1.2. General vEmotion window structure As said before, due to missing MSAA (Microsoft active accessibility) support, vEmotion has not a standard dialog structure, that means, screen reader do not "see" it as a normal Windows dialog box, even if graphically the look is very similar. The window is divided into 4 tabs (let's call them Pages, as "tab" is the Tab key and the terms could confuse people who are not expert and read here). The pages are the following: Emotions, Music, TTS, Records. To switch from a page to another, just press ctrl+tab to go forwards, and ctrl+shift+tab to go backwards, as in standard windows. Of course the synthesizer will not pronounce in which page we are, but it can be easily understandable, by paying attention to the element the focus is on (the tts can be recognized because the first control is an edit box). Every page, has a list of general and specific control, except for Emotions, that has just the general controls (that's why if Emotions is focused, the tab key does not work).

General controls are:
add files, add a directory, remove list items, move up, move down, adjust volumes, mute microphone, enable recording. To switch between general and specific controls (including the current file list in case of emotions/music/records and the edit box in case of tts), the key combination to press is shift+tab. In standard Windows, shift+tab is used to focus the previous control in a dialog box, but in this software, controls can be only navigated forwards, with tab. This is valid both for general, and page-specific controls.

1.2. Adjusting settings, for an easier way to work
Go to recorder menu (alt+r). If you wish to enable recording, leave "enable recording" option checked , without pressing Enter on it. then, from Recorder menu, press enter on Settings, and tab till "real-time memoire when begin a call" and press space bar. Tab again, till "save record without prompting for user input" and press space to check it. Press enter again, to save options. Note: these options could be needed for job or learning purpose (if the voice recording calls contain some notes or important explanations about something really useful), but if you use voice clients just to chat with eprsonal contacts, those dialog boxes are quite annoying for screen reader users, and are not so necessary).

Note: closing VEmotion window with alt+f4, another alert appears, warning that the service continues running and can be accessed in the taskbar, "near the clock", with a "do not show this message again" checkbox, that oc course must be activated with space bar, and then pressing OK.

Saying "near the clock", graphically refers to the System tray: with Jaws for Windows, it can be accessed by pressing the Insert+F11 key combination, and the "VEmotion with call recording" title must be searched for, then Enter, then Show VEmotion (for other screen readers, check the specific product manual to see how to access the system tray).

2. Add audio files to voice emotion list.
By default, "emotions" tab should be the one which is visible, and which has focus on it. Apparently, the voice synthesizer says nothing, it just says "VEmotion desktop", arrow keys and tab seem not to work correctly as the voice does not talk. To add files, there are 3 ways: or pressing alt+l to access List menu, then choosing add files or add directory, or pressing shift+tab once, the first button is Add files. The third way is, from the "silent VEmotion desktop", to press shift+tab twice. The list area, where already existing emotions are listed, will appear. Take mouse cursor to any list item (in Jaws for windows, the command is "route Jaws to PC cursor", accessed via Insert key together with the minus key of numeric keypad)
then press the right mouse button key (in Jaws for Windows, it's the Star key, direct at left of the minus), and choose Add files or Add directory, from the context menu that appears. You will get a windows standard window for you to select some files or a directory. After you close the window by pressing Enter on the "Ok" button, all selected files or all files (*.wav, *.mp3, *.vea) under the selected folder will be added to the voice emotion list.

3. Add files to background music list.
From Emotions, press ctrl+tab to go to Music then, the procedure is identical to the Add files/directory in emotions page (read previous paragraph).

4. Send voice emotions to your friends.
Anytime you are in a IM voice conversation, you can send voice emotions to all your friends who are talking with you. Switch to the Voice Emotions page by pressing ctrl+tab till you reach your emotion files list (or just press shift+tab twice if you just opened the VEmotion and didn't switch to other pages), then use arrow keys up or down, till you reach the voice emotion item you want to send. After you reach it, point the mouse cursor simulator on it (for JAWS for Windows users, route Jaws cursor to PC, by pressing insert + numeric keypad minus), then press the right mouse button simulator (in Jaws for Windows it's the star key, on numeric keypad). From the context menu that appears, select "Send" command. Then the voice emotion is sent to your friends and also played for you. You can also send a voice emotion just simply going with arrow keys on the desired item, then pressing Enter key on it. This is the simplest, and most suggested way to do it without getting lost.

Important: You should be in a voice conversation with your friends to be able to send voice emotions to them. Otherwise, an alert appears, warning about "no voice conversation calls", and this alert can be switched off by checking the appropriate checkbox and pressing OK.
If the Send command is given and no voice conversation is in act, the sound can always be listened, but of course it's just your own computer playing, not others' machine.

5. Share background music with your friends.
The procedure is the same of previous paragraph. To switch between Emotions and Music page, just press (from Emotions) ctrl+tab.

