Hi all,
This will be the last time I ask this. I find it hard to believe
nobody on here knows the answer to what seems like a fairly easy
problem to fix, but I've asked this twice since Thursday, and have
gotten nowhere, when every other question on this list including my
other one has had an answer within a couple of hours. Yes I could ask
for sighted help and probably will if I don't get an answer, but this
form was done correctly, unlike lots of PDFs I've seen, so I should be
able to fill it out without sighted help.
I'm using the latest version of NVDA and Adobe Reader. NVDA will see
that edit fields in the PDF exist, but I'm having the following
issues:
1. I cannot tab through them like I would a form on a webpage.
2. Pressing enter when focused on an edit field does not activate
focus mode as it would on a webpage.
3. Manually activating focus mode with control+space works, but does
not appear to actually fill in the forms as would be expected. How
does this work?
Bob

I'm not writing as I am to give you a hard time and I hope you don't
consider my direct writing to be other than my attempt to make the
following points strongly and clearly.

You say you can't move through the form and you say it is done
properly.  You don't know if it is done properly.  If you can't move
through it, maybe it isn't.

You are assuming that just because a field your screen-reader sees as
edit is available, that it can be filled in and is accessible. Just
because a car has a motor, does it run?  What if the car is out of gas
or the motor is damaged?

There are uncommon web sites where links aren't properly defined for
accessibility and they can't be clicked on by the keyboard.  They look
accessible and the screen-reader announces them as links but some links
require the mouse to be used.  This appears to be a choice a web
designer makes and it isn't the way links function unless the designer
specifies this.  That's very fortunate for us.

Things aren't necessarily as the screen-reader indicates in terms of
accessibility.  There are some things it doesn't know about and perhaps
can't be aware of.

You have gotten another question answered.  Why would people be ignoring
this one?  Maybe people don't know the answer.

If you want others to try working with the form to see if they have the
same problems and can figure a way around them, if the form is one you
don't object to sharing, asking for volunteers may result in people
asking to be sent copy.

You are working with browse mode.  As far as I know, in a properly
designed PDF document, you should be able to move and edit is though you
were working with a web page.

Gene
On 5/17/2022 11:17 PM, Bob Cavanaugh wrote:

Hi all,
This will be the last time I ask this. I find it hard to believe
nobody on here knows the answer to what seems like a fairly easy
problem to fix, but I've asked this twice since Thursday, and have
gotten nowhere, when every other question on this list including my
other one has had an answer within a couple of hours. Yes I could ask
for sighted help and probably will if I don't get an answer, but this
form was done correctly, unlike lots of PDFs I've seen, so I should be
able to fill it out without sighted help.
I'm using the latest version of NVDA and Adobe Reader. NVDA will see
that edit fields in the PDF exist, but I'm having the following
issues:
1. I cannot tab through them like I would a form on a webpage.
2. Pressing enter when focused on an edit field does not activate
focus mode as it would on a webpage.
3. Manually activating focus mode with control+space works, but does
not appear to actually fill in the forms as would be expected. How
does this work?
Bob

Gene,
You do have a tendency to be rather blunt, but your response to me was
no more than usual, and I didn't take any offense. To answer your
questions, I guess I should have been a little clearer in my original
post. I can in fact move through the form using my arrow keys, but I
cannot tab through the form. I think I've seen websites like the ones
you are referring to, but I don't think that's what we're dealing with
here. I downloaded a completely unrelated form a couple months back
and it acts the same way. I just opened a third form that I was able
to fill out when I needed it, but I was using System Access at the
time and it acts as the other two forms do when viewed with NVDA. So,
unless there's a hidden trick when completing PDFs that nobody knows
about, I don't think this is a problem with the file itself, but
rather one with the way NVDA interacts with Adobe Reader.
I wasn't quite sure what to think about the lack of response to this
question, but I do find it hard to believe that out of the probably
hundreds if not at least dozens of people on this list, nobody would
know the answer. Surely there would be someone on this list who has
encountered a fillable PDF and has filled it out using NVDA and could
give me some tips.

On 5/17/22, Gene <gsasner@...> wrote:

I'm not writing as I am to give you a hard time and I hope you don't
consider my direct writing to be other than my attempt to make the
following points strongly and clearly.

