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- SECTION SIX
- CURSOR KEYS AND HOT KEYS
-
-
- 6.1: INTRODUCTION
-
- Earlier, when you first accessed Vocal-Eyes' Voice Control Panel via the
- CTRL-\ key, you undoubtedly noticed several options we haven't discussed yet.
- Two of them are "3: Hotkeys" and "4: Cursoring." In this section of your
- Vocal-Eyes user's guide we will delve into each of these submenus. First,
- we'll show you how to advise Vocal-Eyes as to what screen information you
- would like read when you press any of the cursor keys. Next, we'll walk you
- through the amazingly easy process of re-defining any of the voice hot keys,
- such as "read character," "read word," "read line," "read sentence," "read
- paragraph," and many, many more.
-
- 6.2: DEFINING THE CURSOR KEYS
-
- We first discussed the cursor keys back in Section 3 of this manual. We told
- you that they include such keys as the LEFT, RIGHT, UP and DOWN ARROW keys,
- the TAB key, the BACKSPACE and DELETE keys, PGUP, PGDN, HOME and END. We
- mentioned that the reason these keys are known collectively as cursor keys is
- because in most applications programs pressing any of them affects the
- placement of the cursor in some way. We demonstrated this fact with the four
- cursor keys. We showed you how pressing any of these keys in most
- applications programs causes your cursor to be moved one space left or right,
- or one screen line up or down. You may also recall that when you pressed
- these keys, not only did the key get passed along to DOS or your applications
- program, but Vocal-Eyes also voiced the new current character, in the case of
- the LEFT and RIGHT ARROW keys, or the new screen line, in the case of the UP
- and DOWN ARROW keys.
-
- But what if you don't want to hear the new screen line whenever you press the
- DOWN ARROW key? What if you only want to hear the new current character? Or
- maybe you'd like to hear the new screen column and row position of your
- cursor? Well, Vocal-Eyes allows you to define exactly what is read whenever
- you press the DOWN ARROW, or any of the other cursor keys. Here's how.
-
- 6.3: THE CURSORING MENU
-
- Use the CTRL-\ keystroke to call up Vocal-Eyes' Voice Control Panel. Cursor
- down to option 4 and then press ENTER. (Or, alternatively, simply type 4 and
- then press ENTER.)
-
- Did you hear Vocal-Eyes voice "Cursoring Key Definition 1 LEFT character?"
- Recall that when you pressed the LEFT ARROW key before in DOS or your
- applications program, Vocal-Eyes allowed your program to use the LEFT ARROW
- key as it saw fit and then popped in just long enough to announce your new
- current character. This was very useful, since DOS uses this key to move
- your cursor one character to the left. But what if your particular program
- doesn't move the cursor one space to the left when you press the LEFT ARROW
- key? Perhaps you're working in a spread sheet that uses the LEFT ARROW key
- to move one entire cell to the left. Or maybe pressing LEFT ARROW causes
- your program to display an entire new screen. In either of these cases you
- would want something more than simply the new current character read when you
- press LEFT ARROW.
-
- Do this. Press ENTER from the LEFT character prompt. Vocal-Eyes will repeat
- the current key voice assignment. Now, press the SPACE BAR. What happened?
- Did you hear Vocal-Eyes say "Word?" You have just changed what Vocal-Eyes
- will voice whenever the LEFT ARROW key is pressed. Now, every time you press
- LEFT ARROW instead of hearing the new current character you'll hear the new
- current word.
-
- Press the SPACE BAR again. Now every time you press the LEFT ARROW key your
- program will receive and act on the LEFT ARROW cursoring key and then
- Vocal-Eyes will read the new current line. Press the SPACE BAR repeatedly to
- examine all the various options. Notice that you can select, in addition to
- character, word or line, the current sentence, paragraph, to the end of the
- current line, light bar, current box, cursor position, field data, field
- name, field name and data together, the prior character, the current screen
- window or any selected window from 0 through 9, activate any of the 10
- windows, load a RAM .SET or Link. You may also, if so desired, choose to
- leave the key undefined.
-
- Let's talk for a moment about a few of these options.
-
- Choosing either sentence or paragraph will cause Vocal-Eyes to voice the
- current sentence or paragraph every time you press the LEFT ARROW key.
- Again, Vocal-Eyes will do its level best to determine exactly what you mean
- by a sentence or a paragraph.
-
- Admittedly, it is not likely that you will want to hear your current sentence
- or paragraph read every time you press the LEFT ARROW key. You may, however,
- want to hear the new location of your applications cursor. Select Cursor
- position if this is indeed what you would like.
-
- Perhaps you're working in a spread sheet or database manager in which
- pressing the LEFT ARROW key moves you one data field up or to the left. In
- such cases you would want to select either the "Field Data," "Field Name" or
- "Field Name and Data" options.
