Mail questions, a plenty

By Siobhan, 2 January, 2013

Forum
macOS and Mac Apps
Hello all. I listened to david Woodbridge's great podcast on not only mail, but other apps he uses as well, and he does a wonderful job. Having said this, here is what I can not do in mail. first, the shift, voiceover, function, arrow keys don't let me get to the top or bottom of anything, either messages or the whole amil app itself. Perhaps I've done the command wrong in which case the fault lies between the keyboard and the chair, me. Another thing I can't do is use the VO J command to enter a message to read it. If I try it, Mail says soemthing about interacting with a message content scroll area. Is there a possibility that my amil needs to be set into a different view? I ask because when I go itno another mailbox, say sent, I then interact with the Messages column group.If anyone can shed any light on these, I'd very much appreciate it. david if you read this, thank you for all the wonderful podcasts you have done.

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Comments

By Darrell Hilliker on Tuesday, December 25, 2012 - 16:23

The VoiceOver command to navigate to the top of anything is Control+Option+Shift+Home. On a MacBook keyboard, that is actually Control+Option+Shift+FN+Left Arrow.

By Darrell Hilliker on Tuesday, December 25, 2012 - 16:23

In order to easily navigate text, such as the contents of an email, press Left Arrow and Right Arrow together to toggle the quick nav mode. When quick nav is turned on, you can navigate most areas using the arrow keys without holding down Control and Option. In the case of jumping to and reading an email, quick nav would enable you to start arrowing through a message after you press Control+Option+J and hear VoiceOver say "message content."

By Siobhan on Tuesday, December 25, 2012 - 16:23

Hi all. Thanks for the comments, but I'm still completely messed up. If I use the command that is supposed to take you to the top, I hear sort by date menu button. Even with Quick nav on, which I knew about by the way. VO J still won't read the messages so I'll go back to the tedious way of return, oepn the message, then command w to close it back to interracting with the messages list. Thanks for the help.

Hi Siobhan. I think I know what is happening when you are trying to get to the top or bottom of your messages table. When you interact with the "Messages Column Group", there are two main items: the "Sort By Date" button and the "Messages Table". When you put focus on the Messages Table you can use the up and down arrows to go through your emails, but like you said, the Shift+VO+Fn+arrow just takes you back to the Sort By Date button. What you actually need to do is interact again (i.e. Shift+VO+down arrow) when on the Messages Table. You can then use the Shift+VO+Fn+arrow to go to the first or last email in the inbox or folder. I hope I've understood you right and that this helps.

By Siobhan on Friday, January 25, 2013 - 16:23

Hi dave82 You did fix that problem I was having with the command to get to the top and bottom of the list. Also, now the command to go into the messages and start reading also works. Is there a way to keep themail app this way so I don't have to keep remember to do this again? According to the podcast from david Woodbridge, his seemed to be set a certain way. Thanks very much for your help.

By Dave Nason on Friday, January 25, 2013 - 16:23

Member of the AppleVis Editorial Team
Glad to hear it. I'm not sure to be honest, that's the only way I can figure out to do things in Mail. In some ways I really like the app, but there is a lot of interacting and uninteracting to do, and I occasionally have little problems reading mails, like when there's links or attachments. It is good, but I definitely prefer Mail on iPad and iPhone. With practice we'll probably get used to it.