You say you can't move through the form and you say it is done
properly.  You don't know if it is done properly.  If you can't move
through it, maybe it isn't.

You are assuming that just because a field your screen-reader sees as
edit is available, that it can be filled in and is accessible. Just
because a car has a motor, does it run?  What if the car is out of gas
or the motor is damaged?

There are uncommon web sites where links aren't properly defined for
accessibility and they can't be clicked on by the keyboard.  They look
accessible and the screen-reader announces them as links but some links
require the mouse to be used.  This appears to be a choice a web
designer makes and it isn't the way links function unless the designer
specifies this.  That's very fortunate for us.

Things aren't necessarily as the screen-reader indicates in terms of
accessibility.  There are some things it doesn't know about and perhaps
can't be aware of.

You have gotten another question answered.  Why would people be ignoring
this one?  Maybe people don't know the answer.

If you want others to try working with the form to see if they have the
same problems and can figure a way around them, if the form is one you
don't object to sharing, asking for volunteers may result in people
asking to be sent copy.

You are working with browse mode.  As far as I know, in a properly
designed PDF document, you should be able to move and edit is though you
were working with a web page.

Gene
On 5/17/2022 11:17 PM, Bob Cavanaugh wrote:

Hi all,
This will be the last time I ask this. I find it hard to believe
nobody on here knows the answer to what seems like a fairly easy
problem to fix, but I've asked this twice since Thursday, and have
gotten nowhere, when every other question on this list including my
other one has had an answer within a couple of hours. Yes I could ask
for sighted help and probably will if I don't get an answer, but this
form was done correctly, unlike lots of PDFs I've seen, so I should be
able to fill it out without sighted help.
I'm using the latest version of NVDA and Adobe Reader. NVDA will see
that edit fields in the PDF exist, but I'm having the following
issues:
1. I cannot tab through them like I would a form on a webpage.
2. Pressing enter when focused on an edit field does not activate
focus mode as it would on a webpage.
3. Manually activating focus mode with control+space works, but does
not appear to actually fill in the forms as would be expected. How
does this work?
Bob

.

On May 18, 2022, at 01:25, Bob Cavanaugh <cavbob1993@...> wrote:

Gene,
You do have a tendency to be rather blunt, but your response to me was
no more than usual, and I didn't take any offense. To answer your
questions, I guess I should have been a little clearer in my original
post. I can in fact move through the form using my arrow keys, but I
cannot tab through the form. I think I've seen websites like the ones
you are referring to, but I don't think that's what we're dealing with
here. I downloaded a completely unrelated form a couple months back
and it acts the same way. I just opened a third form that I was able
to fill out when I needed it, but I was using System Access at the
time and it acts as the other two forms do when viewed with NVDA. So,
unless there's a hidden trick when completing PDFs that nobody knows
about, I don't think this is a problem with the file itself, but
rather one with the way NVDA interacts with Adobe Reader.
I wasn't quite sure what to think about the lack of response to this
question, but I do find it hard to believe that out of the probably
hundreds if not at least dozens of people on this list, nobody would
know the answer. Surely there would be someone on this list who has
encountered a fillable PDF and has filled it out using NVDA and could
give me some tips.

On 5/17/22, Gene <gsasner@...> wrote:
I'm not writing as I am to give you a hard time and I hope you don't
consider my direct writing to be other than my attempt to make the
following points strongly and clearly.

You say you can't move through the form and you say it is done
properly. You don't know if it is done properly. If you can't move
through it, maybe it isn't.

You are assuming that just because a field your screen-reader sees as
edit is available, that it can be filled in and is accessible. Just
because a car has a motor, does it run? What if the car is out of gas
or the motor is damaged?

There are uncommon web sites where links aren't properly defined for
accessibility and they can't be clicked on by the keyboard. They look
accessible and the screen-reader announces them as links but some links
require the mouse to be used. This appears to be a choice a web
designer makes and it isn't the way links function unless the designer
specifies this. That's very fortunate for us.

Things aren't necessarily as the screen-reader indicates in terms of
accessibility. There are some things it doesn't know about and perhaps
can't be aware of.

