Using X With JAWS For Windows Screen-Reader

Introduction.

X is a micro-blogging service which can be used to exchange quick frequent messages. Particularly in recent months at the time of writing, X has undergone many changes to the extent that there are now two levels of X access available. The standard usage is a free X account allowing you to compose messages of up to 280 characters in length. The second is X Premium allowing messages of up to 25 thousand characters and other features for subscribers.

X Premium, which used to be known as Twitter Blue, is further divided into three levels:

1. Basic: Includes essential Premium features like editing posts, longer post lengths (up to 25,000 characters), reply prioritization, text formatting, bookmark folders, custom app icons, and more.
2. Premium: Builds upon Basic with additional benefits such as a checkmark (verification), reduced ads, access to apply for ad revenue sharing and creator subscriptions, ID verification, Media Studio, and access to Grok (limited availability). Grok is an AI chatbot which is essentially an AI assistant which is in early beta.
3. Premium+: The highest tier, offering all Premium features along with no ads in the For You and Following timelines, largest reply prioritization, and access to Articles.

In summary, the more you pay, the less advertisements you are going to experience and the more features you will get.

For many years, a small number of specially developed applications were available to screen-reader users which made the management of X posts quick and easy. However, again due to recent changes, the majority of such X clients are no longer permitted to access the service. As far as access to X using the Windows operating system is concerned, it is therefore necessary to use either the X app from the Microsoft App Store or the web site at X.com. The access you will receive is exactly the same.

While many people would say that X itself provides a number of accessibility enhancements to allow people to use either of these methods of access, the reality is that it is not the most optimum experience. The output from the screen-reader is very verbose, since it delivers a great deal of information potentially you would not wish to hear. When using some versions of JAWS, it requires that the JAWS Virtual Cursor is disabled in order that the special shortcut keys can be used. Those shortcut keys are not particularly easy to remember. There are a number of other reasons. To this end, the X scripts provide some support so you can still access X fairly efficiently using any one of the above mentioned methods. The level of access is not going to be of the same high quality and efficiency as previously provided by the older specialist clients. That access is a thing of the past. But it is our hope that the assistance given here will at the very least allow you to keep up-to-date, especially with mainstream organisations present there. X is a thriving community of people with millions of users and it is important that you are not locked out of having quality access to it.

While it is true that the access to X is not quite the same as you may have been exposed to previously, there is a very distinct advantage to using either the app or the web site as opposed to the specialist clients of the past.

There are two ways in which posts can be displayed: using the "For You" Tab or the "Following" Tab. The "For You" Tab is the default. The advantage of the "For You" Tab is that you can meet different people who share your own interests. The more posts you reply to or like influences the X algorithm and will display items which may match your interests. Using older Twitter clients designed for visually impaired people, users were forced to only receive posts from those people being followed. This meant that an important element of social media was lost. Unless you were aware of people you wanted to follow, such as those connected to your friends or maybe personalities and well-known figures, there are plenty of people using the service you will not know of. Potentially you were locked in a "bubble". Using the "For You" Tab gives you access to those people which are likely to share your interests. It is far more useful than you may initially think. The author of these scripts is a heavy user of X on a daily basis and prefers the "For You" Tab.

What follows is a brief summary of how you might accomplish tasks you may typically wish to work through on X. It is by no means exhaustive and improvements to this access will, if possible, be made over time.

Which Method Of Access Should I Choose?

There are two ways of accessing X: either by downloading the app from the Microsoft Windows store or by visiting the official web site in your browser at x.com.

We sometimes receive queries to the effect that people would like to use a particular web browser with X. It is important to say that the support and interaction you will receive with these scripts and the X platform is identical irrespective of the browser being used, so unlike working with web pages, the browser concerned has little baring on the experience you will receive.