-
- The "Field Data" option will instruct Vocal-Eyes to look on either side of
- your applications cursor and voice the block of data that contains the cursor
- and that appears different from other areas of the screen. Most spread sheet
- or database managers highlight, alter colors or inverse the video of the
- current data field. With the "Field Data" option selected Vocal-Eyes should
- pick them up nicely. Even if your application program does not use colors to
- distinguish the field name from the field data, Vocal-Eyes offers another
- approach which will be discussed in a later section.
-
- Often that same spread sheet or database manager will highlight, alter the
- colors or inverse the video of the current field name as well. Would you
- like to hear the new field name voiced whenever you press the LEFT ARROW key?
- Select the "Field Name" option by pressing the SPACE BAR until it appears on
- the LEFT ARROW prompt line. Vocal-Eyes will now seek out areas of your
- screen other than your current field which have a different video mode than
- the rest of the screen and read the information which is contained within.
-
- If you press the SPACE BAR again you'll notice that the next option is "Prior
- Character." Selecting this option would cause your left cursor to first get
- the character to the left of the current cursor position and speak that
- character. Then the actual left arrow is passed to your application program.
- This is used for programs like DOS which instead of simply moving the cursor
- to the previous character, they first replace the previous character with a
- space. If while in DOS you have the left arrow set to read the character,
- you will always hear "SPACE" since DOS always replaces the character with a
- space. However, if you set the left arrow to prior character, Vocal-Eyes
- will first speak the character to the left and then allow DOS to erase the
- character and move the cursor. Notice this is the exact opposite of how
- Vocal-Eyes handles all of the other choices. Normally Vocal-Eyes will first
- send the cursor key to the application and then speak what was requested.
- However, in the case of Prior Character, this would not work. Therefore,
- Vocal-Eyes will first speak the previous character and then send the cursor
- key to the application.
-
- The next 2 options on your cursor voice assignment rotor are "Current Window"
- and "Speak Window". We haven't talked very much about windows thus far in
- this manual. Suffice it to say that later we'll show you how to define any
- or all of these 10 windows to read any portion of your screen from a single
- character up to and including the full screen display. You will then be able
- to select whichever window you would like to hear read every time you press
- the LEFT ARROW key. For example: You could define Window 9 to read your
- applications program status line, which always appears in the same place on
- the screen display. Then you could select Window 9 as your LEFT ARROW voice
- assignment key. Every time you press the LEFT ARROW key, the keystroke will
- be passed along to your program and then Vocal-Eyes will read the updated
- status line.
-
- If you select "Speak Window" as the option and press ENTER, Vocal-Eyes will
- prompt:
-
- Window To Speak: 0
-
- Simply type the single number of the window you wish read from 0 - 9. The
- ENTER key is not required. Vocal-Eyes will remember the number and offer it
- as the default if you should press ENTER on this option again. By default,
- the window to speak will be window 0. If you press ENTER instead of a
- number, Vocal-Eyes will keep the window number supplied as the window to
- speak.
-
- The final three choices available are: Activate Window, Load RAM SET and
- Link. Each will be described below:
-
- Activate Window
-
- This option works just like the above Speak Window option but instead of
- speaking the window, it will make the specified window the currently selected
- window. You will be prompted for the window number just as you were for the
- speak window option.
-
- Switching to a window can be very useful in certain instances. The next
- section of this manual will talk in much more detail about windows.
-
- Load RAM SET
-
- If you select this option and press ENTER you will be prompted as follows:
-
- RAM Set To Switch: 0
-
- Simply type the RAM location which contains the .SET file you wish loaded
- when you press the associated cursoring key. No ENTER is required after
- typing the number from 0-9. Of course, you must have allocated any RAM
- locations and have the correct .SET file loaded there before the cursoring
- key can actually be used.
-
- The power of loading a new .SET file means the sky is the limit. With the
- press of a single cursoring key, you can have a complete new voice
- environment load instantly. You are limited only by your imagination.
-
- RAM locations will be described later in this manual.
-
- Link
-
- The final option in the cursoring menu setup is link. This allows you to
- "link" or chain two of the standard cursor options with one cursoring key.
- For example, you could first speak the lightbar and than load a new .SET file
- from RAM 5. Or you could switch to window 3 and speak the current box. It
- simply allows two commands to be issued instead of the usual one.
-
- Once you have selected the link option and press ENTER, a box will popup in
- the center of the screen. For example, if you are defining ALT-F12 as link,
- the following would be displayed:
-
- Alt-F12 Link Structure
-
- First Command : Undefined
- Second Command : Undefined
-
- The first line of the box will contain the cursoring key itself. The next
- line will display the first command and the final line will display the
- second Command. Verbally, you will hear the cursoring key followed by "link
- structure" and finally "First Command: undefined".
-
- You are now being prompted for the first command of the link structure.
- Simply toggle to the desired setting just as you would before. The only
- option not available for either of the two commands is link.