You have gotten another question answered. Why would people be ignoring
this one? Maybe people don't know the answer.

If you want others to try working with the form to see if they have the
same problems and can figure a way around them, if the form is one you
don't object to sharing, asking for volunteers may result in people
asking to be sent copy.

You are working with browse mode. As far as I know, in a properly
designed PDF document, you should be able to move and edit is though you
were working with a web page.

Gene

On 5/17/2022 11:17 PM, Bob Cavanaugh wrote:
Hi all,
This will be the last time I ask this. I find it hard to believe
nobody on here knows the answer to what seems like a fairly easy
problem to fix, but I've asked this twice since Thursday, and have
gotten nowhere, when every other question on this list including my
other one has had an answer within a couple of hours. Yes I could ask
for sighted help and probably will if I don't get an answer, but this
form was done correctly, unlike lots of PDFs I've seen, so I should be
able to fill it out without sighted help.
I'm using the latest version of NVDA and Adobe Reader. NVDA will see
that edit fields in the PDF exist, but I'm having the following
issues:
1. I cannot tab through them like I would a form on a webpage.
2. Pressing enter when focused on an edit field does not activate
focus mode as it would on a webpage.
3. Manually activating focus mode with control+space works, but does
not appear to actually fill in the forms as would be expected. How
does this work?
Bob

Gene,
You do have a tendency to be rather blunt, but your response to me was
no more than usual, and I didn't take any offense. To answer your
questions, I guess I should have been a little clearer in my original
post. I can in fact move through the form using my arrow keys, but I
cannot tab through the form. I think I've seen websites like the ones
you are referring to, but I don't think that's what we're dealing with
here. I downloaded a completely unrelated form a couple months back
and it acts the same way. I just opened a third form that I was able
to fill out when I needed it, but I was using System Access at the
time and it acts as the other two forms do when viewed with NVDA. So,
unless there's a hidden trick when completing PDFs that nobody knows
about, I don't think this is a problem with the file itself, but
rather one with the way NVDA interacts with Adobe Reader.
I wasn't quite sure what to think about the lack of response to this
question, but I do find it hard to believe that out of the probably
hundreds if not at least dozens of people on this list, nobody would
know the answer. Surely there would be someone on this list who has
encountered a fillable PDF and has filled it out using NVDA and could
give me some tips.

On 5/17/22, Gene <gsasner@...> wrote:

I'm not writing as I am to give you a hard time and I hope you don't
consider my direct writing to be other than my attempt to make the
following points strongly and clearly.

You say you can't move through the form and you say it is done
properly.  You don't know if it is done properly.  If you can't move
through it, maybe it isn't.

You are assuming that just because a field your screen-reader sees as
edit is available, that it can be filled in and is accessible. Just
because a car has a motor, does it run?  What if the car is out of gas
or the motor is damaged?

There are uncommon web sites where links aren't properly defined for
accessibility and they can't be clicked on by the keyboard.  They look
accessible and the screen-reader announces them as links but some links
require the mouse to be used.  This appears to be a choice a web
designer makes and it isn't the way links function unless the designer
specifies this.  That's very fortunate for us.

Things aren't necessarily as the screen-reader indicates in terms of
accessibility.  There are some things it doesn't know about and perhaps
can't be aware of.

You have gotten another question answered.  Why would people be ignoring
this one?  Maybe people don't know the answer.

If you want others to try working with the form to see if they have the
same problems and can figure a way around them, if the form is one you
don't object to sharing, asking for volunteers may result in people
asking to be sent copy.

You are working with browse mode.  As far as I know, in a properly
designed PDF document, you should be able to move and edit is though you
were working with a web page.

Gene
On 5/17/2022 11:17 PM, Bob Cavanaugh wrote:

Hi all,
This will be the last time I ask this. I find it hard to believe
nobody on here knows the answer to what seems like a fairly easy
problem to fix, but I've asked this twice since Thursday, and have
gotten nowhere, when every other question on this list including my
other one has had an answer within a couple of hours. Yes I could ask
for sighted help and probably will if I don't get an answer, but this
form was done correctly, unlike lots of PDFs I've seen, so I should be
able to fill it out without sighted help.
I'm using the latest version of NVDA and Adobe Reader. NVDA will see
that edit fields in the PDF exist, but I'm having the following
issues:
1. I cannot tab through them like I would a form on a webpage.
2. Pressing enter when focused on an edit field does not activate
focus mode as it would on a webpage.
3. Manually activating focus mode with control+space works, but does
not appear to actually fill in the forms as would be expected. How
does this work?
Bob

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant way to do it.

