If you used to be a windows user, and now switch to Mac OS, I'm sure you will miss the good and free Image Viewer program on window. They are simple, clean and you can do some basic photo editing with it easily. And this list collects the Top 5 Free Image Viewer for Mac OS.
To turn on the onscreen keyboard:. Go to the System Preferences panel. Select the “International” icon. Go to the “Input Menu” tab. Select the “Keyboard Viewer”. You now should have an American flag in your menu bar.
Click on the American flag and select “Show Keyboard Viewer”. You now should have a keyboard on your desktop that displays whatever your press on your keyboard. Quick, easy, free!.
If you click the plus arrow in the upper left hand corner of the keyboard it makes it much larger. Suzanne That is great news for folks who have upgraded their hardware. Unfortunately, the bug has not been fixed in Leopard which was originally released as OS X 10.5. Our was only upgradable to Leopard, not Snow Leopard. This is so disappointing and really colors my view of Apple’s responsiveness to customer needs. The view may be that customers can simply make the leap to upgrade, but again the disabled community has many folks who are on fixed incomes and struggle to even obtain a computer in the first place. Schools are also under budget constraints affecting their ability to make hardware upgrades.
I feel like a fool. I paid $125 for a software upgrade to get the one feature that does not work and rendered the computer unable to run needed software. I guess the joke is on me. I really don’t think it should be necessary to purchase a new computer to obtain a feature that was supposed to exist in the operating system upgrade. Unfortunately, this experience has given me pause every time I have considered purchasing a new Apple computer. THANKS A MILLION!! I had downloaded a 30-day trial version of Keystrokes, and while that is a very good program that offers a lot of very useful features, it is not exactly cheap!!
The VERY CHEAPEST version that they offer is a program called TouchStrokes, which is US$ 59 / 49!! And that is for their stripped down version!! Their regular full version is a staggering US$ 299 / Euro 249!!
With the state of the economy at the moment and the fact that I am disabled (which is why I was looking for an on-screen keyboard) I REALLY cannot afford that kind of price for such a simple piece of software. I was in the process of searching for a demo download (possibly) of one of their competitor’s products, because after you exceed the 30-day trial, KeyStrokes will only run for 30 minutes @ any one time & there is always ONE KEY that they disable!! Sometimes you can get around that if it is a letter like a V or a Z but if it is either a vowel (A,E,I,O or U) or one of the more common consonants (R,S,T,L or N) then it can really be a pain in the neck!! As if that weren’t enough of an annoyance to get you to pay for & register their software, the program RESETS ALL OF YOUR CONFIGURATIONS & PREFERENCES TO THE DEFAULT SETTINGS EVERY TIME YOU QUIT THE APPLICATION!! I AM REALLY REALLY GLAD TO KNOW ABOUT THE FREE ON-SCREEN KEYBOARD THAT IS PRE-INSTALLED IN MAC OS X!!
THANKS A MILLION FOR POSTING THE DIRECTIONS FOR HOW TO ACTIVATE THIS FEATURE!! Suzanne My son also relies upon an onscreen keyboard due to his physical disabilities. I specifically upgraded to Leopard for the onscreen keyboard that is native to Leopard, only to find out after the upgrade that the shift key does not work. Then to compound my frustration, my son was no longer able to use his math software on the Mac because Leopard does not support classic and the updates for the math software only support up to Mac OS 9.
Had I known that the onscreen keyboard did not work properly, I would not have upgraded to Leopard at this time. I emailed the accessibility folks at Apple regarding the problem. They acknowledged that Apple was aware of the problem and hoped to have a “fix” in the next release. Unfortunately, the release came out a few days ago and still the problem is not fixed.
In addition, the onscreen keyboard does not appear to have most of the commonly used punctuation and symbols (e.g. Question mark, “at” symbol, etc.) Apple’s solution is to refer disabled users to some onscreen keyboards made for people with disabilities. As I explained to Apple, those keyboards are great, but they are very expensive and people with disabilities are often on very fixed budgets. Further, I explained that being able to use an onscreen keyboard that is native to the operating system has its advantages as sometimes the specialized software keyboards are not compatible with some programs. The problem with the onscreen keyboard does not make sense. Apple has an onscreen keyboard with word prediction on its iPhone, but those features are not available to computer users. An onscreen keyboard without a functional shift key isn’t really a functional keyboard.
The onscreen keyboard will shift if someone physically holds down the shift key on the conventional keyboard, but that should not be necessary and the point is not to have to use a conventional keyboard. Further, I noticed that the number keys do not shift even if I physically hold down the shift key on the conventional keyboard. That means that a person cannot type commonly used symbols and punctuation, such as question marks, the “at” symbol, the dollar sign, the percent sign, etc., using the onscreen keyboard. I am extremely disappointed in Apple’s response, or rather its failure to respond to the defects in its onscreen keyboard.
It is hard to put out a product that pleases everyone and certainly Macs have many great features. But, Apple seems to be disregarding some of the very basic needs of the disabled population. Windows has a basic onscreen keyboard that has been native to its operating system for several years (at least back to XP). That has been a real “lifesaver” when my son’s purchased onscreen keyboard has not worked for some reason. Christine I’m not sure about the hover option, but even with sticky keys enabled, the shift and CAPS do not work unless you physically push them with your fingers on the regular keyboard.
The folks at Apple told me there is no way around it other than downloading “outside software”. I finally downloaded some software from the internet called Virtual Keyboard, but you’ll have to look up if hover keys will work on it. If you can afford it, Keystrokes is the nicest program I’ve found. It comes with word prediction, and increases my son’s typing time tremendously. I’m pretty sure they offer hover keys as well. The only problem is the $350 price tag. James Good day!
I’m a PC user switching to Mac. Since I’m physically disabled, I use On-Screen Keyboard in PC to type but NOT to view what I’m typing. Although I know Mac has On-Screen Keyboard, but I’m not sure whether I can use it the way I do with PC. In PC, there’s a typing mode in which I just need to hover the cursor on the key and the letter would be typed. In short, I don’t need to click the key, just put the cursor on it for 0.5 second.
So is this function available in Mac? If not, then are there any other applications that aid the disabled to type?
Your prompt response is much appreciated.
Hello RforRockin, Thank you for using Apple Support Communities. I understand from your post that after updating your Mac mini to macOS Sierra the Fn key on your wireless keyboard is no longer functioning. I know how important it is for all the keys on your keyboard to work properly for you. I recommend using the steps from the following article to help resolve this issue: Your keyboard has one or more keys that don't respond Use the Keyboard Viewer to test whether the keyboard keys are responding correctly when they are pressed. Choose System Preferences from the Apple menu, then select Language & Text. Select Input Sources.
Select the Keyboard & Character Viewer checkbox. Enable the input source for the keyboard layout you're testing by selecting the checkbox next to it. Make sure that 'Show Input menu in menu bar' is enabled. Choose Show Keyboard Viewer from the Input menu in the menu bar. The Keyboard Viewer showing the keyboard layout appears on your display.
Type the key on the keyboard that doesn’t respond and see if the corresponding key highlights on the Keyboard Viewer. If it does, that key is functioning correctly. Notes:. If the feature in the Universal Access System Preferences pane is enabled, many of the keyboard keys may not respond as expected. If issues persist, try starting up your Mac in to see whether a software issue is causing the issue. Best Regards. Apple Footer.
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