OS X Mountain Lion Bible

Setting Up the VoiceOver Utility

The VoiceOver Utility is something of an oddity in OS X. In many ways, it is an extension of the Accessibility system preference (described in the beginning of this chapter), although in other ways, it is clearly an application in its own right.

VoiceOver, as explained earlier, is a technology that lets OS X read aloud whatever is on the screen, under the pointer, or under the VoiceOver window (a rectangular window that appears over items onscreen).

The VoiceOver Utility lets you fine-tune almost every aspect of VoiceOver, including the amount of punctuation it interacts with, how it navigates applications and web pages, the visual effects that accompany it, and even how it interacts with a Braille display (if one is attached to your Mac).

The VoiceOver Utility application is in the Utilities folder; go there quickly by pressing Shift++U and then double-clicking the application's icon. You also can open it from the VoiceOver pane of the Accessibility system preference.

Adjusting the General settings

Click General in the list to the left to access the General pane.

Greeting options

At the top of the pane, you can change the VoiceOver message that greets you when you log in. By default, this welcomes you to OS X and informs you that VoiceOver is running; it also may tell you that you can access help by pressing Control+Option+H. You can change this ...