Using NonVisual Desktop Access to test
Overview
NVDA stands for NonVisual Desktop Access; it is a free screen reader that is made available for the Windows PC. Equal Entry recommends that you perform testing with NVDA and the Mozilla Firefox browser together. While NVDA works well with many browsers, we find that NVDA and Firefox work best together.
Getting Started with NVDA, Version 2021.2 or Later
- Download NonVisual Desktop Access - NVDA
- Start NVDA.
- Enable Speech Viewer by activating NVDA in the taskbar and selecting NVDA + N Tools > Speech Viewer.
- Enable Visual Highlight by activating NVDA in the taskbar and selecting NVDA + N Preferences > Settings. Select the Vision tab and check Enable Highlighting.
- Assign a shortcut to start NVDA such as CTRL + ALT + N.
- Run Help > Check for Updates and ensure you are running the latest version of NVDA.
Working with Paralllels
If you use Mac to run Windows in Parallels you will need to configure the NVDA key using the instructions at WebAim Parallels Remap Key
The Remapkey.exe can be downloaded directly on the Equal Entry Drive.
Visual Highlight Settings
Equal Entry recommends enabling the Visual Highlight setting in NVDA to best understand what NVDA is doing inside the browser. Visual Highlight can help you identify the system focus, navigator object, and browse mode positions by highlighting objects with a colored rectangle.
Visual Highlight uses a solid blue outline to indicate a combined navigator object and system focus location. It uses a dashed blue outline to indicate only the system focus object. It uses a solid pink outline to indicate only the navigator object. It uses a solid yellow outline to indicate the location of the virtual caret used in browse mode.
For versions of NVDA older than 2021.2, Equal Entry recommends using the Focus Highlight Plugin to provide the same information.
Getting Started with Versions of NVDA before 2021.2
- Download NonVisual Desktop Access - NVDA
- Download Focus Highlight Plugin - Stable Version
- Start NVDA.
- Launch focusHighlight.nvda-addon by activating the downloaded file. NVDA will prompt you to install the addon.
- Enable Speech Viewer by activating NVDA in the taskbar and selecting NVDA + N Tools > Speech Viewer.
- Assign a shortcut to start NVDA such as CTRL + ALT + N.
- Run Help > Check for Updates and ensure you are running the latest version of NVDA.
Focus Highlight Plugin
Equal Entry recommends using the Focus Highlight Plugin with NVDA to best understand what NVDA is doing inside of the browser. The focus highlight plugin uses a red color to display where keyboard focus or forms focus is on a page.
[caption id=”attachment_5210” align=”alignnone” width=”1024”]
NVDA shows red rectangle around hyperlink on web page[/caption]
It uses a green color to show where the virtual focus is on a page. Virtual focus can be used to read things like lines of text.
[caption id=”attachment_5211” align=”alignnone” width=”1024”]
NVDA shows green rectangle around non focusable items like text[/caption]
Focus and Browse Modes
NVDA will play a beep when you manually switch between Focus and Browse modes, or it will speak the change. When NVDA speaks the change, it is captured in the Speech Viewer.
To have NVDA speak the mode change, activate NVDA in taskbar and select NVDA + N Preferences > Settings. Select the Browse Mode tab and uncheck Audio indication of focus and browse modes.
Important Shortcuts
These are the most important shortcuts when working with NVDA.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| NVDA Key | Caps Lock or Insert |
| Start NVDA | CTRL + ALT + N |
| Exit NVDA | NVDA + Q |
| NVDA Menu | NVDA + N |
| Toggle Speech Mode | NVDA + S |
| Switch between Browse and Focus Mode | NVDA + Space |
| Move Mouse Pointer to NVDA Focus | NVDA + Numpad Divide |
| Move To Top of Page | CTRL + Home |
| Find with NVDA | NVDA + CTRL + F |
| Find Next | NVDA + F3 |
| See list of elements | NVDA + F7 |
Testing 1.1.1 - Non Text
Keyboard shortcuts only for testing the graphic text alternatives on page.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Announce next graphic | G |
| Announce previous graphic | SHIFT + G |
Testing 1.3.1 - Structure
Toggling Review Modes
Use this mode so that you can switch between reading the elements as a form or as a page element by element.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Toggle browse/focus modes | NVDA + SPACE |
| Exit focus mode | ESC |
| Refresh browse mode content | NVDA + F5 |
Output All Content of Page
Use this to read the meaningful sequence of the page. Does the page make sense hearing it from top to bottom.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Go to top of page | G |
| Read All Information on Page | NVDA + Down Arrow |
Single Letter Navigation
The following keys by themselves jump to the next available element, while adding the shift key causes them to jump to the previous element. Note that the screen reader must be in virtual browse mode for these single letter keys to function.
| Move To | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| annotation | a |
| button | b |
| blockquote | q |
| checkbox | x |
| combobox | c |
| edit | e |
| embedded object | o |
| form field | f |
| frame | m |
| graphic | g |
| heading | h |
| h1 | 1 |
| h2 | 2 |
| h3 | 3 |
| landmark | d |
| list | l |
| list item | i |
| link | k |
| nonlinked text | n |
| radio button | r |
| separator | s |
| table | t |
| unvisited link | u |
| visited link | v |
Testing Tables
If you need to test tables within content use these shortcuts to understand they are fully working.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Move to table | T |
| Read next column | ctrl + alt + right arrow |
| Read previous column | ctrl + alt + left arrow |
| Read next row | ctrl + alt + down |
| Read previous row | ctrl + alt + up |
Testing Lists
Lists can be used as part of the 1.3.1 testing as well.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Move to list | L |
| Move to end of list | , |
| Move to start of list | SHIFT + , |
Testing 2.1.1 - Keyboard
This is a workaround to test if a keyboard shortcut can work while NVDA is running.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Allow keystroke through | NVDA + F2 |
Testing 2.4.1 - Bypass Blocks
Verify if Landmarks are available
Navigate between landmarks, make sure if more than one than they have a unique name.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Move to next landmark | d |
| Display list of landmarks | NVDA + F7, ALT + D |
Verify if Headings are available
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Move to next heading | h |
| Move to next heading 2 | 2 |
| Move to next heading 3 | 3 |
| Display list of headings | NVDA + F7, ALT + H |
Testing 2.4.2 - Page Titled
It is important to hear the Page Title announced correctly.
| What to Do | Keyboard Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Announce page title | NVDA + T |
- Confirm page title is unique and descriptive
FAQ
Do I have to use NVDA with sound?
No you can turn off the speech synthesizer under NVDA -> Preferences -> Synthesizer -> No Speech
Why does NVDA say “clickable” when navigating the interface?
Screen readers announce the presence of an onclick when the event handler is added inline
<div>some text</div>
How do I get a log file from NVDA?
nvda --log-file=c:\nvda.log
References
- Follow these instructions from eBay OATMEAL Instructions