Visual highlight should follow the navigation in math expression when in interactive mode #345
Comments
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See also tsengwoody/Access8Math#108 |
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Thanks for adding this issue. It is something that I've thought about adding from time to time but was uncertain how useful it would be in a screen reader. I could even add highlighting during speech, not just during navigation as can be seen in the MathCAT demo page. To do the highlighting in the demo, MathCAT makes use of "id" attrs to identify where it is. I don't know how I could do that outside of an HTML page. On the other hand, I wasn't able to get the focus to change when navigating a Word doc, so maybe NVDA can't highlight elsewhere? Is there some documentation or examples on how to do focus highlighting in NVDA? |
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You may have a look on how highlighters are created in NVDA: I do not know what would be the most useful / relevant: branch on an existing highlighter or create a new highlighter for maths? |
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I spent about 15 minutes looking at the code and it isn't clear to me how I can hook in math. It seems to want to use |
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At best the following is probably tangential to the discussion, so apologies if inappropriate here.
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@andrew-l-d: Navigation by character is one of the long planned features (#110). One of these days... That would solve '2' and '4' on your list. '5' is already doable. MathCAT already has three modes of navigation. If more flexibility is needed, I'm interested to hear what is needed (please open a separate issue). MathCAT does have 10 place markers (keys 0 - 9) that can be used during navigation. You can set a place marker (cntl+n), move to it (n), or read it without moving the focus (shift+n). I don't think there are used much, but they do do some of the things a review cursor does. They were added to support things like systems of equations where you want to be able to compare two things to figure out what to multiple one line by so you can remove a variable from a line. That leaves using the military alphabet as a missing feature. I could add an option to do speak the military alphabet instead of the letter. If I do that, I'd probably want to mirror an NVDA setting, but I couldn't find one and I don't hear it being used when I move by character. How do I turn that one in NVDA? As for the review cursor, it sounds like something that potentially should be supported. Not being a screen reader user, I wasn't really aware of it. I tried to see what Access8Math does with the review cursor, but Access8Math didn't work for me (lots of console errors/beeps) -- not too surprising given that I'm running an alpha build of 2025.1. Given the 2D nature of math, can you describe how you would like it to work? Please open a separate issue for that. |
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I have just made an exciting discovery. With MathCAT 0.6.8 I am able to use NVDA’s Review Cursor to read equations. This resolves the five issues I raised.
NVDA needs to be in Object Review mode. Sometimes, but not always, it is necessary first to set the navigator object to focus (NVDA+Backspace in laptop layout). Then use NVDA+right/left arrows to move character by character or NVDA+ctrl+right/left arrows to move by word. With Delayed descriptions for characters on cursor movement turned on under NVDA Speech settings, moving by character and pausing expands to the military alphabet.
Using NVDA’s facility for copying text with the Review Cursor, all or part of the equation can be copied to the clipboard. That copies the text produced by MathCAT, not the equation, but may be useful in some situations.
Andrew
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Subject: Re: [NSoiffer/MathCAT] Visual highlight should follow the navigation in math expression when in interactive mode (Issue #345)
@andrew-l-d <https://github.com/andrew-l-d> : Navigation by character is one of the long planned features (#110 <#110> ). One of these days... That would solve '2' and '4' on your list. '5' is already doable. MathCAT already has three modes of navigation. If more flexibility is needed, I'm interested to hear what is needed (please open a separate issue). MathCAT does have 10 place markers (keys 0 - 9) that can be used during navigation. You can set a place marker (cntl+n), move to it (n), or read it without moving the focus (shift+n). I don't think there are used much, but they do do some of the things a review cursor does. They were added to support things like systems of equations where you want to be able to compare two things to figure out what to multiple one line by so you can remove a variable from a line.
That leaves using the military alphabet as a missing feature. I could add an option to do speak the military alphabet instead of the letter. If I do that, I'd probably want to mirror an NVDA setting, but I couldn't find one and I don't hear it being used when I move by character. How do I turn that one in NVDA?
As for the review cursor, it sounds like something that potentially should be supported. Not being a screen reader user, I wasn't really aware of it. I tried to see what Access8Math does with the review cursor, but Access8Math didn't work for me (lots of console errors/beeps) -- not too surprising given that I'm running an alpha build of 2025.1. Given the 2D nature of math, can you describe how you would like it to work? Please open a separate issue for that.
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NSoiffer left a comment (NSoiffer/MathCAT#345) <#345 (comment)>
@andrew-l-d <https://github.com/andrew-l-d> : Navigation by character is one of the long planned features (#110 <#110> ). One of these days... That would solve '2' and '4' on your list. '5' is already doable. MathCAT already has three modes of navigation. If more flexibility is needed, I'm interested to hear what is needed (please open a separate issue). MathCAT does have 10 place markers (keys 0 - 9) that can be used during navigation. You can set a place marker (cntl+n), move to it (n), or read it without moving the focus (shift+n). I don't think there are used much, but they do do some of the things a review cursor does. They were added to support things like systems of equations where you want to be able to compare two things to figure out what to multiple one line by so you can remove a variable from a line.
That leaves using the military alphabet as a missing feature. I could add an option to do speak the military alphabet instead of the letter. If I do that, I'd probably want to mirror an NVDA setting, but I couldn't find one and I don't hear it being used when I move by character. How do I turn that one in NVDA?
As for the review cursor, it sounds like something that potentially should be supported. Not being a screen reader user, I wasn't really aware of it. I tried to see what Access8Math does with the review cursor, but Access8Math didn't work for me (lots of console errors/beeps) -- not too surprising given that I'm running an alpha build of 2025.1. Given the 2D nature of math, can you describe how you would like it to work? Please open a separate issue for that.
—
Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#345 (comment)> , or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ADZAYAN4XXK4O7GW5FHWVBD2PKLLNAVCNFSM6AAAAABW2RQN3CVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZDMNJSGM4TANBTGE> .
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Steps to reproduce
Expected result
Browse mode cursor should help follow the selected subpart of the math expression being explored. Alternatively, another highlighter should allow to follow the subpart of the expression that is being explored, e.g. allow navigator object to follow the selected subpart of the math expression, so that navigator object highlight can be used.
Configuration
Note
Maybe NVDA itself should provide some information or extension points to help the math provider to do this job. Please explain what should be additionally required from NVDA if needed.
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