Make default pronunciation of some symbols more intuitive

[nvaccessAuto]

Reported by jteh on 2014-11-05 12:10 I would have thought there was a ticket for this already, but I can't find it if there is.

For the sake of brevity, we use names for some symbols that aren't intuitive to new users, notably bang, tick and line. We've resisted changing this in the past because efficiency is important and, further back, because they couldn't be customised. However, we're seeing more reports of this causing confusion. The reality is that the power users that care about brevity to this extent can now easily customise these and will probably be very willing and able to do so.

I don't think we need to go as far as lengthening quote to double quote, semi to semi colon, etc., as those are fairly intuitive. I Also, while the full name for bang is exclamation mark, I think we can shorten this to exclaim without being unintuitive.

[nvaccessAuto]

Attachment symbols-en.dic added by briang1 on 2014-11-07 08:58 Description: my alterations

[nvaccessAuto]

Comment 1 by blindbhavya on 2014-11-05 20:23 Hi, Could you exactly tell which symbols default pronunciation you would like to change? I too completely agree with you, about reports of confusion. But, I always wondered, (but forgot to ever ask :), why is # pronounced as number and not hash, when hash is shorter, and the standard (at least in india) pronunciation of the symbol? Or is # pronounced as number in other parts of the world except India?

[nvaccessAuto]

Comment 2 by jteh on 2014-11-05 20:53 I've listed the symbols under consideration for change above. I considered changing hash to number, but the problem is that in the U.S., they call it pound. This sign is apparently called the number sign and other screen readers seem to agree. Still, I'd be keen to hear from U.S. users as to whether hash would still be understood, especially now that people use terms like "hashtags".

[nvaccessAuto]

Comment 3 by briang1 on 2014-11-07 09:14 Well, rather than go into a long explanation, i have added my alterations as a download. I'm rather confused here as these symbols need to be localised in any case, I'd have thought. If some countries call hash number then its up to them. Where pound came from is rather a mystery, but I do suspect it was old systems where pound was not a character, and the hash already existed as the numbe prefix. It was also traditionally used in hex notation as well in the them early days.

I have modified far more than the ones you mention however as you can see. I do not consider length a problem as one can tell what one is when reading fast even when they are truncated. For new users or those who like the more human voices they sound just better to me.

One question, there are at least two forms of bullet, and I'm not really sure how to tell them apart.

[LeonarddeR]

CC @Brian1Gaff

@JCSTeh: Would you be able to provide the old trac attachment?

[jcsteh]

symbols-en.dic from @Brian1Gaff (remove .txt extension)

[jcsteh]

P3 because it'd be nice to be more intuitive. However, the exact changes here need to be discussed further. I'd suggest we opt for a minimum set of changes which deal with the most pressing confusion reported by users (such as the ones I originally described), rather than an extensive set of changes that result in a lot fo controversy and extended debate.

[bhavyashah]

Do you think it may be a good idea to ask for opinions on this suggestion on the NVDA Users International Forum? @Qchristensen @josephsl I understand that there may be an unneded plethora of conflicting views, but I do believe that the only way to proceed with this ticket is involving user feedback. This would aid in giving us an idea about some of the most confusing default symbol pronunciations, so that we would could revise only those, for the benefit of future newcomers.