On Windows 10 1903 NVDA starts after logon even when this is disabled

Question

On Windows 10 1903 NVDA starts after logon even when this is disabled

Closed this issue 5 years ago · 35 comments

a11cf0 commented 5 years ago

Steps to reproduce:

Install NVDA,
Do not configure NVDA for starting automatically after logon, but let it run on secure screens,
Restart Windows or sign out and in.

Actual behavior:

NVDA starts right after logon just as if the corresponding option is enabled.

Expected behavior:

NVDA shouldn't autostart when it isn't told to do so.

System configuration

NVDA installed/portable/running from source:

Obviously NVDA is installed.

NVDA version:

I'm running NVDA alpha-17099,0d2a1525.

Windows version:

Windows 10 Version 1903 18362.53 x64.
This issue doesn't occur on older systems.

Name and version of other software in use when reproducing the issue:

I think this is irrelevant. This happens after a fresh OS install.

Other information about your system:

As expected, the registry key normally responsible for automatic startup doesn't exist on my system.

Other questions

Does the issue still occur after restarting your PC?

Yes.

Have you tried any other versions of NVDA? If so, please report their behaviors.

Not yet. I can do this if needed.

Answer 1 · 2019-04-30T19:35:21.000Z

Is NVDA also started at the logon screen? What happens if you disable that?

Answer 2 · 2019-04-30T21:06:11.000Z

Is NVDA also started at the logon screen? What happens if you disable that?

If this option is disabled NVDA doesn't autostart at all.
But if starting on logon screens is enabled NVDA starts both at and after logon.

Answer 3 · 2019-06-25T23:51:32.000Z

Hello,

Please see this link for more context on the issue.

In short, I talked to people at MS immediately when this issue occurred and they had many months before release to get it fixed and they failed to.
Narrator is also affected. If it's possible, are others able to upvote this please?

https://aka.ms/AA4g3cq

Thanks,

Brandon

Answer 4 · 2019-07-18T12:54:36.000Z

Good morning,
The last comment here was three weeks ago...I just started having this problem last week when our network admin updated Windows. Every computer in my school (WI School for the Blind and VI) has NVDA installed, and everyone is contacting me to report/solve the issue. Has there been any change yet and if so, is there anything I can do to resolve it? So far everything I've tried everything I can think of (even installing a previous version of NVDA) and nothing has worked. Suggestions are most appreciated :)

Answer 5 · 2019-07-18T20:59:32.000Z

cc: @feerrenrut

Answer 6 · 2019-07-20T17:07:42.000Z

Hello, As far as I know the only thing you could do right now is that after you use NVDA to enter your password, then quit NVDA before pressing enter to log in. Thanks, Brandon

…

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On Jul 18, 2019, at 3:59 PM, Adriani90 ***@***.***> wrote: cc: @feerrenrut — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

Answer 7 · 2019-07-20T19:20:36.000Z

This is comical. I decided to test your problem. On my system running 1903, which always starts NVDA after logon, I entered general settings to turn the option off. Only to find that it already was! So, on beta-18133 (latest), I can definitely replicate this bug.

Answer 8 · 2019-07-20T19:27:50.000Z

btman16 wrote:

As far as I know the only thing you could do right now is that after you use NVDA to enter your password, then quit NVDA before pressing enter to log in.

That doesn't actually work.

Answer 9 · 2019-07-20T20:15:00.000Z

Hi,

Brandon's workaround won't work because this scenario will repeat after a restart.

Having confirmed this on another computer, I'm thinking this may have to do with registry. The fact that this problem doesn't show up if "use NVDA on the logon screen" checkbox (Settings/General) is unchecked suggests something is going on with Ease of Access portion of Windows Registry. Specifically:

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Accessibility determines whether or not NVDA will start after you log in.
Replacing "HKCU" with "HKLM" gets us to secure screens.

At the source code level, I recommend looking at config/__init__.py and easeOfAccess.py

Thanks.

Answer 10 · 2019-07-20T20:26:17.000Z

I assumed it had something to do with Ease of Access controls, but couldn't figure out what.

Answer 11 · 2019-07-20T23:30:25.000Z

I totally appreciate all the feedback guys! I’m in Assistive Technology specialist, not a network administrator, so this kind of thing is totally outside of my wheelhouse. I forwarded your comments onto our network administrator and hope he will be able to implement the solution.

Answer 12 · 2019-07-20T23:33:56.000Z

Hi, when you do tell the IT professional, please let this person know that Microsoft and NV Access were notified, and the solution proposed (turning off starting NVDA from secure screens) has a side effect of preventing NVDA from speaking in places such as User Account Control. Thanks.

