Keyboard shortcut to place unbound control on form/report?

[duncedunce]

Hi - reposted from c.db.ms-access, sorry if you read it there!

Have 'googled' and no luck (after 2 hours!) - hope someone here can
help.

Access 2003

I am looking (for a visually impaired student of mine) at how to insert
unbound controls in to a form or report. I can get the field list &
toolbox visible from the view menu and I can move to the field list
using F8. I can then insert a bound field using Enter.

How can we get to the Toolbox using the keyboard?

How can we insert an unbound control using the keyboard?

Got no problem changing the control type once it is on the form/report
- can use the menus.

Sure I am being stupid and it will be an obvious answer - sorry if it
is )

TIA

Stuart

 

[Fred Boer]

Dear Stuart:

I want to talk to you! I teach blind and visually impaired students, and I
teach a course in Access/Programming. Are you a vision itinerant teacher?
Just a teacher with a visually impaired student in a regular class? Where
are you from? Are you using speech synthesis? What program?

Fred Boer

 

[Fred Boer]

Oh, btw.. to get to toolbox using keyboard, use Ctrl-Tab. Press "Alt" to put
the focus on the File/edit command bar, then press "Ctrl-Tab" to cycle
through the command bars. I can't remember how to insert an unbound control
with the keyboard off of the top of my head. I'll get back to you on that
one..

Fred

 

[Fred Boer]

Just remembered.. If your student is using the JAWS speech synthesis program
from Freedom Scientific, then the the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-Shift-B will
place a control from the toolbox on a form in design view.

HTH
Fred

 

[dunce]

Hi Fred

Many thanks for that - I am a teacher/trainer in the UK. As well as
teaching 11-19 year olds, I also deliver training in MS Office to local
government staff and it is one of these who is visually impared (95%+).
For this training we use the Step-by-step manuals. I am sighted
myself and so are all the rest of my trainees. I've only had a handful
of day sessions with him, and who knows, eventually the council might
let me know BEFORE I arrive that he is attending!

We had fun using Powerpoint XP last year - but at least the Help
facility provided all of the keyboard alternatives he needed. There
was no facility for him to access the text (and therefore the tasks) at
that point - despite much arguing with Microsoft UK (who held the
copyright) about accessibility rights. At least the Office 2003
version of teh texts is available in PDF format, so can be used by a
screen reader. Last year I had to scan & OCR the text!!! 2hrs extra
preparation for 1 day's training.

The books still use a predominantly point-and-click approach, though I
do tend to highlight keyboard approaches when I can (for efficiency
more than anything) - this was the first time I had hit a brick wall
trying to get around the point & click.

My visually impaired trainee uses the Jaws screen reader, so I shall
forward your information to him and he can try it out; I know he was
keen to develop an inventory using Access. He works in the council's
IT support department, so is no slouch on computers.

Best regards

Stuart

 

[Fred Boer]

Happy to hear from you Stuart! Just let me know if I can be of further help.
Please feel free to extend that offer to the student, as well. If you wish
to contact me privately, email me at the address used in this post. You will
have to remove the obvious munging...

Using visually oriented programs like Access and (especially!) Powerpoint is
a real challenge for blind users. JAWS provides a comprehensive list of
keyboard shortcuts in its help files. JAWS also provides its own keyboard
shortcuts for specific tasks that aren't covered by Windows keystrokes. Be
sure to have the student look for these program-specific keystrokes in the
help.

Scanning and OCR.. ah yes, the story of my life! In the U.S.they have this
wonderful system where scanned copyrighted material can be legally
downloaded by blind/visually impaired users. Sadly, this doesn't exist in
Canada. Is there a similar process in the U.K., I wonder?

Good luck!
Fred Boer

P.S. I work at the W. Ross Macdonald School in Brantford, Ontario, Canada.
It is a provincial resource centre and residential school for blind and
visually impaired students. You can check out the school at
http://www.psbnet.ca/webs/wrm/index.htm

 

[dunce]

Thanks for that Fred - will bear it in mind.

Best regards

Stuart