Jared Rimer’s Technology blog and podcast

Posted yesterday to the GW lists.

GW Micro is proud to announce the official release of Window-Eyes 7.01.

Thanks to customer feedback and the tireless efforts of the Window-Eyes Error Reporting feature (and those who choose to send in error reports) Window-Eyes 7.01 boasts more stability, reliability, and performance than ever before.

Window-Eyes scripting is changing the accessible landscape of computers, and the increased stability that Window-Eyes 7.01 provides means being able to spend more time focusing on script development. Window-Eyes 7.01 also resolves several issues that affected localized versions of Window-Eyes, and has increased Window-Eyes marketability across the globe.

While Window-Eyes 7.01 is a minor upgrade, it packs a significant punch including a few new features along with several bug fixes. A complete list of all changes is included below.

Window-Eyes 7.01 is a FREE upgrade to Window-Eyes 7.0 users. To install Window-Eyes 7.01, you must already have a working copy of Window-Eyes 7.0 installed (Retail, Demo, Evaluation, Dongle, Everlock, and LTO/Payment Plan versions are all supported). To download the upgrade, select the “Window-Eyes Update” option from the Window-Eyes Help menu, or navigate directly to www.gwmicro.com/upgrade, and enter your serial number manually.

If you have any questions or comments please contact us at support@gwmicro.com, or via phone at 260-489-3671.

Enjoy!

Enhancements between Window-Eyes 7.01 and Window-Eyes 7.0
We have resolved several memory leaks, and fixed several stability issues thanks to the Window-Eyes error reporting feature. Window-Eyes 7.01 is a significant improvement over Window-Eyes 7.0 in terms of stability and responsiveness.

We fixed a problem where Window-Eyes could hang while leaving and entering Browse mode quickly.

We fixed a problem where list boxes were not reading correctly in Visual Studio 2005/2008.

We fixed a a problem where Browse Mode would not refresh when a link was activated in Firefox 3.

Many upper Unicode characters (most above 7fh) were not getting translated correctly in English grade 2 braille. This problem has been resolved.

If the user profile path contained Unicode characters that didn’t map into ANSI, you were not able to install script package files. This problem has been resolved.

Window-Eyes would only read part of words with upper Unicode characters in PowerPoint 2003. This problem has been resolved.

Added the WEUpdate script to the factory default scripts. This script will automatically check for Window-Eyes updates and let you know if there is an update available.

iTunes
We resolved several issues relating to iTunes, including support for using the Window-Eyes Find command while in the iTunes store, resolving the issue of not being able to activate links using the Insert-Tab dialog, resolving the double reading in listviews and treeviews, speaking expanded and collapsed when you open and close tree view nodes, speaking the pull down menus correctly under Windows Vista, and resolving a problem where set files could not be associated to the iTunes window (or any window whose title was null). In addition, Window-Eyes does not automatically enable Browse Mode when the iTunes Store option is selected, meaning you can successfully arrow through all of the main items without suddenly getting tossed into Browse Mode.

Scripting
If Window-Eyes is localized in a language that a script was not localized in, the hotkeys won’t work because they’re not localized to the Window-Eyes language. To resolve this issue, we have added a new property to the Key object called UntranslatedName. From now on, our policy is to hard code default hotkey names in your script, always in English, even if you are writing the script in another language, because Window-Eyes will always be able to interrupt English hotkey names. They can still be displayed to the user in the script language, but they should be stored in INI files, and in scripts as English. This way no matter what language Window-Eyes is localized in, or what languages the script you are trying to use is localized in, the hotkeys will always work. Once again, default hotkey names should not exist in the XML resource, because they should never be localized. Keyboard.Key will accept both Key.Name and Key.Unstranslated name. Refer to the documentation for more information.

Added Mouse.ButtonDownEx and Mouse.ClickEx methods. Both methods provide the ability to enhance their respective functions with key modifiers. In addition, ClickEx fixes a problem of interrupting speech after performing the mouse click.

If a null string was returned through various Speech event handlers, speech would get disabled. This was mainly a problem with Visual Basic which would return null for speech events that weren’t specifically hooked. This problem has been resolved.

The scripting error dialog would sometimes pass a blank string for the error description. Now, if Window-Eyes cannot retrieve the error description, a default message will be used rather than displaying a blank string.

You can now use language id strings in the XML resource, such as “en” or “en-us” instead of having to use a hexadecimal number.

If was possible for a script to not successfully restart, but you would still hear the restart message. This problem has been resolved.

We fixed a problem where scripts could error when invoking Keyboard.Registerhotkey on launch.

We fixed a problem where you couldn’t Control or Shift-Click using the keyboard (meaning you couldn’t tap the Control key and then press the Left Mouse button hotkey to perform a left click).

We fixed a version comparison problem when installing script package files.

Window-Eyes now ensures that any read only attributes on script files being installing, uninstall, or used when created packages are cleared. This resolved a problem of script files not getting installed, or removed correctly.

The Window-Eyes Scripting Manual has been updated.