Read documents and web pages using the screen reader¶
Warning
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS might present some challenges when using the screen reader. If you experience difficulty, refer to Improve screen reader usability.
Read documents using caret mode¶
In caret mode, also known as caret browsing or caret navigation, you navigate a document using the text cursor (caret). You move the cursor using the arrow keys. As you navigate within the text of the document, Orca presents your current location.
Enable caret navigation:
Applications with text input, such as text editors and word processors, enable caret navigation by default. The caret is the text cursor that you use to enter text in the window.
In many GNOME applications and in web browser such as Firefox and Chrome, you can enable caret navigation by pressing F7.
For other applications, consult their documentation.
Read the document using caret navigation:
Use Left and Right to move and read by character.
Use Ctrl+Left and Ctrl+Right to move and read by word.
Use Up and Down to move and read by line.
Use Shift in combination with the previous commands to select and unselect text.
To read, spell, and obtain the Unicode value for the current text, or to read the whole document, refer to Examine a window.
Examine text formatting¶
Let Orca speak the text attributes of the current object, such as the font, style, alignment, and other formatting associated with the given characters:
CapsLock+F
Insert+F
Preferences¶
The number of text attributes is large. You can customize which text attributes Orca presents in speech, along with the order in which Orca lists them. Optionally, Orca can indicate text attributes in braille by “underlining” them as you navigate a document. Go to the Text Attributes page of the Orca preferences dialog to change these settings.
You can also customize text attribute presentation for each application that you use in the application-specific settings.
Identify misspelled words¶
You can learn about spelling issues in several ways:
When you examine text formatting, Orca also announces spelling issues as one of the text attributes:
CapsLock+F
Insert+F
Orca recognizes the spelling issue by reading the underline formatting that applications use to mark errors.
Enable key echo or word echo. When you misspell a word, Orca announces “misspelled” so that you can immediately go back and correct the error.
When you move the caret into a word that’s misspelled, Orca announces the presence of the spelling error.
Perform detailed Where Am I to learn more details about the spelling issue:
CapsLock + double-press Enter
Insert + double-press Enter
Read tables¶
Orca provides several features to access tables on web pages and in other documents.
Read the cell or the row¶
Consider the list of messages in your Inbox. To hear the sender, subject, date and presence of attachments, you want Orca to speak the row.
On the other hand, consider the rows in a spreadsheet. You might not want to hear the full row because of the large number of cells in each row. In that case, you want Orca to only speak the cell with focus. Similar situations occur in document tables.
You can switch between cell and row reading for the current table:
CapsLock+F11
Insert+F11
You can customize whether Orca reads the cell or the full row by default. You can also choose different table reading modes for each type of table and for specific applications. To edit the options, go to the Speech page of Orca preferences.
Mark a row or column as a header¶
Many tables have incorrectly marked headers. A row or column often serves as a header but it only uses bold or large text instead of semantic markup. In other cases, the header might be correct but the application or the toolkit don’t provide the information to the screen reader.
In those cases, you can manually mark a row or column as a header using the Dynamic Header feature.
Set a row as a header¶
Tell Orca that the current row is the one with the headers:
CapsLock+R
Insert+R
Set a column as a header¶
Tell Orca that the current column is the one with the headers:
CapsLock+C
Insert+C
Reset the custom header¶
To clear headers, double-press the command that you used to set them. This removes all custom row headers or column headers.
Fill out forms¶
In browse mode, you can read forms. In focus mode, you can fill out form fields.
Read or write¶
Switch between the modes:
CapsLock+A
Insert+A
To enable sticky focus mode, double-press the shortcut.
To enable sticky browse mode, triple-press the shortcut.
Browse form fields¶
In browse and focus mode, you can browse all focusable objects using Tab and Shift+Tab. After the last form field, you exit the form.
In browse mode, you can also use the following navigation:
To navigate to a specific form field, use Structural Navigation commands for Forms.
To leave the form and navigate to another object, use Orca Structural Navigation commands.
In certain forms and applications, you can use caret mode.
Read live regions¶
A live region is a dynamically-updated portion of a web page, such as a table of sports statistics, a list of current stock prices, a log from a chat, or an alert displayed by the page you are reading.
Live regions are common on the web. However, not many web pages with live regions are fully accessible.
Browse live regions¶
Monitor live regions:
CapsLock+Shift+\
Insert+Shift+\
Go to the next live region: D
Go to the previous live region: Shift+D
Go to last live region that made an announcement: Y
Review the last nine announcements:
CapsLock + F1 through F9
Insert + F1 through F9
Adjust live region politeness¶
Live regions have a “politeness” level. It tells your screen reader how important the information is and when you should hear the updates in that region.
In increasing order of importance, the politeness levels are:
Off
Polite
Assertive
Rude
You might not agree with the politeness level that the page author specified. In that case, you can modify the politeness level of live regions on the page:
Cycle between politeness levels: \
Set the default politeness level to off: Shift+\