Returning to our question in this section, there is possibly an advantage to working with X in a browser rather than the app. Quite often, the official app does cause focus to refresh more often than is the case with a browser, despite the settings you may have made relative to your X account. This has the effect that when you move away from X, and then focus back on it, your position is lost. While every effort has been made to at least stop JAWS from causing loss of focus, this may be an important consideration.

A Note About Braille.

The output from the JAWS scripts, including from Abbreviated Mode as described below, is available in Braille as well. If you use Braille exclusively you should not be disadvantaged in any way.

Let's Get Started.

When X is launched, at least for the first time, you will want to press Insert+Q (or Caps Lock+Q if you are using the JAWS Laptop Layout). If JAWS announces that the scripts for X are loaded, you can proceed.

A Note About the JAWS Virtual Cursor.

As previously indicated, in order for you to gain a meaningful experience with X, the JAWS Virtual Cursor needs to be disabled. In terms of The JAWS scripts for X, this occurs by default. As soon as you launch X from the web site or via the official app, the Virtual Cursor is switched off and, to a large extent, you can navigate X as if it was a standard application. However, there may be times when you wish to enable it, particularly when customising settings as an example. You can do this at any time by pressing Insert+Z (or Caps Lock+Z if you are using the JAWS laptop layout). This is a toggle action and will enable and disable the feature. Once enabled, X can be accessed in the same way as you would read (and interact with) a regular web page.

X Basic Principles.

From this point forward, when X is accessed, you will probably be on your Home timeline where you will see posts from the people and organisations you follow. Press Up or Down Arrow keys to move through the posts. You will probably hear the author name, the X username, the time the post was sent, the post itself and, if appropriate, statistical information such as the number of likes.

You may find that you wish to abbreviate some of this information. To do this, activate Abbreviated Mode. This can be manipulated with ALT+Windows+A. Once enabled, this setting will remain in effect until you disable it. Enabling Abbreviated Mode has the effect of reducing the output so you hear all the details with the exception of the X username and the time, so it makes navigation a lot less of a chore. However, there is a further level, which is to activate Abbreviated Mode without statistical information, such as the previously mentioned number of likes, replies or reposts. All three modes can be cycled through by pressing ALT+Windows+A.

Should you wish to hear all of this information regardless of the above setting, you can use the JAWS command to read the current line, Insert+Up Arrow (or Caps Lock+Up Arrow if you are using the JAWS laptop layout). Pressing this keystroke twice quickly will allow you to read all of the information in the JAWS Virtual Viewer for closer examination, perhaps word by word. Press Escape to close.

As previously stated, there are two ways in which posts can be displayed: using the "For You" Tab or the "Following" Tab. The "For You" Tab is the default. The advantage of the "For You" Tab is that you can meet different people who share your own interests. The more posts you reply to or like influences the X algorithm and will display items which may match your interests.

To change to the "Following" Tab, press ALT+Windows+F2. If that does not work for any reason, activate the Virtual Cursor with the JAWS Key+Z. Then, from the top of the page, arrow down until you reach the Tabs. You will find both the "For You" and "Following" Tabs. JAWS does announce which Tab is selected. Press the Space Bar on the appropriate Tab. To return to the "For You" Tab, press ALT+Windows+F1 or again locate it with the Virtual Cursor enabled.

The Navigation Experience.

You will notice that your most recently received posts are at the top of the list. In the majority of cases, as you enter the X platform, the top of the list is the focus. This means that you are reading your posts in reverse time order which is not the best experience and there is no way of changing it. We cannot think of anyone who, for example, would want to start by reading the concluding part of a news story coverage and to work backwards.

Every effort has been made to ensure that, as you move through a timeline, focus does not move away from the list of posts. Should this happen, press the Tab key once, then try moving through the posts again with the down Arrow key. However, every effort is being made to reduce the times you would need to do this with each build of the scripts, so be sure you are using the latest version. Details of how to check this are given in a later section.

Should you wish to access a link referenced as part of the post, press the Tab key repeatedly until JAWS announces the link. Then press Enter. The page referred to should open up as a new tab in your web browser. When you have finished reviewing the page, press Control+F4 so as to return to X.

