Orca on laptops.

[Luke Yelavich]

Hi all
The topic of Orca on laptops has popped up many times in the past on the 
lists. So the Ubuntu Accessibility team, and the Orca team decided 
to get together and talk about it. We have several ideas as to what a 
good laptop keymap could be, but we would like to hear from you, the 
users of Orca as to what you would like to see.

The first discussion point, is what modifier key should be used. A 
modifier key is a key that gets held down on the computer keyboard, 
while the user presses another key, to perform a particular function. 
Shift, Control, and Alt are all modifier keys, and Orca also uses the 
Insert key as a modifier key, to allow the user to perform different 
functions that Orca has to offer.

In the case of a laptop however, things get a little complicated. There 
is no standard laptop keyboard layout. All manufacturers have different 
layouts, some with no insert key at all, some with the insert key at the 
top, and some with the insert key at the bottom. This makes performing 
some, if not all Orca functions difficult at times. On many laptops, the 
number pad overlay on the keyboard is also difficult, or even impossible 
to use for Orca's cursor review functions.

So what modifier key would you like to use for Orca? Note that 
this excludes the Windows keys found on many keyboards, as there are 
laptops that do not have these keys. We do not want to talk about other 
keys for performing Orca functions as yet, as the modifier that is 
decided upon may have a great bearing on what other keys are used on the 
keyboard for review/feedback functions.

I encourage everybody to have a say, as the larger range of opinions 
will lead to a better laptop keyboard layout being defined, so that all 
Orca users, both current and future, can benefit.
-- 
Luke Yelavich
GPG key: 0xD06320CE 
	 (http://www.themuso.com/themuso-gpg-key.txt)
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