-
- Once you press ENTER from the first command, you will be prompted for the
- second command. Again, toggle the setting to the desired setting and press
- ENTER. You will now be at the next cursoring key as before.
-
- If you setup a cursoring key as LINK but only define one of the two commands
- the cursoring key will not show as LINK but as the single command. The link
- option should only be used if you wish to do two functions with a single
- cursoring key.
-
- If a key has been setup as LINK and you wish to see what the two commands
- are, simply press ENTER while on LINK. Vocal-Eyes will popup the same box as
- before but instead of both commands being undefined, they will hold your
- previous commands.
-
- Of course, in certain cases, you may not want Vocal-Eyes to do anything
- special when you press the LEFT ARROW key. If this is the case, press the
- SPACE BAR until you reach the "Undefined" option. Or a quicker way is to
- press the DELETE key. Remember this option will always reset a toggle option
- to a known state. Well, in this case the know state is "Undefined."
-
- As you have seen, the SPACE BAR will toggle through all of the options in a
- forward direction. You can use the BACKSPACE key to toggle in a backward
- direction if you wish. Between the SPACE BAR, BACKSPACE key and the DELETE
- key, you should be able to select the desired setting with little difficulty.
- Remember, you may have to press ENTER if you select SPEAK WINDOW, ACTIVATE
- WINDOW or LOAD RAM SET. This is so you can specify the exact window or RAM
- location. If you press the up or down arrows instead of ENTER, Vocal-Eyes
- will use the previous setting for the desired task. If there was no previous
- setting, a value of 0 will be assumed.
-
- Now that you've made your selection, do one of five things to complete the
- process of assigning voice response to your LEFT ARROW key.
-
- 1. Press ENTER. If you have selected SPEAK WINDOW, ACTIVATE WINDOW or LOAD
- RAM SET, Vocal-Eyes will prompt for the specific window or RAM location.
- Simply accept the default with another press of ENTER or type the new number
- from 0 to 9.
-
- 2. Press DOWN ARROW . This will lock in your selection and move you down to
- the next key to assign.
-
- 3. Press UP ARROW. This will lock in your selection and move you up to the
- previous key to assign.
-
- 4. Type the number of the next selection you wish to edit and press ENTER.
- This will lock in your current selection and move you directly to the
- specified option number.
-
- 5. Press ESCAPE. This will lock in your selection and return you to the
- main Voice Control Panel menu.
-
- 6. Press ALT-X or ALT-ESCAPE. This will lock in your selection and return
- you directly to your applications program.
-
- Are you still in the Cursoring submenu? If not, return to this submenu now.
- Use your DOWN ARROW key to move through the various keys that can be given
- individual voice response. Notice that all of the standard cursor keys are
- among the choices, as well as the DELETE key, the BACKSPACE key and the ENTER
- key. Regarding the first two of these: Remember, earlier, when you
- encountered "Prior Character" as an option? Well, here are a couple of
- instances where you might want to select "prior character."
-
- Also notice that you can choose to give the ENTER key a voice assignment.
- Recall from the previous section that you can use the Keyboard selection on
- Vocal-Eyes' Voice Control Panel's main menu to instruct Vocal-Eyes to
- announce "ENTER" every time you press the ENTER key. Now, using the
- cursoring submenu, you can add additional voice response. You can, for
- example, instruct Vocal-Eyes that every time you press the ENTER key you
- would like to hear "ENTER," followed by the new cursor location, the new
- current character, word, line, sentence, paragraph, field data, field name,
- both field data and field name, the entire screen or any portion of your
- screen you'd care to mark out in any of 10 screen windows, activate any of
- the 10 windows, load a new .SET file from any of the RAM locations or even
- link any two of these commands together. And by using a different .SET file
- with each program you can tailor what you hear when you press the ENTER key
- to match the requirements of each and every program you run! And all of
- this is just for the one key!
-
- Are you beginning to see the possibilities?
-
- Examine the various cursor assignment options and the default settings we've
- provided for several of them. Keep the defaults for now, or experiment with
- the settings to find what works best for you. Remember, even though you have
- added voice features to these keys, their original meaning will be passed
- along to DOS or your applications program before the desired voice response
- is given. After all, what would be the sense in making one of your ARROW
- keys, your TAB key, or any of the other cursoring keys talk if they were
- prevented from doing what they were supposed to do in the first place?
-
- 6.3.1: DEFINING YOUR OWN CURSORING KEYS
-
- While cursoring through all of the cursoring options, you probably noticed
- that many of them are undefined. You can use these or even the ones we setup
- for your own specific needs.
-
- There are 46 keys all together that you could assign voice response to--far
- more than any applications program would be likely to use. Have you assigned
- voice response to several of the cursoring keys? Do you have extras, keys
- you've left unassigned? If so, here is a feature you're sure to appreciate!