Keystrokes you may wish to use at this point are:

• ALT+Windows+H: Home timeline.
• ALT+Windows+M: Mentions timeline.
• ALT+Windows+N: Notifications timeline.
• ALT+Windows+D: Direct Messages timeline.
• ALT+Windows+K: Likes timeline.
• ALT+Windows+I: Lists.
• Control+Windows+P: Profile.
• ALT+Windows+S: Settings.
• ALT+Windows+C: Change Account.
• L: Like a post.
• Forward Slash: Search.
• B: Block a user.
• Control+C, copy focused post to Clipboard. If Abbreviated Mode is enabled, only the output spoken is copied, removing the username and the time the post was posted. This is recommended.
• U: Mute a user.
• Enter: Open Post.

Scanning Images.

One of the most valuable aspects of using X is being able to scan and interpret images which are frequently posted. This especially means that you can join in conversations from which you may otherwise have been excluded. This can be an essential aspect of social media participation and is achieved using JAWS 2024 and Picture Smart AI. You can also use the free app from Be My Eyes if you do not have access to JAWS 2024.

Find a post containing an image. JAWS will announce if an image is present. Then, press Control+Windows+I. The image is scanned and the text presented. You are then able to read it and, if necessary, obtain a more thorough explanation using two AI chat services and even ask further questions. For example, if a general description is given of an outfit someone is waring, you can ask for more description about it.

Press Escape to exit the description. In the event that focus is now not located on the post you were previously reading, press function key F12. The X scripts will try to locate this for you.

Should you wish to achieve the same result with the Be My Eyes app, you will first need to ensure that the app is open in the background. Then, as previously directed, find a post containing the image. Press Control+Windows+E. Again after a short pause, the image description is spoken and presented to you. Note that the X scripts also contain a small set of scripts for the Be My Eyes app. This means that you can focus upon an image description and press function key F9. The description is then available in the JAWS Virtual Viewer which can be read with the Arrow keys and if necessary copied to the Windows Clipboard.

Post Composition.

To compose a new post, press Control+N. Start typing your text into the Edit Field.

To send the message, press Enter or Control+Enter.

Should you wish to attach an image (such as a photo) to the post, press ALT+Windows+P. This takes you into a standard Windows "Browse" Dialog Box. Locate the image and press Enter. Fields are then available which you can move through by pressing Tab and Shift+Tab to allow you to tag the image with alternative text.

Let us now pause for a moment and give you an important tip relating to composing messages.

Very often, you will wish to refer to someone using his or her X username. This is achieved by typing an At sign followed by the username. Alternatively, and very often, you will wish to use a hashtag. Hashtags are used on many platforms including X, Mastodon, Teams and even in Outlook. Hashtags group together posts with a common subject in which people may be interested.

When you begin typing a username or a hashtag, a list appears. This is very similar to the Autocomplete list you may experience when using Microsoft Outlook and when typing an address into the To field of a message. In the case of typing a username, a list of accounts matching the username is displayed. You can either keep typing or press Down Arrow so as to move through the list of choices. As with any autocomplete list, the more characters you type, the more likely it is you will find the result you want. While usernames will be displayed of anyone on X matching the text you have typed, JAWS does announce if you are following a particular account. If you do choose to select an item from the list, just press Enter to do so.

In the case of using hashtags, the autocomplete list again is available and is identical to that described above. Particularly if a hashtag is trending, (meaning it is exceptionally popular at a given time), you are likely to find it in the list if you type the first few characters. This can be especially helpful if the hashtag is difficult to remember or contains some ambiguity.

It is worth noting that when a username or hashtag is selected from the autocomplete list, a space character is entered after the item, so that presents nicely when you begin to type your post. You do not need to enter this yourself.

To conclude, while this section has contained discussion of the autocomplete list, bare in mind that you can completely ignore it. If you are confident of typing the item correctly, just continue to do so and ignore what JAWS is saying.

