[MC-122645] Narrator hotkey cannot be customized or disabled

Summary

The narrator hotkey cannot be rebound or disabled. It does not appear in the key binding interface.

What I expected to happen

I expected to be able to rebind the narrator toggle hotkey or disable the narrator activation entirely.

What happened

Without fail, the narrator hotkey toggles the narrator. There is no option to disable, nor is there a configurable hotkey.

Why this matters

violine1101 points out:

This key not being able to be rebound is a huge accessibility issue in itself; on some keyboard layouts, some letters are written by pressing Alt Gr (which acts as if you would press Ctrl and Alt simultaneously) and another key at the same time. For instance, to write the at symbol @ on a German keyboard, we need to press AltGr + Q.

Now, on some keyboard layouts, some letters or symbols are written by pressing AltGr + B, which will toggle the narrator in Minecraft. For instance, if you're using a Polish, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak, or South Slavic Latin keyboard layout and want to write the symbol "{", you need to press exactly that combination of keys.

for myself:

One of my favorite things about Minecraft is the rich ecosystem of mods. Some of the most popular mods are forced into awkward keybindings because of this issue.

How to fix it

Look at this comment by geni for a concise explanation including source code references.

https://bugs.mojang.com/browse/MC-122645?focusedCommentId=547830&page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel#comment-547830

Instead of checking for the hotkey in this hardcoded way, it just needs to be handled the same way as (almost) every other keystroke in the game.

Linked issues

is duplicated by 4

MC-115236 Narrator Hotkey and Advancements Notifications Resolved

MC-127903 There is no item to change the narration hot key in the control setting. Resolved

MC-178853 Narrator activates every time I use hotkeys. Resolved

MC-202620 There is no option in the settings to change the narrator hotkey Resolved

relates to 4

MC-203401 Double-tapping forward button to sprint cannot be disabled/reconfigured Resolved

MC-147718 F1, F3, F3+[char] combos and Esc key functions cannot be rebound Open

MC-91315 Some inventory controls can't be reconfigured Reopened

MC-127862 "Alt Gr" key makes "Ctrl" locked Reopened

Comments 35

Christopher Hilder 2018-01-02T22:10:56Z

This is driving me nuts, especially for those of us modded minecraft community. Many mods utilize a lot of additional hotkeys. It would be much appreciated if the narrator could be remapped or disabled. Thank you!

Alex Summers 2018-03-15T08:16:05Z

So I decided to take the advice of a few others, and attempt to remove the library from com.mojang:text2speech, and update the 1.12.2.json file.

Welp, seems Minecraft no longer checks for the library first, but instead, insists upon it. Ended up with a callback crash.

So there is literally no way to disable this most annoying feature.

Needs fixed, so many users use the baubles mod or journey map, and want their 'B' key BACK!

muzikbike 2018-04-19T17:56:54Z

Affects 18w16a.

Kyiiel 2018-04-27T12:52:53Z

This issue has directly affected my mod, see https://github.com/Gamebuster19901/InventoryDecrapifier/issues/8

muzikbike 2018-05-09T09:25:32Z

Affects 18w19a

25 more comments

muzikbike 2018-05-15T14:42:21Z

Affects 18w20a

muzikbike 2018-05-16T15:17:14Z

Affects 18w20b

muzikbike 2018-05-18T13:05:33Z

Affects 18w20c

muzikbike 2018-05-23T22:13:56Z

Affects 18w21a

muzikbike 2018-05-26T09:01:44Z

Affects 18w21b

muzikbike 2018-05-31T18:04:15Z

Affects 18w22c

muzikbike 2018-06-04T20:40:06Z

Affects 1.13-pre1

muzikbike 2018-06-15T13:29:55Z

Affects 1.13-pre2

muzikbike 2018-06-27T16:04:20Z

Affects 1.13-pre4

muzikbike 2018-06-28T15:34:02Z

Affects 1.13-pre5

muzikbike 2018-07-04T21:43:36Z

Affects 1.13-pre6

muzikbike 2018-07-10T22:06:53Z

Affects 1.13-pre7

geni 2019-05-16T15:18:37Z

Affects 1.14.1.

This is due to the narrator not even being a "keybind", in the sense that the check for the B key is hardcoded.

net.minecraft.client.Keyboard#onKey (yarn mappings)

if (int_3 != 0 && int_1 == 66 && Screen.hasControlDown() && boolean_1) {
   Option.NARRATOR.cycle(this.client.options, 1);
   if (parentElement_1 instanceof ChatOptionsScreen) {
      ((ChatOptionsScreen)parentElement_1).method_2096();
   }

   if (parentElement_1 instanceof AccessibilityScreen) {
      ((AccessibilityScreen)parentElement_1).method_19366();
   }
}

Shawn Anderson 2019-07-26T00:46:30Z

So is this still unable to be rebound? When will we be getting the fix, it's the only key-activated action in the game that lacks a rebind...

