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Thread: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
Number of posts in this thread: 7 (In chronological order)
From: Ilana Gordon
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 6:49AM
Subject: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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Hello all,
I am wondering if it is possible to have NVDA and JAWS always read the same
way. One of our government clients is using both to audit documents and
we're having a hard time marrying the two to read things exactly the same
way.
I have my explanations but wanted to get some professional opinions
from this community. Any insight is appreciated.
Ilana
--
Ilana Gordon
CEO
Word Wizards, Inc
8609 2nd Avenue, Unit 406-B
Silver Spring, MD 20910
*v.*301-986-0808 *fax.*301-986-0809
*Direct: 240-380-2639*
www.wordwizardsinc.com
From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 7:08AM
Subject: Re: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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On 13/05/2021 13:49, Ilana Gordon wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I am wondering if it is possible to have NVDA and JAWS always read the same
> way. One of our government clients is using both to audit documents and
> we're having a hard time marrying the two to read things exactly the same
> way.
>
> I have my explanations but wanted to get some professional opinions
> from this community. Any insight is appreciated.
Probably worth giving a few examples of where you're seeing
discrepancies. Are the differences about content (e.g. how in some cases
dates/numbers/etc are announced as if they were in a format that they
are not) ... which may well be down to the specific speech engine that
is being used (see the recent thread here
https://webaim.org/discussion/mail_message?idF146)?
Or is it more fundamentally about how certain structures/roles are
announced, what hints are being given by the AT, etc? (which, depending
on the specifics, may simply not be possible to address at all, as it's
down to how these ATs work)
P
--
Patrick H. Lauke
https://www.splintered.co.uk/ | https://github.com/patrickhlauke
https://flickr.com/photos/redux/ | https://www.deviantart.com/redux
twitter: @patrick_h_lauke | skype: patrick_h_lauke
From: Noble,Stephen L.
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 7:33AM
Subject: Re: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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That's sort of like trying to get the Windows and Mac OS to have exactly the same user experience. Screen reader developers have their own opinions on how things should be voiced and users often gravitate to one or the other based on those differences. While both screen readers have extensive options to personalize the reading experience, some of the voicing for interactions is essentially hard coded and cannot be changed by the user.
--Steve Noble
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502-969-3088
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Sent: Thursday, May 13, 2021 8:49 AM
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Subject: [WebAIM] Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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Hello all,
I am wondering if it is possible to have NVDA and JAWS always read the same
way. One of our government clients is using both to audit documents and
we're having a hard time marrying the two to read things exactly the same
way.
I have my explanations but wanted to get some professional opinions
from this community. Any insight is appreciated.
Ilana
--
Ilana Gordon
CEO
Word Wizards, Inc
8609 2nd Avenue, Unit 406-B
Silver Spring, MD 20910
*v.*301-986-0808 *fax.*301-986-0809
*Direct: 240-380-2639*
https://nam11.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.wordwizardsinc.com%2F&data%7C01%7Csteve.noble%40louisville.edu%7Cfe5aab1a790c47f531fc08d9160d8978%7Cdd246e4a54344e158ae391ad9797b209%7C0%7C0%7C637565070273346898%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000&sdata=rrZrGCiiO5K9TyKgYGg1zEWHvSx8i09G%2BmXnY%2BgPj4Q%3D&reserved=0
From: general
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 8:13AM
Subject: Re: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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If I am not mistaken (it's been a long time), I think both can be personalize such as changing keystrokes or add new ones, changing some of the default languages, etc. It's not something you can find easily but with a few keystrokes to get to the settings will display a wealth of options you can adjust. Both are different but I believe JAWS is more adjustable than NVDA. Then again, it's been a long while so that may have changed.
From: Ilana Gordon
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 8:24AM
Subject: Re: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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The issues are more related to the structural tagging. An example of
language that identifies "defects." Oh that word gets me too!
Example 1. The table information announced by the screen readers JAWS and
NVDA differs. On page 2 (6 of 40 pages), Screen reading software does not
announce the
correct table information for users of screen reading software. i.e. Screen
reading software JAWS announces table with "8 columns and 15 rows" while
NVDA screen
reader announces table with "9 columns and 15 rows".
All of your responses are in line with what I'm thinking. The problem is
this particular Agency has hired auditors for compliance (who by the way do
not give solutions only identify problems) and whoever set up the criteria
obviously didn't consider any of these important issues that make the
software unique in the way it reads the tags. There are many things that
can be accomplished so that both do the right thing. But they are different
and I find it impossible to remediate so that both do the same thing all
the time.
Thanks for corroborating!
Ilana
On Thu, May 13, 2021 at 10:13 AM < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> If I am not mistaken (it's been a long time), I think both can be
> personalize such as changing keystrokes or add new ones, changing some of
> the default languages, etc. It's not something you can find easily but
> with a few keystrokes to get to the settings will display a wealth of
> options you can adjust. Both are different but I believe JAWS is more
> adjustable than NVDA. Then again, it's been a long while so that may have
> changed.
>
>
From: Mark Magennis
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 8:32AM
Subject: Re: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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Ilana,
I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "audit documents", but if you mean "investigate whether documents are read correctly by a screen reader" then you need to be careful about changing the screen reader's behaviour away from its default out-of-the-box settings. Many of the users who are going to have most difficulty accessing content using their screen readers are also most likely to be using the default out-of-the-box settings. They are also least likely to be able to change the settings in the way you are proposing. So if you make changes you won't be replicating the experience of some of your most impacted users.
Mark
From: Steve Green
Date: Thu, May 13 2021 8:39AM
Subject: Re: Questions about NVDA and JAWS
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I would not usually be concerned about differences in how JAWS and NVDA read documents, but I would be concerned if they are announcing different numbers of columns in a table. That suggests that the table might be coded incorrectly or perhaps there is a hidden column. It might be to do with merged cells, but I don't recall coming across anything like it, so I would definitely investigate.
Steve Green
Managing Director
Test Partners Ltd