Let us now return to our discussion of post composition.

To reply to the focused post, press Control+R.

To resend a post without quoting, press Control+Shift+R.

To Resend a post with quoting, (adding a comment), press Control+Shift+Q.

Viewing a Conversation.

There is a strong likelihood that an X post which is focused will be a reply to a previous message. This is known as being part of a conversation thread. To open up the post so as to view other elements of the conversation, press Enter. You ought then to be able to use the Up and Down Arrow keys to explore the other messages. To return to the timeline with which you were previously working, press the appropriate keystroke to go back. For example, if prior to pressing Enter you were viewing your Home timeline, press ALT+Windows+H. Focus should return to the appropriate timeline and also to your previous position in the timeline.

Viewing a Profile.

In the event you wish to view a profile of a user, when you hear the post details press Tab to reach the user name, then press Enter. The username is also denoted by the word "Link", meaning it is hyperlinked.

From this point, the Virtual Cursor should be enabled automatically. If not, you can activate it by pressing Insert+Z (or Caps Lock+Z if you are using the JAWS Laptop Keyboard layout). From here, you can use the Up and Down Arrow keys to review the bio, number of followers, etc. You can also perform actions, such as to follow the user, by pressing Space Bar on the appropriate Button. This is most certainly an activity to work through if someone has followed you and you wish to either follow the person back or at the very least read the details of the profile.

When you have finished reviewing the details of the profile, don't forget to deactivate the Virtual Cursor with the same keystroke once again to return to normal operation. If you use one of the keystrokes to move to a particular timeline, such as Home,
the Virtual cursor is automatically disabled anyway.

It is worth mentioning that if you wish to view posts belonging to the user concerned, you can ensure the Virtual Cursor is disabled, and then press the Up or Down Arrow keys. Again, this is a useful exercise and allows you to determine the quality of what someone is posting which should influence your decision as to whether you wish to follow the person or not.

Viewing Posts Related to a Hashtag.

The procedure for achieving this is identical to viewing a profile. From the originating post containing the hashtag, press Tab repeatedly to move to the hashtag name which is denoted by a link. Press Enter, whereupon you can use the Up and Down Arrow keys to review the posts belonging to it.

Playing a Video.

If the post contains an embedded video, open it up by pressing Enter, then press Tab to reach the "Play Video" Button and press the Space Bar. You can press the Space Bar again to pause and resume playback. Depending upon your settings, the video may already be playing. If this is so, and you cannot hear it, press Space Bar on the Unmute button.

Another way of achieving the same objective is as follows. Do not open up the post. Instead, press Tab repeatedly until you reach the total time of the video. This is displayed in the format of minutes colon seconds, such as, 3:11. From this point, press the Home key and the video should start playing. Press the Space Bar to pause and resume.

Switching Accounts.

If you have multiple X accounts, the chances are fairly high that you will wish to switch to a different one. To do this, press ALT+Windows+C. Then press the Tab key repeatedly to reach the account you wish to switch to. When the desired account is announced, press Enter.

Sending a Direct or Private Message.

Sending a direct message is one of the most difficult things you can do using the X's interface. This section of the documentation explains how you might go about it.

1. To begin a new message, or reply to an existing one, press Control+D.
2. You are now in a search Edit Field. Type the name (or part of it) into the text edit area. This searches X for names which match your requirements. If you know the full name, type that so as to narrow the search criteria.
3. Press the Tab key repeatedly. You will reach two items. The first is a Check Box pertaining to the name and the second is a button, again containing the name. Press the Space Bar on the button.
4. Focus returns to the search Edit Field. If necessary, you could add someone else to the conversation using the above procedure.
5. When you are ready to move to the next stage, press Shift+Tab to reach the "Next" Button, then press the Space Bar.
6. You are almost ready to compose your message, but focus is not in the correct location. To move to the "Start a New Message" Edit Field, press Control+Windows+S.
7. Now type your text and press Enter to send.