-
- You can turn any key into a sort of cursoring key by way of this Cursoring
- submenu. As with all other cursor keys, the key will be passed along to your
- applications software. But then you get the added bonus of user definable
- voice response. Here is how it works.
-
- Let's say you are using a database manager that uses the ALT-N key to move
- you down to the next field. You could press ALT-N every time you want to
- move down one field, and then press your read current field hot key to see
- what's there. But here's a easier way to accomplish the same task with a
- single keystroke.
-
- Make sure you are in the Cursoring submenu. Locate a key you've left
- unassigned because your database manager doesn't need it. Remember, there
- are 46 options and over half of them are not defined. Are you at the prompt
- for an unassigned key? Okay, do this. Press ALT-N. Notice what just
- happened. Your unneeded cursoring key vanished from the menu and ALT-N was
- substituted in its place. Now, press the SPACE BAR or BACKSPACE key enough
- times to rotor through to the "current field" option. Press ALT-X to exit
- the Voice Control Panel and try using your ALT-N key. Notice how now, not
- only does pressing this key move you down one field, but it also reads your
- new current field information.
-
- Here's another example of how this feature can assist in your work with the
- PC. For this example, let's say you are using a spread sheet and that
- pressing the F1 key causes a contact sensitive help screen to appear. The
- help screen always occupies the first 12 lines of your PC's screen display.
- You could create a window to read the first 12 lines of your screen, then,
- every time you want help, you could press the F1 key and follow that with a
- press of your read window hot key. But why not simplify the process as
- follows?
-
- Find a cursoring key your spread sheet doesn't use. Go to that key in the
- Cursoring submenu. Press the F1 key. Now, press the SPACE BAR or BACKSPACE
- enough times to rotor through to the Speak Window option. Now press ENTER.
- Vocal-Eyes will prompt for the window to be voiced. Simply type a number
- from 0 to 9 indicating the window you wish read when the F1 key is pressed.
- From now on, every time you press the F1 help key, your help screen will
- appear and Vocal-Eyes will automatically read the window containing it.
-
- How's that for having what you want to hear when you want to hear it? Feel
- free to setup all 46 cursoring options if you like.
-
- 6.3.2 MORE ABOUT THE CURSORING MENU
-
- What if you have setup a cursoring key and later wish to undefined it. Well,
- you could get to the entry containing the key and press ENTER. This will
- place you in the column which decides what should be spoken. You can then
- press the DELETE key to undefined what should be spoken.
-
- You could also simply press the DELETE key while on the line containing the
- key you wish to remove. For example, lets say you don't want the TAB entry
- we supplied as a default. First get to the option either by using the arrow
- keys or simply typing 17ENTER. Now press the DELETE key. Vocal-Eyes will
- say Undefined and move you to option 18:Shift-TAB. If you cursor back to
- option 17, it will say 17:Undefined.
-
- Now what if you wanted to define the arrow keys, BACKSPACE, SPACE BAR or the
- DELETE key? Lets go back to option 17, the one we just undefined. Now try
- and define the SPACE BAR. What happened? That's right, Vocal-Eyes thought
- you wanted to go to the next entry. In order to define one of the cursoring
- command keys, you must first proceed the character with a press of the `
- (grave accent). Go back to option 17 and now press the grave accent and then
- the SPACE BAR. Vocal-Eyes now said 'SPACE Cursor Position.' It defaulted to
- Cursor Position because this is what was left over from the TAB key. You can
- rotor through till you get the option you want spoken each and every time you
- press the space bar. If you want to define the grave accent key itself,
- simply press it twice.
-
- Do you need to add a voice feature to the ALT-X key? Remember, this is your
- fast exit key from the Voice Control Panel. Pressing ALT-X while in the
- Cursoring submenu will not turn this key into a cursoring key. It will
- return you to your application program. Unless, of course, you press the `
- (grave accent) key first and then follow immediately with a press of the
- ALT-X key.
-
- As we have mentioned previously, the ` (grave accent) key is your Voice
- Control Panel's special bypass to next key hotkey. It works exactly like
- your bypass to next key hot key, but it only works when you're in Review Mode
- or the Voice Control Panel. Do you need to assign a voice feature to the `
- key? Or maybe you'd like to assign the ` as one of your hot keys. If so,
- simply press the key twice--the first time to bypass the next key and the
- second to actually type the key. Remember, though, the ` bypass key is only
- used when you're in Review Mode or the Voice Control Panel. For all other
- occasions use your bypass to next key hot key which we will talk about later
- on.
-
- Don't forget, when you're done, to use the Files option on the main control
- panel menu to save your changes so they'll still be there the next time you
- run Vocal-Eyes.
-
- 6.4: THE HOT KEYS MENU
-
- Do you have all of your cursoring keys set to the voice response of your
- preference? If so, then you're ready to move on to the next group of keys
- that can be set to elicit the voice response of your choice.