Answer 13 · 2019-07-20T23:45:07.000Z

Will do! Sounds like if this truly is implemented that our school may wish to use narrator for secure logon screens to prevent future issues. I certainly appreciate your help

Answer 14 · 2019-07-20T23:50:30.000Z

Hi, not so fast, actually: it was noted that, according to Brandon, if Narrator is enabled from secure screens, Narrator will come up after one logs in even though it is told not to. Provided that this is indeed the case, I advise against implementing it, as this is something that should be looked at by Microsoft (hopefully by later this year or early next year if the fix makes it to a cumulative update for 1903, part of 19H2, or resolved in 20H1). Thanks.

Answer 15 · 2019-07-20T23:59:38.000Z

Well now I know why am I not a network administrator... this is way too much thinking for a Saturday night ...

Answer 16 · 2019-07-21T02:45:02.000Z

But will they? If I understand things correctly, Microsoft intends this behavior. If you look at the Narrator section in Ease of Access, the control to use Narrator on secure screens, makes pretty clear that it will cause Narrator to work everywhere, on all accounts. "Start Narrator for everyone before log-in." At least, that's my understanding of the option. I'm unwilling to try it on the system I have available right now, for fear of fuing it bar for good and all. It would seem that the same effect is occurring with NVDA. It's a one size fits all solution--exactly MS's style. They seem to be anticipating that only one screen reader will be needed on the system at any one time. Having the annoying side effect described in this thread. Or maybe I'm wrong--like I said, I'm unwilling to test to the depth I would like. Maybe someone has a VM they can play with and prove me wrong.:)

Answer 17 · 2019-07-21T03:04:40.000Z

Hi,

Perhaps. In short, that option performs NVDA's equivalent of starting from secure screens.

Technical: in order to understand this, we need to talk about sessions. Although Windows did support what's called "session space" for years (a session space is a range of system memory locations subject to context switches in order to give appearance of multi-user environment, which is prerequisite of Remote Desktop/Terminal Services (Windows internals, Fourth Edition)), it wasn't until Vista that sessions became more prominent (Windows Internals, Fifth Edition). That is, when Windows boots, it starts in session 0, which is used to manage services, certain global system processes, and as a side effect, used to display secure desktops such as User Account Controll; this is typically what is meant by secure screens. Session 1 and beyond refers to interactive user session. in effect, when using Windows, one is effectively using two sessions: normal user interface, and secure screens.

A subtle beneficiary of multiple sessions is Ease of Access. Because assistive technologies might be used from login and other secure (session 0) interfaces (including from logonui.exe), Ease of Access will check which AT executables should run before and after a user logs on. The way Ease of Access knows about it is through registry hive: HKLM (local machine) for session 0, HKCU (current user) for session 1 and beyond. This is the reason why one can run one screen reader before logging in and another while logged on, and that's precisely the intention behind the Narrator option noted above. This also explains why it takes a while for NVDA to speak User Account Control if it uses certain speech synthesizers because Ease of Access must run another copy of NVDA, this time from within secure desktop, and NVDA can detect it and fall back to system configuration and can remember that it is a secure copy via a flag.

As for Microsoft confirming this: yes, confirmed by a member of the Narrator team, and engineers are looking into this. I asked her (Narrator engineer) if this will impact 19H2 and 20H1, and no reply at the moment.

Thanks.

Answer 18 · 2019-07-21T03:42:46.000Z

Hi,

Update: apparently this affects 19H2 and 20H1 as well, which means this issue will haunt admins for a long time.

Thanks.

Answer 19 · 2019-07-29T20:33:51.000Z

Hi, this is Shou-Ching from Microsoft. I was wondering if I could gather some information on this issue. Things like:
(1) How many machines were affected?
(2) Does it repro 100% of the time? Does it repro after reboot?
(3) What are the OS version and configurations? [Multiple users? single users? password protected? domain joined? AT installed and their configuration? etc.)
(4) Briefly describe what happened? (Feel free to reply here or via the feedback hub's add more detail or conversation area).

Thank you very much for your help!
Shou-Ching Schilling
Windows Accessibility Community Champ
@SCMuiLan

