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Below are some suggested settings and hints for using JAWS with Band-In-A-Box.

Note: These scripts were optimized for Band-in-a-Box 2019 runningJAWS 2019 or later.

IMPORTANT: JAWS will not function properly with Band-in-a-Box unless configured as described in this section

As a bit of background, JAWS 2019 has two methods for determining text that is displayed on the screen. The "legacy" method is used by default. Unfortunately, JAWS is unable to see much of the important text being displayed when the legacy method is being used. For this reason, a new method of determining what text is displayed on the screen is being developed for JAWS. This new method, the GDI-Hooking method, is intended to be used as the default method in the future but is still a "WORK IN PROGRESS". In order for the scripts to work properly JAWS must be configured to use the new GDI-Hooking method. This configuration should also work fine for most other aplications and will continue to improve over time, but the user can easily switch back and forth if required.

Below are the steps for configuring JAWS to use the new GDI-Hooking method:

  1. Activate the JAWS Settings Center by hitting JAWSKey+6.
  2. Shift+Tab to get to the list of aplications
  3. Hit the Home button to get to the top of the list which should be the Default aplication. Alternately, UpArrow until you come to the Default aplication.
  4. Tab once to get to the Search field and type "Accessibility" without the quotes.
  5. When the result of the search appears, Tab once to the item which will say "Use Accessibility driver".
  6. The "Use Accessibility driver" item is check by default. This means that the legacy method is being used. If this item is checked on your system, hit the Spacebar to uncheck it. With this item unchecked, JAWS is now using the new GDI-Hooking method which is required for proper use with Band-in-a-Box and the JAWS scripts.
  7. Tab to the "OK" button and hit enter. Now Band-in-a-Box will work properly with the scripts.
  8. Note: If you need to use the legacy method in order to have other programs work properly then follow these steps but leave the "Use Accessibility driver" item checked in the JAWS Settings Center.

Other Required Settings

In order to Make Band-In-a-Box work properly with JAWS certain changes need to be made to the Preferences / Display settings. There are two methods for doing this:

Method #1: Loading the pre-configured scheme.

  1. Find the file entitled "bbw JAWS access scheme.csc" that came with these scripts and copy it to the "data\schemes" folder under your BIAB installation. This should be something like:
    c:\bb\data\schemes
  2. In the Band-In-a-Box program, open up the Display preferences by hitting control+E and hitting enter on the "display" button.
  3. Tab to "Load Scheme" and hit enter.
  4. Arrow down to "bbw JAWS access scheme" to select this scheme and hit enter.
  5. Shift+Tab to "OK" and hit enter to close the Display Preferences dialog.
  6. Your preferences should now be set to use JAWS with Band-In-a-Box and you can ignore Method #2 below!
Sometimes the Chordsheet font is not saved properly by this file. To check, after opening the Preferences / Display dialog tab 28 times to get to this combo box. Arrow down to "System" to select this as the ChordSheet Font. JAWS does not speak the title of this combo box, but it is one tab stop past the item labeled "Chord Font (Main)".

Method #2: Manual method (instead of using Method #1)

