Some blind users of Apple’s built-in VoiceOver Mac OS X screen reader have reported an inability to rate content or post reviews in the iTunes Store. Apple has responded with a solution that has been confirmed to solve the problem effectively.
The trouble is found in the way the ratings widget interacts with VoiceOver, said Nate Doss, a member of Apple’s executive relations team.
“Each review requires that you rate the product you wish to review,” he said. “The normal VoiceOver command for pressing a button does not set the star rating. Instead, you would have to try the “Move Mouse Cursor to VoiceOver Cursor”
command (Control Option Command F5) which would then set the star rating to whatever rating desired.”
Doss said there is a secondary issue involving notification of blind users when the content on a dynamic page has changed.
“To start writing a review, there is a link that you press called ‘Write a Review’ or ‘Be the first to write a review’,” he said. “When you press that link, the review writing tools are revealed within the page, but the application does not notify VoiceOver that the page was changed. This is a common problem with websites that use JavaScript to change the part of a web page instantly without reloading the entire page. From your perspective, there was no change in the page. However, if you were to explore the page, you would discover that there are new elements on the page.”
Doss said Apple’s developers are aware of this issue and are working to fix it in a future update.
Follow these steps to rate a product in the iTunes Store:
- Browse to or search for an app, podcast, song or other content in the iTunes Store.
- Follow the link to view its page in the store.
- Move down to the “Rate this application:” section of the page.
- Move to the desired star rating you wish to assign.
- Press Control+Option+Command+F5 to move the mouse cursor to the position of the VoiceOver cursor on the desired star rating.
- If you explore past the end of the star ratings, you will now see a description of that rating. For instance, “it’s great” will be displayed if you positioned the mouse cursor on the “rate five stars” option. If this description is not present, you have not succeeded. Try again.
- Move back to the desired star rating and press the typical Control+Option+Space Bar command to rate the content.
- If you explore past the end of the star ratings, you will now see the word “thanks.” This means you have successfully rated the content in the iTunes Store. If you do not see “thanks,” you have not succeeded. Try repeating these steps.
Follow these steps to post a review in the iTunes Store:
- Browse to or search for an app, podcast, song or other content in the iTunes Store.
- Follow the link to view its page in the store.
- Move down to the “Customer Reviews” section of the page.
- To start writing a review, follow the link called “Write a Review” or “Be the first to right a review.”
- Follow the steps previously described for rating content.
- Fill out the title and text body as appropriate.
- Move to the Submit button and press the typical Control+Option+Space Bar command to post the review.
We thank Apple for their diligent work in getting to the bottom of this perplexing issue.
Update:
Another solution exists that enables posting of reviews without the extra mouse cursor movement command. It involves changing VoiceOver preferences that affect its cursor tracking behavior everywhere on your system. This supplementary solution may not be the right one for everyone.
Follow these steps to modify VoiceOver preferences so that the mouse cursor always follows the VoiceOver cursor:
- Press Control+Option+F8 to open the VoiceOver Utility.
- Press Control+Option+Down Arrow to interact with the categories table.
- Press n to move to the Navigation category.
- Press Control+Option+Up Arrow to stop interacting with the categories table.
- Press Control+Option+Right Arrow until you hear “mouse cursor.”
- Press Control+Option+Right Arrow once more to move focus to the popup associated with this field. The default setting is “ignore VoiceOver cursor.”
- Press Control+Option+Space Bar to open the popup.
- Press down arrow until you hear “follows VoiceOver Cursor.”
- Press Control+Option+Space Bar to select the option to have the mouse cursor follow the VoiceOver cursor.
- Press Command+Q to close the VoiceOver Utility.
- Post reviews in the iTunes Store at will.