Searching.

To search for an X account to follow, press Forward Slash. Type what you would like to search for and press Enter.

A list of results is displayed. Press Down Arrow to move through the results. When you wish to follow an account, press Enter to open it.

Now, you can either press the Tab key once to reach the Button to follow the account and press the Space Bar, or to carry out other actions, activate the Context Menu by pressing ALT+Windows+F10.

Working With the Context Menu.

If a post is focused, you can activate the Context Menu on it by pressing ALT+Windows+F10. This allows you to follow or unfollow the user, mute the user so you will not see posts again, and other actions. Locate the item you would like with the Up and Down Arrow keys, and press Enter. There is in addition an item listed which is "Not Interested". This again influences the X algorithm described above.

Taking Advantage of Nicknames.

Many people do have usernames on X which do not reflect their individual names. They can also contain emoji characters or the term, "Verified Account". This means that it can take time for the screen-reader to announce. You can condense this spoken output through the assigning of a nickname; a short-form.

Focus on a post containing the username and press ALT+Windows+X. Check to ensure that the correct username is in the edit field and press Enter.

Next, type the abbreviated form and press Enter.

That's it. From this point, JAWS should announce (and display in Braille) the abbreviated form. To delete any of your nicknames, press ALT+Control+Windows+X to bring into view a list of these. Find the one you want with Down Arrow and press Enter.

If you wish to share your nicknames across computers, in your JAWS Settings/ENU folder, find the file TwitterNames.ini and just copy it to the other machine.

Checking for Updates and Getting Help.

You can press Insert+H to get a list of keystrokes for X. You will notice at the very top of the Hotkey Help screen is a link entitled "Check for Updates." Press Enter on this link to check to see if there are any new X Script updates available.

Technical Support.

If you require Technical Support, please email brian@hartgenconsultancy.com.

If necessary we can use the Remote Incident Manager or JAWS Tandem feature to remote onto your computer with your permission and rectify any problem which may have arisen.

Keystrokes.

Next tweet, Down Arrow.
Previous tweet, Up Arrow.
Set a nickname, ALT+Windows+X.
Delete a nickname, ALT+Control+Windows+X.
Toggle Abbreviated Mode, ALT+Windows+A.
This has three states.
1. Disabled.
2. Enabled. Removes the username and time the post was sent.
3. Enabled without statistics. Removes details including the number of likes, replies and reposts.
New tweet, Control+N.
Send the composed tweet, Enter.
Open tweet, Enter.
Context menu for tweet, ALT+Windows+F10.
Reply to tweet, Control+R.
In JAWS 2024, to locate an image and have it described, Control+Windows+I.
If having scanned an image focus in your timeline moves back to the top, press F12.
To scan an image using Be My Eyes, press ALT+Windows+E.
For You Tab, ALT+Windows+F1.
Following Tab, ALT+Windows+F2.
Photos or videos, ALT+Windows+P.
Retweet a tweet, Control+Shift+R.
Quote a tweet, Control+Shift+Q.
Like a tweet, L.
Bookmark a tweet, B.
Find a user, ALT+Windows+U.
Block a user, X.
Mute a user, U.
Load new tweets, full-stop or period.
New Direct Message, Control+D.
Start a new message, necessary for composing a Direct Message, Control+Windows+S.
Home timeline, ALT+Windows+H.
Mentions timeline, ALT+Windows+M.
Notifications Timeline, ALT+Windows+N.
Direct messages timeline, ALT+Windows+D.
Likes timeline, ALT+Windows+K.
Bookmarks, ALT+Windows+B.
Lists, ALT+Windows+I.
Profile, Control+Windows+P.
Settings, ALT+Windows+S.
Twitter Menu, ALT+Windows+O.
Accounts, ALT+Windows+C.
List Followers, ALT+Windows+F.
Search, Forward Slash.
Copy Tweet to Clipboard, Control+C.