NVDA and UKAAF guidelines for foreign languages

[LizNVDA]

@LizNVDA
LizNVDA commented on Jun 3
Detailed description of the issue
Significant issues when using NVDA to access modern foreign languages in England using UKAAF method 2
In England, UKAAF method 2 is used in Education and as industry standard in public examinations for translating modern foreign languages such as French and German into braille. French, German and Spanish are commonly taught in English schools from age 11 onwards. UKAAF method 2 means that, rather than using actual French or German braille, uncontracted English braille is used with English numbers and English punctuation. This uncontracted English braille is supplemented with braille symbols for accents. The braille symbols used for accents are some of those that are usually seen in contracted braille e.g. the contraction for ‘for’ (all 6 dots) is used to represent the French letter e with an acute accent. Guidance can be found on the UKAAF website www.ukaaf.org
In the UK, when creating Word documents in modern languages, Unicode codes are used when wanting to type accents. These accents created using Unicode can be read by NVDA and also by Duxbury braille translation software. If a foreign language ‘style’ (e.g. French style settings) is used in Word and the corresponding foreign language is selected in NVDA, then NVDA will also correctly read and display the foreign words on a braille display.
Unfortunately, the foreign language options in NVDA show foreign punctuation and foreign numbers e.g. French numbers don’t have the UEB numeric sign shown on a braille display before them but show a dot 6 under the start of the number instead. French punctuation bears no resemblance to English punctuation.
In addition, when typing on a braille display connected to a laptop via NVDA, numbers can’t be inputted on the display and need to be inputted using the laptop keyboard. Some English punctuation can be inputted on the braille display e.g. a capital when typing in French, but this will not display correctly e.g. pressing key 6 (dot 6) for a capital will result in the a capitalised letter displayed with a dot 7 under it rather than a dot 6 before it.
The above are a considerable glitches for anyone reading foreign languages in the UK via NVDA unless they are e.g. 1st language French speakers who learned French braille in France.

Why are the other templates not appropriate in this case?
This is not a bug and, although it could be a request, as it is specific to one country, I was not sure the standard request format was applicable either.

Have you asked for advice on how to report this issue via a community discussion? If so, please link to the discussion
Steps to reproduce or illustrate the issue (if applicable)
All attempts at using United Kingdom guidelines on braille foreign languages based on the United Kingdom Association of Accessible Formats (UKAAF)

Expected outcome or behaviour (if applicable)
It would be SO good to be able to support students learning foreign languages with accurate braille translation.

[egli]

@LizNVDA I appreciate that you take your time and file an issue with liblouis. However I had to go and look at the original NVDA issue and in particular this comment to find out what you are really asking for:

A braille table that supports foreign languages when using UKAAF

As far as I can tell this should not be tremendously difficult. I believe that there are people on the mailing list that have done that before. Can you ask there for some advice on how to proceed? You can find the mailing list at https://www.freelists.org/list/liblouis-liblouisxml