-
- First, let's review the difference between a cursoring key and a Vocal-Eyes
- hot key. Both may have one of a number of different voice features assigned
- to them. The difference comes in how your applications program treats them.
- Cursoring keys are passed along to DOS or your applications program. Your
- program acts on the keystroke, and then Vocal-Eyes pops in just long enough
- to voice your new current character, line, field data, screen window, etc.
- A Vocal-Eyes hot key, on the contrary, is a key that is set to invoke a
- specific voice feature every time it's pressed. Vocal-Eyes retains the
- keystroke, and does not allow it to affect your underlying software in any
- way. Pressing your DOWN ARROW key may cause Vocal-Eyes to read your new
- current screen line, but only after your program has received and acted on
- the DOWN ARROW keystroke. Pressing CTRL-L will also read your current screen
- line, but Vocal-Eyes will keep this "hot key" keystroke all to itself.
-
- By now you're familiar with the various read previous, current and next hot
- keys we first introduced you to back in Section 3 of this manual. We told
- you then that there were a number of voice hot keys we'd be introducing you
- to later on, and that also you would learn how to reassign these keys to suit
- your individual requirements and preferences. Well, that time has come at
- last.
-
- If you're not presently in the Voice Control Panel, press CTRL-\ to get there
- now. Cursor down to option 3: Hot Keys. Press ENTER. Did you hear
- Vocal-Eyes say "Hot Key Definition 1: Prior Char Control-B?"
-
- Recall that Control-B is your read previous character hot key. But maybe
- you'd prefer that this hot key be ALT-B. If this is indeed the case, go
- ahead and press ALT-B now. What happened? Did you hear Vocal-Eyes repeat
- your keystroke and then move down to hot key 2: Char? Use your UP ARROW key
- to go back to hot key 1. Notice that now, instead of Control-B, your read
- previous character hot key has been changed to ALT-B. Would you like to
- change it back to Control-B? All you need to do is type CTRL-B. Give it a
- try now.
-
- Use your DOWN ARROW key to cursor your way through the first 15 hot key
- options. You probably recognize all of them as the read character, word,
- line, sentence and paragraph hot keys we first introduced you to back in
- Section 3 of this manual. We told you then that you'd be able to reassign
- any and all of your hot keys in accordance with your own personal needs and
- preferences. Are there any here you'd like to change? Go ahead and do it
- now. Press ESCAPE or ALT-X to return you to DOS or your applications program
- and take your new hot keys for a test drive.
-
- Are there some hot keys among these first 15 that you never use? Perhaps
- you're working with a spread sheet, in which case you probably have little
- use for the read paragraph hot keys. Would you like to free up these keys so
- you can use them for other Vocal-Eyes functions? Easy enough. Simply cursor
- down to the item you wish not to use. Press the delete key on your PC's
- keyboard. You'll hear Vocal-Eyes say "Undefined" and then move along to the
- next hot key choice. Since this command is undefined, (no keyboard sequence
- has been assigned to it) it is not available. You therefore do not have to
- worry about a conflict with your application. If a hot key is defined to a
- keystroke which your application program requires, Vocal-Eyes would win out.
- Does this mean you would never be able to use the application key? Not at
- all. Later you will learn how to temporally bypass the hot key allowing your
- application to see the keystroke.
-
- Move down to hot key 16. Use your DOWN ARROW key, if you like, but a faster
- way to get there is to type in the number 16 and then press ENTER.
-
- Notice that hot keys 16 through 19 are for read functions we haven't talked
- about yet. Option 16 says "Top Cursor." This is your Vocal-Eyes hot key to
- read from the top of your screen all the way down to your current cursor
- location. Option 17, on the contrary, is your Vocal-Eyes hot key to read
- everything on your PC's screen from your cursor on down to the bottom. What
- do you think option 18, "Left Cursor" does? That's right. It reads
- everything on your current screen line that lies to the left of your cursor.
- And of course option 19, "Cursor Right" is your Vocal-Eyes hot key to read
- everything on your current screen line that lies to the right of your cursor.
-
- Notice that none of these four hot keys have been assigned. Each says
- "Undefined." Do you have some good ideas as to which keys you'd like to
- assign to each of these read functions?
-
- Here are a few things to keep in mind when deciding which keys to assign as
- Vocal-Eyes hot keys. First, stay away from all the normal, lower and upper
- case letters, numbers and marks of punctuation. You could, say, assign a
- lower-case "t" to read the "top" of your screen, but then the next time you
- tried to type "cat" what you'd end up doing would be to type "ca" and then
- command Vocal-Eyes to read the top half of your screen. True, you could use
- your CTRL-N bypass key, but do you really want to have to do that every time
- you need to type the letter "t?"
-
- It's probably a good idea to stick to the special PC shift states of CONTROL
- and ALT. And of course there are always the function keys from F1 through
- F12 and their various SHIFT, CONTROL and ALT shift states. Does your
- applications software use all of these keys. If not, why not make use of a
- few of them for Vocal-Eyes hot keys.