6. Using Text-to-speech (TTS) in a conversation
To switch from Emotions to TTS (text to speech) press ctrl+tab twice. An edit box will appear, where text can be written. The controls in this page, are: the edit box the Speak button (speaks the current text, and the caller can hear it) Preview button: it speaks, but during a conversation the caller cannot hear it Save to file: converts written text to audio (wav) file stop speaking: the title comments itself! Interrupts speech. then, there is a slider (it can be managed via up and down arrows) it's the voice rate, which can be increased and decreased. Parse XML checkbox: it's for power users. XML is a markup language, which allows to do specific action for specific purposes. That is, for example, changing the synthesizer's pitch, volume and voice during the speech. (of course the VEmotion's synthesizer, not the screen reader's one!) Then, the following combo box, is to change voice bit rate (it's recommended to use it only knowing what to do, because it may worsen the TTS voice quality) The other combo box, is used to select different voices if installed; to hear if we like that voice, it's necessary to press tab key 4 times to reach Preview and press enter. Even in tts control, shift+tab takes to general controls (add files, add directory...) that, in this case, are not necessary at all. So take your fingers away from shift key! Then, after the Voice control, there is another edit box, but it's a reading-only text, which displays the short explanation of what TTS is, and below, the already sopken text history. A rapid way to write and make it speak, is to type text in the edit box, and press Enter on it. (attention, it does not support multi-line text). VEmotion is compatible with SAPI5 tts voices: Microsoft's default "Microsoft Sam" is sapi5, as Microsoft Mary & Mike (they can be found on Microsoft's web site, Sam should be installed in most recent Windows versions). The quality is not very good, but better synths can be used, such as Loquendo, RealSpeak, AT&T Natural Voice, Cepstral...but they are not free. It does not support Sapi4.

7. Record a voice conversation/call.
Actually, call recording is completely automatically done for you. When you are on a call, with vEmotion running and recording enabled, voice streams into an audio file. The call is being recorded. As you finish the call, vEmotion will prompt a window for you to fill some contents for the call record (if "save without prompting for user input" control is not checked, but for blind users it's recommended to check it, if not necessary to cathegorize recordings).
In case the Save records without prompting is not checked, you can choose to save the recording or discard it.

When you begin a call, depending on settings, vEmotion will show a window titled "Real Time Memoire" for you. During the voice conversation, you can write some memo/comments about what you are talking about. Memo/comments you entered here will be saved in a VEA file together with the call record.

8. Real-time memoire/comments.
While a call is going on, you are able to type some memo/comments for the call in real time. Just access Recorder menu, with alt+r, then arrow down till "Real-time Memoire". In following window, you can write what you want to say about the call.

When the call is finished, comments you entered here will automatically go to the comment area of the above window named "Image one". Depending on settings, the above "Real-time Memoire" window may be displayed for you automatically when a call begin.

9. Adjust local volume.
Local volume is with which voice emotions or background music are played for yourself. Change of it does not affect other call/conference participants' hearing.

If you want to change volume of voice emotions, navigate with ctrl+tab to the Emotions page, then press button "adjust volumes" on the toolbar (shift+tab from Emotions page, then tab till you reach adjust volumes, and press enter).
An apparently silent dialog box (screen reader just says Dialog) will pop up. The structure is, local volume (our own computer's volume) to the left, and remote volume (the volume our call partners will hear our music with), to the right.
To manage local volume, press up arrow to increase, and down arrow to decrease. Text is displayed, but the synthesizer does not follow automatically (Braille display users have no problems, as text is shown on the Braille cells in real time)

For non-expert users, it's suggested to play a music on VEmotion (read above paragraphs about music to see how), as for local volume the screen reader may not be needed: going up and down with up and down arrow keys, it's easy to hear when volume is good for our own ears. For expert users, to check if volume is OK, music is not needed; just activate the mouse pointer simulator (in Jaws for Windows, the Jaws cursor, route Jaws to PC, that is insert + numeric keypad minus), after having pressed up or down arrow to increase/decrease the volume. Attention: to increase/decrease volume the mouse pointer simulator must be switched off (in Jaws just press numeric keypad plus to switch back to PC cursor), for other screen reading products see the specific manuals. In this case, the simulator is just needed to read the text. Attention: the simulator will make our synth read both local and remote value. For example, 60 50. The 60 (at the left) is the local, and 50 (at the right) is the remote. Do not confuse the 2 values. After finishing with volume managing, press Enter, or escape, to go back to VEmotion main window.

10. Adjusting remote volume
To reach remote volume, go from the current page (music, emotions, tts or records) to the general controls, by pressing shift+tab then press tab till Adjust volumes button, and press enter When the volume dialog appears (read previous paragraph for information) press tab to go to remote volume (it's silent, but there are no other controls, to get confused) Arrow keys, up and down, respectively increase and decrease the volume value. This volume cannot be checked without the screen reader's help, as just remote user (our caller) can hear the volume change So, the mouse pointer simulator (see previous paragraph) is needed. The remote value is the one on the right. Remember to use the mouse pointer simulator just to read, and to switch it off when you are increasing/decreasing with arrow keys.