Next week, Microsoft Edge support is coming to JAWS 18

As we’ve blogged previously, we’ve been collaborating closely with Microsoft to deliver support for their latest browser, Microsoft Edge.

If you’ve been running our JAWS 2018 beta, you’ve already been able to benefit from the work we’ve done to date. Since we’re publicly testing JAWS 2018 at the moment, which means users understand there may be bugs we’re still ironing out, we felt it best to introduce support for Microsoft Edge there first. This has meant that those who enjoy testing new features can do so, and we haven’t inconvenienced users whose top priority is stability. Thanks for all the helpful feedback we’ve received from beta users so far.

Now, it’s time to take the next step, and introduce Microsoft Edge support to JAWS 18, our current official version, as promised.

Next week, we’ll be releasing a new build of JAWS 18. We’ll let you know via Facebook and Twitter the moment it’s out. If you haven’t changed the default way we alert you about updates, you’ll receive a notification that an update is available the next time you start JAWS after we release the update. Choose to update, let your computer restart to apply changes, and you’ll be ready to take the next step.

There’s one more thing you’ll need to do to make use of Microsoft Edge in JAWS 18. Support for Microsoft Edge depends on some emerging technologies, which we continue to fine-tune in close collaboration with Microsoft. We’re mindful that as that fine-tuning occurs, we may introduce unintended stability issues, something you don’t want when you depend on JAWS to get things done reliably. For this reason, Microsoft Edge support is off by default at the moment. But it’s easy to switch it on.
Here are the steps.

1. Press the JAWS key with the number 6 on the number row above the qwerty keyboard to start JAWS Settings Center.
2. You’ll need to load the JAWS default configuration. To do this, press Control+Shift+D.
3. Settings Center will have placed you in an edit field. To locate our setting for Edge support, just type the word “edge”, and press the tab key.
4. JAWS will have found one result. It’s called “Microsoft Edge browser support”. It’s not checked by default. To enable Edge support, press the space bar. JAWS will confirm to you that the option is now checked.
5. Press Alt+F4 and answer “yes” when asked if you want to save changes.
6. You’re set. Run Microsoft Edge and take it for a spin.

If you encounter any unusual issues after enabling Edge support, you can go back into Settings Center as described above, and disable it. If you need to do this, please let our Tech Support team know. We’ll log the issue, and ensure its investigated thoroughly.

We’ll have more news soon on beta 2 of JAWS 2018.