-
- Another thing to keep in mind when assigning or reassigning Vocal-Eyes hot
- keys is that it's only one per customer. Your first thought might be to
- assign CTRL-T to read the top half of your screen. Recall, however, that
- CTRL-T is already the hot key to read the next sentence. You cannot assign
- the same keystroke to two different voice functions. Vocal-Eyes will beep
- and say "Keystroke already defined" if you try. Take care, then, when
- assigning a hot key that the keystroke you're planning to use hasn't already
- been assigned elsewhere in the hot key submenu. If it has, and you'd really
- prefer to use it here, first return to the original use of this key and
- reassign the function to another, unused key, or press DELETE to unassign the
- feature.
-
- In the above example, before we could assign the CTRL-T to read the top half
- of our PC's screen, we would have to do one of two things. We could:
-
- 1. Reassign the Read next sentence hot key by moving to that option and
- typing in a new keystroke.
-
- 2. Change the read next sentence hot key to "Undefined." Do this by moving
- to the read next sentence prompt and then pressing the delete key.
- Vocal-Eyes will respond "Undefined," then allow you to proceed with other
- changes.
-
- 6.5: MORE HOT KEYS
-
- Cursor down to hot key selection 20. Notice that it through selection 29
- assign the hot keys to read the 10 screen windows from 0 through 9. Your
- read screen hot keys can also be reassigned by you, the user. Perhaps
- instead of ALT-0 through ALT-9 you'd prefer your read window hot keys were
- ALT-A through ALT-J. Accomplishing this would be as easy as typing in the
- new keystrokes as each window prompt appears in the hot key submenu. Be
- sure, however, that no other hot keys have already been assigned to any of
- these keys.
-
- (NOTE: In the next section of your Vocal-Eyes users' guide we're going to
- have a lot to say about windows. We'll be referring to the hot keys that
- invoke them as ALT-0 through ALT-9. It's probably a good idea for you to
- leave these hot key assignments alone, for now, to avoid a lot of confusion.)
-
- Cursor down to Option 31. This option allows you to assign a hot key to read
- from your current cursor location all the way to the end of your document.
- Do you have Noteworthy, WordPerfect or some other word processing program
- loaded? If so, you'll certainly want to assign a hot key to this feature.
- Now, in your word processor or text editor, when you press this key
- Vocal-Eyes will automatically press your DOWN ARROW key for you and read each
- line all the way to the end of your document.
-
- Would you like to cancel the "read to end" operation? If so, simply press
- ESCAPE. The reading will be stopped immediately, though it may take your
- synthesizer a moment or two to catch up.
-
- The next several Hot Key menu options control voice functions we haven't
- discussed yet. Let's skip them for now, and move down to Options 39 and 40.
-
- We've already discussed both of these options in a sense. Remember, at the
- beginning of this section when we were describing the process of attaching
- voice functions to your various cursor keys. Among the rotary selection of
- voice functions you could select "Field Data" or "Field Name." We mentioned
- how handy these voice functions could be when working with many spreadsheet
- or database management software packages. Well, now you can assign hot keys
- to read either or both of these special display formats.
-
- What do you suppose is the difference between a hot key assigned to read the
- field data or name and a Cursoring key assigned to read the same textual
- unit? That's right--a Cursoring key will pass along the appropriate
- keystroke before reading the field data or name. The "read" field data or
- name hot key will read the information without affecting your underlying
- software in any way.
-
- The next option, 41: Any line, allows you to setup a hotkey which when
- pressed will prompt you for the line number to be read. This like all the
- hotkeys can be done in or out of review mode. Reading any line regardless if
- you are in or out of review mode, will never move your cursor position.
-
- When you press this hotkey, Vocal-Eyes will prompt:
-
- Line to read:
-
- Simply type the line number you wish read and press ENTER. Vocal-Eyes will
- voice the line specified.
-
- 42: Spell Word
-
- Pressing this hotkey will cause Vocal-Eyes to spell the current word under
- the cursor position. While spelling the word, the speech rate will be
- lowered by a factor of 2. For example, if your screen rate is set at 5,
- Vocal-Eyes will spell the word at a rate of 3. You can also spell the
- current word by pressing the read current word hotkey twice. Pressing it a
- third time will spell the word phonetically.
-
- 43: Forward sentence
- 44: Backward sentence
-
- Option 43 (Forward sent) and option 44 (Back sent) allow you to move through
- your document forward and backward by sentence. Assuming your applications
- programs moves the cursor using the four arrow keys such as a word processor,
- Vocal-Eyes can cause your applications program to automatically scroll up or
- down as required. This is a very handy way of reading up or down a document
- sentence by sentence.
-
- If your applications program already offers a way of moving by sentence than
- it would be better to make that keystroke a cursoring key setup to speak the
- sentence. However, very few applications program offer you the ability of
- moving by sentence so you are sure to enjoy this feature.
