With JAWS you have the flexibility to make changes on-the-fly that are temporary, or you can make changes that stay in effect permanently. Throughout the exercises in Surf's Up - Surfing the Internet with JAWS you will encounter some of these differences, which are described below.
Any changes you make to JAWS using the JAWS Verbosity list while you are in Internet Explorer are temporary. When you press INSERT+V while in a Web page, the JAWS Verbosity list appears. The items at the top of this list are specific to Internet Explorer and the items near the bottom of the list are more generic. The changes you make remain in effect as long as you stay within the Internet Explorer program (or other HTML environment). If you press ALT+TAB to move to another running application and then return to Internet Explorer, the changes are lost and JAWS reverts to default behavior. This is very handy for making quick changes for testing or reading purposes.
The Configuration Manager allows you to make permanent changes to the way JAWS behaves on the Web, or in other programs. When you press INSERT+F2 in Internet Explorer, the JAWS List of Managers appears. Use the UP and DOWN ARROW keys to select "Configuration Manager." Press ENTER to open the Internet Explorer.jcf (the file extension ".jcf" stands for "JAWS Configuration File") window. To take a look at where to go to make these changes, do the following:
The HTML Options dialog box appears. This is a multi-page dialog box and you can press CTRL+TAB to move from one page to another. On any page, you can press the TAB key to move from one option to another, making changes as needed.
Tip: You can press INSERT+F1 on any option in this dialog box to find out more information about it.
It is HIGHLY recommended that you NOT make any changes to the Configuration Manager without having first tested them temporarily with the JAWS Verbosity list. For the purposes of this exercise, press ESC to get out of this dialog box without saving any changes.
If you really want to make any changes, choose the OK button to close the HTML Options dialog box. You will then be back in the Internet Explorer.jcf file. Press CTRL+S to save your changes and then press ALT+F4 to close the configuration file.
JAWS stores .jcf files in the SETTINGS\ENU folder located in the folder where you installed JAWS.
If you want to make changes that are permanent, but only for a specific Web site, you can use the JAWS list of Personalized Settings for Web Pages. This is discussed in more detail later in Surf's up-Surfing the Internet with JAWS.
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