> Hi there! I would just like to say that I went to set up a text edit shortcut as described by Esther! But was surprised to find that my copy of Nisus writer had already put one in the services so I'm going to see if I can add a shortcut command to that! So if any of you have Nisus then you might have that option already sitting there to use! hth Colin
> > Finally, there's a neat way of sending selections to TextEdit that I use, > which is a Service menu option called "New TextEdit window containing > selection". You can activate this option by going to your Services > Preferences. This is actually a selection under the Keyboard shortcuts tab > under the Keyboard menu of System Preferences, but there's a fast way to get > there. Here are the instructions. (I'm still using Lion, but it shouldn't > make a difference). > > 1. Navigate to Services Preferences via your menu bar > 1a. Use either VO-M or Control-F2 to go to the Apple Menu > 1b. Right arrow to your application (TextEdit, Mail, etc --- note: you can > get to your services setup starting from any application) > 1c. Arrow down then press "s" to select the "Services" menu option and press > Return > 1d. Arrow down the Services submenu to "Services Preferences…" and press > Return (Since "Services Preferences…" is always the last item in the submenu, > a quick way to get there is to press Command-Down arrow, and then press > Return) > > 2. You're now in the "Keyboard" menu of System Preferences with the "Keyboard > Shortcuts" tab selected and "Services" already selected in the "Shortcuts > Categories" table. > 2a. Press VO-Command-T twice to move to the second table for services options > and interact (VO-Shift-Down arrow) > 2b. Use item chooser menu (VO-I) and press "t e x", pause slightly, then > press "n e w". You'll find an entry for "New TextEdit Menu from Selection". > (Pausing slightly between the two sets of entries means that your results > will first be filtered for matches to "tex", then those results will next be > filtered for matches to "new". If you type both selections really fast you > won't get the secondary filtering applied.) Press Return to go there. > 2c. Navigate (VO-Left arrow) to the first column in the table and use > VO-Space to check it. This item for sending your selection to TextEdit will > now appear as an option in your "Services" submenu on your menu bar when > select text in any application. > 2d. However, an even easier way to use this option is to assign it a keyboard > shortcut. I only do this for a few commands that I frequently use, because > there are lots of built-in shortcut keys for the Mac, and I don't want to > conflict with these assignments. If you want to assign a keyboard shortcut > to this service, here's how. > > 3. Starting from the table of service menu options in the "Keyboard" menu of > System Preferences on the "Keyboard Shortcuts" tab with "Services" selected > in the "Shortcuts Categories" table (where you left off in 2a.) You have > interacted with this table. > 3a. Repeat 2b: Use item chooser menu (VO-I) and press "t e x", pause > slightly, then press "n e w". Press Return on the entry for "New TextEdit > Menu from Selection" to be taken to this column 2 entry in the table. > 3b. Interact (VO-Shift-Down arrow) and then navigate (VO-Right arrow) to > column 3. Route your mouse cursor to your VoiceOver cursor (VO-Command-F5) > and double click with VO-Shift-Space by holding down the Control, Option, and > Shift keys, and double tapping the space bar. Then type in the shortcut you > want to assign. (I use Command-Option-Shift-W here.) > 3c. Command-W to close the window. > > You're done. If you have set your TextEdit preferences for format to plain > text, when you bring up a web page and press Command-A to select all, > followed by your shortcut for "New TextEdit Window containing Selection" > (e.g. Command-Option-Shift-W), a plain text window of the contents will pop > up in TextEdit and VoiceOver immediately starts reading the dialog. If you > want to go back to the web page use Command-Tab to switch applications. And > of course, this service menu shortcut also works for any selected portions of > a web page or document. The selection works anywhere -- you could select > part of a formatted mail message, or a section of a document in Preview, and > the service menu option will send this to TextEdit. > > The Services menu option is much more efficient than using simple copy and > paste. It uses fewer system resources and doesn't require you to use the > space on your clipboard and associated memory to copy selected text. (For > those of you with linux or unix backgrounds, think of this as a kind of piped > process.) Furthermore, it has accessibility advantages, because it strips > out non-text characters and code. Although I'd posted previously a few times > about this service menu option all the way back in Tiger in the old archived > list -- some years before the macvisionaries list moved to Google Groups in > early 2009 -- I believe the first post about this service menu option that > people paid attention to was an instance where someone asked for a way to > read some really horribly coded (from the point of accessibility) web page > with a screen reader. Checking this service menu option (and also > assigning a shortcut) meant that page could be read with two sets of keyboard > keystrokes -- one for the selection and one to apply the service menu option. > Because there are more ways of making web pages inaccessible than that > simple type of bad coding (as we all know, especially a lot of new web pages > that use AJAX, etc.), this shortcut won't solve all (or even most) of those > problems. But it will work to let you automatically read embedded tables or > lists in Word or Pages documents, for example. > > TextEdit is more powerful than notepad and can work quite simply when you > become familiar with it, so try sticking with it a while longer and asking > when you have questions. This post (and the instructions) could have been a > lot shorter and simpler if I had left out the explanations, so the actual > suggested steps really don't take long to implement. > > One final explanation: VO-Space is actually VoiceOver's shortcut to "perform > the default" action in a given situation. That may not be the one that you > want/expect (e.g. playing a linked MP3 file on the web instead of downloading > it). > > HTH. Cheers, > > Esther > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To post to this group, send email to macvisionaries@googlegroups.com. 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