-
- If you are going to be using this feature, if may be necessary to configure
- the current active window to only contain the lines and columns for which the
- data from the applications program can reside. For example, WordPerfect
- places a status line on line 25. Vocal-Eyes has know way of knowing this is
- a status line and may try to route the applications cursor to this line
- thinking it is part of your document. Of course, this can not be done so
- this would cause undesirable results. The solutions with WordPerfect is to
- set a window from lines 1 to 24. Now the sentence routing will only be
- relative to the top 24 lines.
-
- Note: Because of the technique employed by Vocal-Eyes to determine the
- beginning and ending of a sentence, double spaced text will not work using
- these hotkeys. If a document must be in double spaced format, it is
- suggested that you create the document in single space and at print time,
- convert to double space. This way, your editing can be done in the more
- simpler single space format.
-
- 45: Forward paragraph
- 46: Backward paragraph
-
- Option 45 (forward para) and option 46 (back para) allow you to move through
- your document forward and backward just like the sentence routing above but
- by paragraph instead of by sentence.
-
- Because some paragraphs can be very large, this feature may not always work.
- Vocal-Eyes will attempt to get the entire paragraph on the screen. If the
- paragraph is too large to fit, only the top part of the paragraph will be
- read. Normally this is not a problem but keep this in mind as you move
- through your document this may happen.
-
- The same limitations and suggestions for the sentence routing hold true for
- paragraph routing as well.
-
- 48: Time and date
-
- Option 48 (Time/date) allows you to assign a hotkey which when pressed will
- speak the current time and date. The time and date spoken is retrieved
- directly from your computers time and date values. If these values are not
- set correctly, this hotkey will not give the correct information. Those
- using the Sounding Board will not necessarily need this feature since it also
- has a similar option.
-
- Cursor down to option 49. Notice that here you are presented with the
- current "read screen address" hot key. Would you like to change it? If so,
- go ahead and do it now. Pressing this hotkey will cause Vocal-Eyes to give
- you the current applications cursor position in the form: Cx,Ly where x is
- the column number and y is the line number.
-
- Option 51 in the hot keys submenu allows you to assign a second Review Mode
- entry key. Remember, when we first discussed the concept of Review Mode, we
- told you about the fast review hotkey via the ALT key.
-
- This review hotkey should only be used within macros. As you can see, we
- have defaulted this keystroke to CTRL-ENTER. Section 16 will discuss macro
- and Vocal-Eyes in much more detail. If you every wish to change the hotkey
- to something other than CTRL-ENTER, here is where it would be done.
-
- Options 50, 53 and 54 on the hot key submenu are undoubtedly already familiar
- to you. They include the CTRL-X Momentary Silence hot key, the CTRL-\ Voice
- Control Panel entry hot key and the CTRL-N Bypass to next key hot key. Do
- any of these keys conflict with your applications program? Change any or all
- of them if you like. Be careful, however, not to leave the Menu Entry hot
- key in an unassigned state. Otherwise, the next time you exit the Voice
- Control Panel, there won't be any way for you to get back inside.
-
- Remember if you have interruptability on, even though you may have CTRL-X or
- some other key assigned as the momentary silence hot key, Vocal-Eyes would
- treat it as if it were undefined. Only if interruptability is off or set to
- Cursor Keys only will you be able to use the momentary silence hot key.
-
- The remainder of the hotkeys will be described later in this manual.
-
- 6.6: THE SPECIAL ` BYPASS COMMAND KEY
-
- Let's say you're using a word processing package that doesn't make use of the
- 10 or 12 function keys along the left or upper edge of your PC's keyboard.
- You've decided to make use of these keys yourself, assigning the F1 key as
- your read character hot key, F2 as your read line hot key, F3 as your read
- sentence hot key and F4 as your read paragraph hot key. Additionally, you
- have decided to use the CTRL and ALT versions of these keys as your previous
- and next hot keys respectively. And oh yes, you've also made one other
- change: instead of using CTRL-X as your Momentary Silence hot key, you've
- decided to "alter" this hot key slightly and use ALT-X instead.
-
- Every one of these keys will work perfectly fine in applications mode, which
- is to say when you're working with your word processing program. Should you
- need to enter Review Mode, however, you're going to encounter a bit of
- conflict. As you will learn in upcoming sections of this manual, Vocal-Eyes
- uses several of the function keys, the ALT-X key and a few other keys to
- control some pretty essential features, such as windows, and cursor routing.
- Also, as you've already learned, pressing F1 from inside Review Mode calls up
- one of Vocal-Eyes' handy help screens.
-
- Vocal-Eyes' Review Mode command keys take precedence over any and all of your
- user definable hot keys. You have a bypass to next key hot key, but what if
- you wanted to assign this feature to F10 or ALT-X? How could you bypass a
- Vocal-Eyes command if you can't get to your bypass hot key in the first
- place?
