Released:

New Document Object Model Support

Internet Explorer logoDolphin's development have gone back to the drawing board and re-engineered our Microsoft Internet Explorer Document Object Model (DOM) support. This major overhaul has provided superior responsiveness when browsing web pages using the Dolphin Virtual Focus. 
The new Microsoft Internet Explorer support improves navigational consistency and accuracy for users relying on Virtual Focus speech and/or Braille output on web pages. The new support also enhances stability on more complex and poorly written web pages.

Improved Support for Office 2007 Ribbon

Version 9 offers enhanced support for the Office 2007 Ribbon bar. 
An all new Dolphin online tutorial for Office 2007 will be made available for Dolphin users upon the release of version 9.01.

New Internet Explorer Quick Navigation Keys

A whole host of new and intuitive quick navigation hotkeys have been added to version 9 to enable our users to do what they love the most, surf the web quickly and easily. These much requested keys allow you to move the focus between the next and previous element such as button, link, edit area etc within a web page. 
Whilst in Interactive mode, CAPS LOCK can be used in conjunction with the quick navigation hotkeys to navigate by any of the elements listed below.

Choose from the following extensive list selecting CAPS LOCK + letter as listed below for forward navigation through the webpage. Alternatively SHIFT + CAPS LOCK + letter as listed below to navigate backwards through the webpage.

B: Button
C: Check box
D: Different
E: Edit area
G: Graphic
H: Heading
L: Link
N: Text block (blocks of text divided by non-text objects such as links, graphics etc.)
P: Paragraph
R: Radio
S: List box
T: Table
U: Unvisited Links
V: Visited Links
X: Control

Where an element is not present the screen reader prompts with an appropriate error message and retains the current focus and position. For example "Not found".

IE Quick Navigation Keys documentA new Internet Explorer Quick Navigation Keys will be included in full boxed editions of version 9, alongside the existing Quick Reference Guide. 

A PDF, Text and Microsoft Word version of this document is also available for download from our website.

 

 

Cut, Copy and Paste Announcement

Whilst in Live mode the version 9 screen reader announces text cut, copied or pasted from the Windows clipboard. Should that data be write protected version 9 will announce the failure to cut or copy text. 
Moving folders or files? Version 9 will also announce the number of objects you cut, copy or paste.

The Speech Preferences dialog now includes a checkbox which can be used to disable clipboard announcements. The new Clipboard key mappings dialog allows users running non English operating systems that don't use the default key assignments of CTRL C, CTRL X and CTRL V, to adjust the hot keys to their local cut, copy and paste settings.

New Dolphin List Utility

Version 9 offers a consolidated list of popular document elements into one handy single multi-page List Utility.

To launch the new multi-page dialog with a single hot key press CAPS LOCK +TAB from all the applications that are currently supported, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word.

The new dialog can easily be navigated using standard Windows conventions CONTROL+TAB and CONTROL+SHIFT+TAB to move between the various tab sheets.

These Tab sheets offer the user a convenient list of the following document elements:

  • Links
  • Headings
  • Revisions
  • Objects
  • Comments
  • Frames
  • Tables
  • Controls
  • Spelling errors
  • Grammar errors.

Each of these lists can be sorted in document order or alphabetically. In addition the user can choose to perform a variety of actions on each element including route Virtual Focus, Left Click and Right Click.

The utility can also be launched on the expected page with legacy hotkeys such as CAPS LOCK + 1 for the list of Links etc.

A screenshot of the Dolphin list utility on the summary tab sheet. The dialog contents reads Link: 54 links, Heading: 9 Headings, Frame: 0 Frames, Table: 0 tables, Control: 2 Controls

A screenshot of the Dolphin List Utility on the useful Summary tab sheet.

A screenshot of the new Dolphin List utility in action on the Dolphin website.

A screenshot of the new Dolphin List Utility using the Links tab sheet.

The new Dolphin List Utility is open on the Tables tab sheet whilst browsing the Dolphin website.

The new Dolphin List Utility is open on the Tables tab sheet whilst browsing the Dolphin website.

A screenshot of the Dolphin List Utility in action in Word. The Summary Tab sheet is showing that there are 8 links, 16 headings, 5 spelling errors, 5 grammar errors, 0 revisions, 1 tables, 0 objects, 1 comment.

The List Utility includes a Summary list that details the number links, headings, spelling errors, grammar errors, revisions, tables, objects, comments on the other tab sheets.

New Braille Tables

A significant amount of development time has contributed to the following long list of languages that are now supported for literary Braille output and/or Braille input.

Literary Braille Output

  • French Grade 1
  • French Grade 2
  • Norwegian Grade 1
  • Norwegian Grade 2
  • Swedish Grade 1,
  • Swedish Grade 2 (levels 1 and 2)
  • Unified English Braille Grade 1*
  • Unified English Braille Grade 2 *
  • German Grade 2 (improved)
  • German Code for the UK (for English students studying the German language)
  • French Code for the UK (for English students studying the French language)
  • Spanish Code for the UK (for English students studying the Spanish language)

Braille Input

  • Unified English Braille
  • French Grade 1
  • French Grade 2
  • Norwegian Grade 1
  • Norwegian Grade 2
  • Swedish Grade 1
  • Swedish Grade 2

In addition some fixes to the Braille output when navigating and selecting cells in Microsoft Word tables have been made. Braille display should now accurately show the selected cells when selecting down a column.

* Unified English Braille has been adopted in Australia, New Zealand, Nigeria and South Africa and is due for consideration in the UK in April 2008.

Support for Terminal Services

Version 9 reintroduces support for Windows Terminal Server and Citrix MetaFrame operating systems, allowing blind and visually impaired computer users access to applications running on remote thin clients, as well as Windows desktop terminals.

Other v9 releases:

Complete Version History