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My semi-anual reminder to turn on braille mode in Google Docs/sheets/slides if you are a screenreader user. Do this even if you are not a braille user. It does far more than enable support for braille displays.

What it actually does is place the document in an off-screen content editable. This allows you to use normal screenreader commands to access things, E.G. insert+down arrow for say all. With braille mode off, the content is in a black box that communicates state changes via live regions, relying 100% on the browser to do so correctly. This mode is considered legacy and is no longer developed, despite it being the default.

This has been the case for 8+ years but Google is bad at branding, leaving it to me to inform the good people of Mastodon.

You’re welcome!