-
- To solve this dilemma, Vocal-Eyes comes equipped with a special Review Mode
- bypass command key. It's the ` (grave accent) key. Press this key to bypass
- any Review Mode command key, such as F1 or ALT-X, and to reach any hot key
- you may have assigned to these keys.
-
- Have you assigned any hot keys to the HOME, END, PgUp or PgDn keys? You will
- recall from an earlier section of this manual that these keys operate several
- useful Review Mode features. Pressing Home instructs Vocal-Eyes to read the
- previous sentence. Pressing CTRL-HOME instructs Vocal-Eyes to read the
- previous paragraph. Pressing End or CTRL-END instructs Vocal-Eyes to read
- the next sentence and paragraph respectively. We also showed you how you
- could use PgUp to express move your cursor to the first character on your
- line, CTRL-PgUp to move to the upper left hand corner of your current window,
- and PgDn and CTRL-PgDn to move to the last character on your current line or
- bottom right hand corner of your current window respectively.
-
- As is the case with the other Review Mode command keys we've already
- mentioned, the HOME, END, PgUp and PgDn commands will always take precedence
- over any hot keys you may have assigned to use these keys. If, say, you have
- assigned your HOME key to read the current field data, pressing HOME in
- Review Mode will still read the previous sentence. If you want to hear your
- field data, press ` (grave accent) first and then press HOME.
-
- Here's another use for the ` bypass command key. Say you're in the Hot Keys
- menu, and what you'd like to do is assign the ALT-X key to be your Momentary
- Silence. You cursor down to Option 44 and press ALT-X. What happened?
- That's right. ALT-X is one of the keys you can press to exit the Voice
- Control Panel, so instead of defining your Momentary Silence hot key you've
- express exited back to your applications program.
-
- Try it again. This time, just before pressing ALT-X, press the ` key. This
- time it worked perfectly, didn't it?
-
- Let's review the difference between the ` bypass command key and your user
- definable bypass hot key. First, it's important to understand the difference
- between a user definable hot key and one of Vocal-Eyes' Review Mode or Voice
- Control Panel command keys. Command keys control specific Vocal-Eyes voice
- functions. Most of these command keys are used in Review Mode, but there are
- a few, such as the ALT-X express exit command key, that you can use when
- working inside the Voice Control Panel. These keys cause Vocal-Eyes to
- perform a specific action, such as reading the previous sentence, or
- accessing the F1 Help screen. A Vocal-Eyes hot key, on the contrary, can
- perform any of 61 different functions, as we saw when we explored the Hot
- Keys menu. You can assign any key to perform any hot key function.
-
- Use your user defined bypass to next key "hot key" when what you want to do
- is bypass another user defined hot key, such as the CTRL-L read line or the
- CTRL-C read current character hot keys. Use the ` bypass "command key" when
- you want to bypass any of Vocal-Eyes' predefined command keys, such as the
- Review Mode HOME or F1 help keys.
-
- Remember while in the Hot Keys menu, you can define any keystroke which
- produces an actual code. If you have the enhanced 101 keyboard and your
- system supports it full potential, you will have far more options then those
- without this keyboard. As an example, the 101 keyboards, have a separate
- cursor pad. These four keys are dedicated to the four arrow keys. If you
- define this UP ARROW, it is different then if you defined the UP ARROW on the
- numeric keypad. Regardless of what keyboard you have, the two enter keys you
- have are considered to be different. You could define the ENTER key from the
- numeric keypad to read window 0 and still be able to use the ENTER key on the
- standard keyboard normally. Feel free to play with the keystrokes. We are
- sure you will enjoy all the possibilities.
-
- Also remember if you wish to define a hot key to one of the keys normally
- used to control the cursor position in the Hot Keys menu, such as the arrow
- keys, ENTER, ALT-X, SPACE BAR, BACKSPACE and all the others, you must first
- proceed the keystroke with a press of the ` (grave accent). This will Tell
- Vocal-Eyes you really want to define the next keystroke after the grave
- accent. If you want to define the grave accent as a hot key simply press it
- twice. This allows you to define every keystroke on the keyboard if you
- wish.
-
- 6.7: SUMMARY
-
- Well, how are you doing? Keeping up with the many features discussed thus
- far? If not don't worry about it. The more you use Vocal-Eyes, the more
- intuitive it will be come.
-
- This section, we covered many useful features. We talked about how you can
- define up to 46 cursoring keys. These are keys which are first sent to the
- application program and then cause something relevant spoken. Next we
- discussed many of the hot keys available to you. The rest of the hot keys
- will be discussed in later sections. You can setup the 61 possible hot keys
- exactly to your liking. Define those you will be using with a particular
- application and undefined the ones you would not be using. With this
- ability, there should never be any conflict between a Vocal-Eyes command and
- your applications program.
-
- Believe it or not, there is still much to be discussed.
-