Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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Looking for recommendations for HTML text editors that work well with JAWS (self.Blind)
submitted by ModernistMelancholic
The back story: I'm a part-time adjunct instructor at a local college, teaching introduction to front end web development courses. I was contacted by a prospective student who is blind. They are interested in my HTML & CSS classes for next semester. My full-time job involves manual accessibility testing of websites and apps so I am familiar with screen readers and other AT. This student prefers JAWS. I am happy to rethink my courses to accommodate them. I am more concerned with the tooling than the material we will cover. Some of it is in my control. We have been using the Atom text editor in class but could easily use another one. Are there any text editors that work well with JAWS?
I do share my screen when I'm typing out code examples and I can be mindful to more clearly describe the syntax I'm typing. But I occasionally share brief YouTube videos with my class, to give my voice a break. None of them have audio description options. Just captioning. We also occasionally run through freeCodeCamp exercises and share code with one another through CodePen. Both work well for keyboard-only users, but I need to test them out more with JAWS. Any advice would be appreciated!
I do share my screen when I'm typing out code examples and I can be mindful to more clearly describe the syntax I'm typing. But I occasionally share brief YouTube videos with my class, to give my voice a break. None of them have audio description options. Just captioning. We also occasionally run through freeCodeCamp exercises and share code with one another through CodePen. Both work well for keyboard-only users, but I need to test them out more with JAWS. Any advice would be appreciated!
BenandGracie 3 points 2y ago
Either Notepad++ or VisualStudioCode will work with JAWS.
CloudyBeep 2 points 2y ago
Many blind programmers use simple text editors like Notepad++. Many others use Visual Studio. For a novice programmer, the former might be more simple, but don't make your other students use something different if Atom isn't accessible.
The code editor FreeCodeCamp uses is fairly accessible, though accessing other information like whether test cases passed and failed is only partially accessible.
I apologize if this is obvious to you, but just in case it isn't, a blind student isn't going to be able to know by observation whether most of their CSS works as expected. JAWS can announce some formatting information, but it doesn't always work. The blind student may not even understand some CSS concepts.
Videos will be useful depending on how much of the code is read aloud by the presenter. You should consider either having descriptive transcripts created from them (as this would be more useful for reviewing code) or suggesting textual resources instead that cover the same material (which you could suggest for all of your students).
The code editor FreeCodeCamp uses is fairly accessible, though accessing other information like whether test cases passed and failed is only partially accessible.
I apologize if this is obvious to you, but just in case it isn't, a blind student isn't going to be able to know by observation whether most of their CSS works as expected. JAWS can announce some formatting information, but it doesn't always work. The blind student may not even understand some CSS concepts.
Videos will be useful depending on how much of the code is read aloud by the presenter. You should consider either having descriptive transcripts created from them (as this would be more useful for reviewing code) or suggesting textual resources instead that cover the same material (which you could suggest for all of your students).
ModernistMelancholic [OP] 2 points 2y ago
Thank you! This is helpful. I already share accessible slide decks with my students after each class, which includes the material we have covered. As well as a web page on my personal site linking out to useful resources. You raise good points about CSS, and about the freeCodeCamp output pane.
ModernistMelancholic [OP] 1 points 2y ago
Thanks again for all the recommendations! Class started last week and my student reports that Notepad++ is working well. We'll start using JSBin in class soon too. In the past, I've had students use neocities.org for free hosting. I appreciate their mission and their website is fairly accessible. Right up until you reach their built-in text editor, which does not work with screen readers at all. But I want all of my students to understand the concept of editing files locally and uploading them to be hosted on the web. Thankfully, that part works just fine with JAWS. In tonight's class, we'll go over files and folders and absolute vs relative paths. I'm often surprised by how little exposure any of my students have had to these concepts.
paneulo 1 points 2y ago
VSCode is also what I use, as a full-time web dev. Codepen is kinda' ok, but I've had better luck with JSBin. The editor has an accessible mode, which basically just turns it into a big textarea.
AndAdapt 1 points 2y ago
Visual studio code. Works well with screen readers, including code suggestion and expansion. The extensions system is great too
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