[Mod] violine1101 2019-08-01T16:59:20Z

I heavily disagree with the resolution of this ticket.

I myself am affected as well: If I want to write the letter í. Though admittedly, I don't use that letter often, and my keyboard layout is a little eccentric and not used a lot.

Wil Langford 2019-08-01T18:08:18Z

Hovering over the green "resolved" tag tells me that the next step is for me, the original reporter of the issue, to verify the resolution. I explicitly decline to verify the resolution.

This has been a problem for years. It's an accessibility issue, and it's an easy fix. geni even pointed out where the problem was in the source code.

Please reopen and fix this. I'm unwilling to let this go.

Wil Langford 2019-08-01T18:21:52Z

I've updated the mod description to be more easily understood and acted on. To be honest, I'm surprised that this issue has persisted this long given how easy it would be to fix and how it adversely affects many users of language specific keyboard layouts and popular mods.

[Mod] violine1101 2019-08-02T09:51:38Z

Hovering over the green "resolved" tag tells me that the next step is for me, the original reporter of the issue, to verify the resolution. I explicitly decline to verify the resolution.

It's exclusively up to Mojang to decide whether an issue is a bug or not. Here they decided it's not a bug and that it won't be fixed. You don't need to verify the resolution, the tooltip above the "Resolved" label is incorrect.

I posted my comment in order to convince Mojang to review this issue and reconsider their decision. That might take some time though.

[Mod] violine1101 2020-02-05T16:08:56Z

@unknown, we gave this ticket to @unknown in order to keep it updated. If you want to have it back, please tell us.

Aldan Tanneo 2020-11-05T12:22:03Z

The most annoying thing. It makes the game unplayable for me because I use B as a control key, and I constantly activate the narrator. Please, this would be so easy to fix! It's still present in the first 1.17 snapshot (20w45a)

SoloAlguien 2021-11-16T19:23:26Z

Can confirm in 1.18 Pre-release 2.

SoloAlguien 2021-12-04T00:02:06Z

Can confirm in 1.18 and 1.18.1 Pre-release 1.

SoloAlguien 2021-12-18T06:09:40Z

Can confirm in 1.18.1.

null 2021-12-23T05:53:19Z

The problem with adding the hotkey to the controls menu is that Minecraft's controls don't support key combinations (as far as I know). Go to the controls menu and try to bind a key to "Ctrl+A" – it doesn't work. It's either Ctrl or it's A. That's probably the reason Ctrl+B was hardcoded in the first place.

So the easiest solution would probably be to add an option to disable the hotkey.

SoloAlguien 2022-03-01T21:04:55Z

Can confirm in 1.18.2.

SoloAlguien 2022-05-04T18:50:44Z

Can confirm in 22w18a.

Avoma 2022-08-23T13:41:46Z

Can confirm in 1.19.2.

PappaDavid 2023-04-29T08:51:40Z

On Mac it on occasion activates via F3 B, which is also used to hid o show hitboxes. Overly annoying when it happens.

Riley McConnell 2023-06-11T13:54:51Z

Please take this issue seriously. I accidentally turned narrator on while trying to paste (Ctrl+V) a structure name into a structure block. Suddenly the narrator is loudly reading the UI contents to me. Gave me a pretty bad jumpscare. I panicked (anxiety disorder... yay) because I didn't know this was a hotkey, didn't know how to shut it off, and it just kept talking at me.

Apparently the hot key will turn the narrator on while in an UI but won't turn it off while it is reading the UI? I mashed Ctrl+B several times assuming that's what I accidentally pressed but it did not appear to alter the narrator setting while I was still in the structure block UI. (Although in my panicked state I couldn't actually parse what it was saying, maybe it did change the setting but I couldn't recognize it since it verbalizes the narrator setting changes.)

I had to exit the UI and go into Accessibility settings to silence the narrator before I learned Ctrl+B was the proper hotkey.

The lack of support for hotkey combinations in the keybindings settings is a problem. Clearly combination hotkeys are supported in some way, are they hardcoded?

Lacking documentation of this hotkey (it isn't mentioned at https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/accessibility or https://help.minecraft.net/hc/en-us/articles/360061018612 or anywhere obvious in the in-game menus) is a problem. Not having a way to change or remove this keybind is a problem.

Accessibility features are important, but it is equally important to have them fully configurable including the option to fully disable them. Accessibility features that are useful for some people may be problematic for others.

iSolazzes 2024-01-10T20:56:46Z

There is a fabric mod called Rebind Narrator