Welcome to November! We’ve continued to get great feedback on NVDA 2020.3. Users appreciate the stability and performance improvements, and new and updated features. First off this time though, let’s go to Russia:
NVDA Certification in Russia
Anatoliy Popko is a well-known Russian accessibility expert. Recently, Quentin had the opportunity to Chat with Anatoliy and find out about some of the exciting projects he is involved with.
The video is a little longer than some of our other pieces, but it’s a fascinating story. It was great to hear about the work they are doing in Russia, and how integral NVDA Certification has been to their training. Read the Transcript or Watch the Video of NVDA Certification in Russia.
Wherever you are in the world, if Anatoliy’s story has inspired your becoming an NVDA Certified Expert, we’d love to have you on the list!
Visit https://certification.nvaccess.org/ to find out more. Sitting the certification test is free and without obligation. If you would like to purchase your certificate once you pass, you are most welcome to do so.
If you feel you would like to prepare a bit more before sitting the exam, we would recommend studying the “Basic Training for NVDA” module. There is nothing in the exam which is only documented in Basic Training for NVDA, but just about everything in the exam is covered in the module. Basic Training for NVDA is available in Human-Read MP3 Audio, Hardcopy UEB Braille or Electronic Text.
Text: “There is a trend, a very noticeable one, to move from commercial screen reader solutions to NVDA”, in purple on a white block, on an orange background.
NVDACon 2020
NVDACon is rapidly approaching with exactly one month to go. There is still an opportunity to Submit an NVDACon Presentation idea and the organisers would love to hear from you.Digging through the old NVDACon archives in the 23rd October Edition of In-Process was fun, so I’ve had another look this week. This week, I’ve found an NVDACon memory from last year, a Lightning Talk by Minako Nonogaki of Japan. She is presenting a demonstration of the Orbit Reader Braille display with NVDA.
Lightning talks like Minako’s are usually between 15 – 30 minutes, so presenting doesn’t have to be an hour long session. In fact, you can even go as short as a 30 second “Thunder Clap”. Are you an add-on developer, or a user with a great tip to share? Even a quick Thunder Clap would be a great way to quickly share your news with the NVDA Community. Get in Touch with the NVDACon Organisers to Express your Interest.
NVDA’s Document Formatting Settings
There are a couple of new features in NVDA 2020.3 on NVDA’s document formatting settings screen. So what are these settings, and how do you use them?
NVDA’s Document Formatting screen lets you set what information is reported when reading a document. This can include changes in the font, text size, or paragraph alignment. Reporting of features such as lists, headings, and links can also be enabled or disabled. Note that when this formatting information is not reported, the underlying text is still read. Similarly, Single Letter Navigation Keys such as L for list, i for list item, H or 2 for headings or K for links still jump to those elements. To highlight the difference, I thought I’d use Wikipedia, an online encyclopaedia. In Wikipedia, virtually very sentence is dotted with links to other articles. Following the links from article to article can be a fascinating and informative read. Here is how the start of today’s “On This Day” section of the main page reads by default:
heading level 2 On this day link November 6 : link Gustavus Adolphus Day in Estonia, Finland and Sweden ( link 1632 ); link Finnish Swedish Heritage link Day in Finland link graphic George Eliot George Eliot list with 5 items link 447 – A powerful earthquake destroyed large portions of the link Walls of Constantinople , including 57 towers.
NVDA’s Document Formatting settings control which of those elements are reported. In the paragraph there was a heading, a list, a graphic and a number of links. If we disabled each of those, and read the text again, NVDA would read:
On this day November 6 : Gustavus Adolphus Day in Estonia, Finland and Sweden ( 1632 ); Finnish Swedish Heritage Day in Finland George Eliot 447 – A powerful earthquake destroyed large portions of the Walls of Constantinople , including 57 towers.
The text reads more smoothly, but it is not clear where links are, or the list, or that “George Eliot” is an image. (further down in the list of events, it notes that her first story was submitted for publication on this day in 1856).
To enable or disable options in NVDA’s document formatting settings, press NVDA+control+d to open the Document Formatting settings. Or, open NVDA’s settings and press CONTROL+TAB to the “Document” page. New in NVDA 2020.3 is the ability to toggle reporting of graphics, and also highlighted text in web browsers.
That’s all for this week. Do keep Letting Us Know how you are going with NVDA 2020.3. Until next time, stay safe and well!