Gabe.

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant way
to do it.

Gabe.

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant
way to do it.

Gabe.

Sarah,
To answer your question, I just tried opening said file in Firefox,
and it doesn't see the edit fields. My machine doesn't give me the
option by default to open the file in Word, just Adobe Reader and the
two browsers, Edge and Firefox. I actually thought I could get by with
only using Firefox to read PDF files, but when I thought I needed to
fill out the form I'm currently using as a test case a couple months
ago, that's when I downloaded Adobe Reader.
Gene, to answer your question about System Access, I could try that to
use this PDF, but I've never installed it, and I'm not sure SA To Go
works with Edge. Microsoft has announced that Internet Explorer will
not work on Windows 10 within the next month I believe, so that may
work to fill out the PDF in question, but that's not going to be a
long term solution.

On 5/18/22, Faithville via groups.io <faithville@...> wrote:

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant way
to do it.

Gabe.

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant
way to do it.

Gabe.

What did you use System Access with before to work with the other PDF
form?  If you used Adobe, then System Access should work with it as
well.  We don't know if the current document will be properly accessible
using System Access but you may want to try.

Gene
On 5/18/2022 1:18 PM, Bob Cavanaugh wrote:

Sarah,
To answer your question, I just tried opening said file in Firefox,
and it doesn't see the edit fields. My machine doesn't give me the
option by default to open the file in Word, just Adobe Reader and the
two browsers, Edge and Firefox. I actually thought I could get by with
only using Firefox to read PDF files, but when I thought I needed to
fill out the form I'm currently using as a test case a couple months
ago, that's when I downloaded Adobe Reader.
Gene, to answer your question about System Access, I could try that to
use this PDF, but I've never installed it, and I'm not sure SA To Go
works with Edge. Microsoft has announced that Internet Explorer will
not work on Windows 10 within the next month I believe, so that may
work to fill out the PDF in question, but that's not going to be a
long term solution.

On 5/18/22, Faithville via groups.io <faithville@...>
wrote:

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant way
to do it.

Gabe.

You are absolutely right, System Access should work with Adobe reader
to fill out this form, but as I said, I don't know how much longer
I'll have access to System Access, as from what I've heard, they
haven't made any updates to make that screen reader work with Edge or
any browser other than IE, which is being discontinued pretty soon.

On 5/18/22, Gene <gsasner@...> wrote:

What did you use System Access with before to work with the other PDF
form?  If you used Adobe, then System Access should work with it as
well.  We don't know if the current document will be properly accessible
using System Access but you may want to try.

Gene
On 5/18/2022 1:18 PM, Bob Cavanaugh wrote:

Sarah,
To answer your question, I just tried opening said file in Firefox,
and it doesn't see the edit fields. My machine doesn't give me the
option by default to open the file in Word, just Adobe Reader and the
two browsers, Edge and Firefox. I actually thought I could get by with
only using Firefox to read PDF files, but when I thought I needed to
fill out the form I'm currently using as a test case a couple months
ago, that's when I downloaded Adobe Reader.
Gene, to answer your question about System Access, I could try that to
use this PDF, but I've never installed it, and I'm not sure SA To Go
works with Edge. Microsoft has announced that Internet Explorer will
not work on Windows 10 within the next month I believe, so that may
work to fill out the PDF in question, but that's not going to be a
long term solution.

On 5/18/22, Faithville via groups.io <faithville@...>
wrote:

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant way
to do it.

Gabe.

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant
way to do it.

Gabe.

Use adobeacrobat reader dc to fill out pdf forms.

On 5/18/2022 2:46 AM, Gabriele Battaglia via groups.io wrote:

Reply to Bob Cavanaugh's message, wrote on 18/05/2022 at 06:17:


Hi. To me it's not possible. At least I've never find a consistant
way to do it.

Gabe.