[Emacspeak] Re: Text on overlays not announced

[Tim Cross <blind-bat@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I don't do python - one of the very few languages I find extremely
frustrating to code in :-(

Do you know what elpy is using for these 'overlays'. It sounds like it
might be company. If so, yes, there is a possible solution.

If they are generated with company, you can re-configure company to not
use overlays, but instead use a different front end which essentially
uses the minibuffer.

Confirm if elpy is using company for this functionality. If so, have a
looke at emacspeak-company.el (may also be worthwhile looking in the tvr
directory for Raman's company configuration as a guide).

Some modes, possibly like elpy, will allow you to configure what type of
mechanism to use for completions, documentation snippets etc. So another
approach may be to change the elpy configuration to use a mechanism
which is more emacspeak 'friendly'.

One of the challenges with more recent 'design' or UI choices in Emacs
is that it is focusing more and more on UI styles which are heavily
weighted towards a visual interface - tooltips, documentation popups
etc. Often, these choices are not optimal for a VI/Blind user and
difficult to work with from an accessibility perspective. However, Emacs
being Emacs, you can often change which framework is being used for one
that is easier to work with. This does mean that in addition to
investigating whether you can get emacspeak to work with the 'default'
configuration, you also need to look at whether you can modify that
configuration to use an alternative framework which is better supported.

I also think there are some differences in how we need to work with
code. For a sighted person, little popups which give quick tips on
function argument types or short documentation strings can be very
useful. However, for a TTS user, this type of information can be
annoying or frustrating because it generates too much speech. For this
reason, I frequently configure things like eldoc to have a much larger
delay before speaking function documentation.

Of course, I'm an old programmer who is probably still stuck in the 80s!
I really don't like these interfaces which are popping up helpful tips
every few key strokes. I prefer an older style where the editor waits
for me to ask it to complete something or give me documentation. I hate
my editor chatting away at me while I'm sitting there thinking about how
I want to name a variable, code a conditional or select a function etc.

________________________________________
From: Simon Wheatcroft <moochoo(a)gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, 1 April 2021 8:22 PM
To: emacspeak(a)emacspeak.org
Subject: [Emacspeak] Text on overlays not announced

Hi,

I am having an issue with text not being announced.

I am using elpy and for code suggestions an overlay loads on top. I can navigate and select items within the overlay but nothing is announced. It makes code suggestions hard to use as i have no idea what is in the pop up overlays.

Does anyone have a solution?

Many thanks

Simon
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