  1. Hit control+E to get into the "Preferences" dialog.
  2. Hit "Enter" on Display to get into this dialog.
  3. Tab until you get to the checkbox labled "Highlight Selected Cell. Make sure this box is checked.
  4. Tab until you come to "Choose Font..." and hit enter.
  5. Arrow down to "Times New roman" to select this font.
  6. Tab to "OK" and hit enter.
  7. Tab to "Chords (Main)" and verify that this is set to "Times New Roman".
  8. Tab once more to a combo box with a list of fonts. JAWS does not speak the title of this combo box but it is "Chordsheet Font".
  9. Arrow down to the item labeled "System" and hit "Enter" to select this font.
  10. Tab to a button labeled "Custom...".
  11. Tab once to get to the Combo Box entitled "Superscript Chord Extensions (Main)". Note: the title of this combo box may not be spoken.
  12. In this combo box make sure "Never" is selected.
  13. Tab to the next Combo Box entitled "Superscript Chord Extensions (Additional)". Note: the title of this combo box may not be spoken.
  14. In this combo box make sure "Never" is selected.
  15. Tab once more. This is an edit box which JAWS does not speak. When you are here, activate the JAWS cursor, perform a left mouse click, and route JAWS to PC.
  16. Now you are in the edit field. Enter the value 10 into this edit field.
  17. Tab to the "OK" button and hit enter.
  18. Tab to the check box entitled "Autoadjust Number of Rows" and make sure it is checked.
  19. Next, turn on the JAWS cursor and navigate to a line where you hear the text "Min rows Max rows". Below this line you will see two numbers. These are the minimum and maximum number of lines to show in the Chord Ssheet display. Use the JAWS cursor to navigate to one of these at a time and route the PC cursor to the JAWS cursor. Change the min and max numbers to 2 and 3, respectively.
  20. Finally, with the PC cursor active, tab to "OK" and hit enter to make the changes to the Display preferences.

Additional hints and trouble-shooting

Troubleshooting

If chords or other information do not appear to be reading properly, hit Control+W to make sure you are in the Chord window. Sometimes refreshing the screen with JAWSKey+Escape or Alt+Tabbing to another application and back again can fix these issues. Maximizing the window may also help.

Also, make sure that all extraneous windows (such as "Big Lyrics", "Big Piano", etc.) have been closed. You can check the status of these windows by going to the Windows pull-down menu by hitting Alt+D.

If the Control+T BIAB hotkey is used to move the Chord window to the top of the screen, some screen information will be obscured and JAWS will not be able to read it. For example, if one tries to read the song memo information with JAWSKey+Shift+E, the user will hear information that is not related to the style memo.

JAWS verbosity should be set to Intermediate or Beginner to insure proper speech feedback from all dialogs and events.

Other useful tips

BIAB supports a number of native hotkeys and commands to control many functions and settings. Most of these can be found in the BIAB Help documentation by hitting F1 and looking for the 3 topics on Keyboard Hotkeys contained in the "References" book. The JAWS Keyboard Help (JAWSKey+1) can also be used to identify the function of most of these hotkeys as well as other scripting functions.

Sometimes it is not possible to properly navigate the BIAB help topics from within BIAB itself. In this case you will need to read the BIAB help documentation by getting to it from within Windows Explorer. To do this:

  1. Open Windows Explorer.
  2. Navigate to the folder where you have BIAB installed.
  3. Within your BIAB install folder, navigate to the "Documentation" folder.
  4. Within the Documentation folder look for a file named bbb.chm. This is the BIAB help documentation. As an example, this file will be located at:
    bb\Documentation\bbb.chm
    where bb is the folder where BIAB is installed.
  5. Hit enter on the bbb.chm file to open it and you will be able to use it as you would any other Windows help file.
  6. If you want to make it easier to find this help file next time, do the following:
    1. With focus on the bbb.chm file, perform a right mouse click or hit the aplications key to bring up the context menu for this item.
    2. Arrow down to "Create shortcut" and hit enter to create a shortcut to this file. You can then move this shortcut to a location where you can find it easily. Then when you click on the shortcut it will automatically open the BIAB help documentation.
    3. Alternately, you can easily create a Desktop shortcut to this file by arrowing through the context menu until you come to "Send To". Hit enter to bring up a sub menu, arrow to "Create Desktop shortcut", and hit enter. This will put a shortcut to the BIAB help documentation right on your Desktop so that you can easily find it again.

    Hit JAWSKey+H once to bring up a list of other useful hotkeys supported by these scripts.

    Band-in-a-Box Accessibility Enhancements

    Pg Music has introduced a number of new accessibility enhancements in version 2023. You can find these by going to: https://www.pgmusic.com/bbwin.new.accessibility.htm
    On that page you will find a number of useful hotkeys and suggestions which you might not have known about.5:16 PM 1/8/2023

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