollar sign can be accessed
by the screen reader and presented to the user. In this case, however, the
content that is presented is entirely controlled by the user's user agent.
Of course, it appears that you are already trying to figure out the
difference between what the web site needs to provide and what the assistive
technology controls.
Another step in the process is beginning to understand the user's actual
experience. That usually comes when you have a product or a prototype which
you can have the user's perform tasks on while you observe.
Tim
>
From: James Gagnier
Date: Tue, Nov 04 2003 7:32AM
Subject: Re: Numbers and JAWS
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Hi Todd:
Both the questions you ask are Jaws settings options. Users can have
numbers spoken as single digits, pairs or all one number. As far as having
the dollar sign be spoken, this is again a user setting in the JFW
configuration manager. Most users will have these settings set to their
preference.
James
----- Original Message -----
From: "Todd Clarke" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
To: < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
Sent: Monday, November 03, 2003 6:39 PM
Subject: Numbers and JAWS
Hi all,
I'm a newbie to accessibility in HTML and I am currently helping a bank
create a JAWS friendly site. I have a couple of questions I hope someone can
answer.
I am displaying an account number in a formatted behaviour, ie 1234 1234
1234 1234 but I was hoping to get JAWS to read each digit as opposed to 4
numbers. Does Anyone know of any tags, attributes or tricks to help with
this?
We are supporting JAWS 4.5 so CCS 2 audible styles are not a possible
solution
unfortunately.
My second question is if there is any way to make a reader interperet
currency figures such as $123.00 as "one hundered and twenty three dollars"
instead of "dollar one hundered and twenty three"? Any assistance anyone
could
provide would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Todd.
----
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visit http://www.webaim.org/discussion/
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From: sean keegan
Date: Tue, Nov 04 2003 9:53AM
Subject: RE: Numbers and JAWS
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Todd,
I am going to echo Jared's comments on this issue.
While it technically may be possible to "hack" a page to get the desired
response you want (I really don't know in this case), the user may end
up having more difficulty as their assistive technology is no longer
responding in a manner consistent with how the user interacts with it.
I have been involved in several situations where webmasters have created
a page that works exceptionally well for one version of one
screen-reader, only to find out later that the page would not work in
subsequent versions of the screen-reader (or other assistive
technologies). Not the best solution...
A screen-reader user can manipulate their technology to get a specific
type of feedback. This can include how financial information is
presented (i.e., "dollar sign x" or "x dollars"). Better to stick to
standard HTML coding and development than to try and make something work
in only one version of one type of assistive technology. When that one
version changes, it could mean retrofitting a lot of content that you
just got to work.
Good luck,
sean
Sean Keegan
Web Accessibility Instructor
High Tech Center Training Unit for the
California Community Colleges
Cupertino, CA
408.996.6044