Answer 20 · 2019-07-31T20:48:49.000Z

Good afternoon, My apologies for the delay in response. There is so much to do to get ready for the start of school in a few weeks! 1. It’s hard to say exactly how many machines were affected. There was no real rhyme or reason for why some machines were affected and some were not. 2. Yes, the problem would persist after a reboot or when settings were changed. Even an uninstall and reinstall would reproduce the same problem. At one time, I thought uninstalling NVDA, Rebooting, running Fusion (from Freedom Scientific/Vispero), shutting Fusion down, rebooting, then reinstalling NVDA would work, and it did for a while, but my guess is whatever I did was overwritten by an update or some sort or some other change because the fix lasted perhaps 7-10 days before the issue reoccurred. 3. We are a Center for the Blind and our computers are networked. Installs and updates of NVDA are “pushed out” by our network administrator. Users have a password protected roaming profile and can log into any PC with that profile and access their data (domain wcbvi). Most of those affected were using only one or maybe two computers (not logged in simultaneously) on the campus. We are using Windows 10.0.18362 on desktop Lenovo computers. 4. All of our computers are outfitted with NVDA running on the logon screen, but not once the user profile is loaded. The user profile determines whether NVDA or JAWS runs upon logging in. When the affected user logged into the affected PC, NVDA was on when logging in even though in the NVDA settings this option was not enabled. Even if the option was disabled and the computer rebooted, NVDA still started up when the user logged in. An idea that would work for institutions like ours would be to configure Narrator to speak on logon or secure screens and have a separate option for starting (or continuing) NVDA once the individual logs in to Windows. Currently it’s an all or nothing option, with Narrator speaking on the logon screen and once the user is logged on, but not having a separate setting for either option. I hope that made sense. Also, please know that I am not a network admin or programmer. My specialty is teaching use of assistive tech and doing evals as well as some occasional helpdesk and troubleshooting. So please forgive me if anything here is not clear or if I do not use the correct terminology. Thank you for following up! I’ve included my contact info below if you’d like to touch base and brainstorm. I’m always open to learning and sharing knowledge with others! Have a wonderful Wednesday! Amy Snow Amy Snow Certified Assistive Technology Instructional Specialist Teacher of the Visually Impaired 1700 W State Street Janesville, WI 53546 Phone: 608 758 6157 Fax: 608 758 6169 amy.snow@wcbvi.k12.wi.us<mailto:amy.snow@wcbvi.k12.wi.us> Check out our AT Loan Library!<https://www.wcbvi.k12.wi.us/outreach/at-loan/>

Answer 21 · 2019-08-01T08:40:34.000Z

Hi Amy,
Thank you very much for taking the time to gather this information. It is very clear and very useful. Thank you!

Thanks for the offer to provide further assistance. I will get in touch with you via email if I need more information, or if I have something to update.
Have a good day!

Shou-Ching
Windows Accessibility Community Champ

Answer 22 · 2019-08-05T14:13:59.000Z

Good morning!
My network admin requested that I throw this question out there:
Does anyone know how to do a silent uninstall of NVDA
Thanks for any help you can provide!

Answer 23 · 2019-08-05T14:40:23.000Z

Hello, To do a silent install of NVDA, I believe you put --install-silent at the end of the command. In order to achieve this, you'd have to launch it from either the run dialog (windows key+R) or Command Prompt. So if the file is called nvda-2019.1.1.exe then you would put: nvda-2019.1.1.exe --install-silent if I remember correctly. Does that make sense? Thanks, Brandon

…

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On Aug 5, 2019, at 10:14 AM, snowflake-tvi ***@***.***> wrote: Good morning! My network admin requested that I throw this question out there: Does anyone know how to do a silent uninstall of NVDA Thanks for any help you can provide! — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

Answer 24 · 2019-08-05T18:54:28.000Z

Great thanks! I'm guessing for an uninstall you'd just replace the word install with uninstall in the command line? Totally appreciate the help!

Answer 25 · 2019-08-05T19:15:13.000Z

Hello, Unfortunately, I'm not certain that this will work. I think you'll have to do it through Programs and Features in Control Panel. Thanks, Brandon

…

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On Aug 5, 2019, at 2:54 PM, snowflake-tvi ***@***.***> wrote: Great thanks! I'm guessing for an uninstall you'd just replace the word install with uninstall in the command line? Totally appreciate the help! — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

Answer 26 · 2019-09-06T17:47:09.000Z

[Update] We included a fix for this AT startup issue in the Windows Insiders Preview build 18975 released today (aka.ms/wip18975): "We fixed a bug where assistive technology (e.g. Narrator, Magnifier, NVDA) were starting after sign-in when only the before sign-in setting was set."
If any of you are part of the Windows Insider Program, we would really appreciate it if you could update to this build and see if the fix resolves the issue. Thanks!!!

Shou-Ching Schilling
Windows Accessibility Community Champ

Answer 27 · 2019-09-06T17:49:52.000Z

Hi, two questions: what was the cause of this issue, and will this be backported to 1903 and 1909? Thanks. From: SCSchilling1 <notifications@github.com> Sent: Friday, September 6, 2019 10:47 AM To: nvaccess/nvda <nvda@noreply.github.com> Cc: Joseph Lee <joseph.lee22590@gmail.com>; Comment <comment@noreply.github.com> Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] On Windows 10 1903 NVDA starts after logon even when this is disabled (#9528) [Update] We included a fix for this AT startup issue in the Windows Insiders Preview build 18975 released today (aka.ms/wip18975): "We fixed a bug where assistive technology (e.g. Narrator, Magnifier, NVDA) were starting after sign-in when only the before sign-in setting was set." If any of you are part of the Windows Insider Program, we would really appreciate it if you could update to this build and see if the fix resolves the issue. Thanks!!! Shou-Ching Schilling Windows Accessibility Community Champ — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#9528?email_source=notifications&email_token=AB4AXEA7QAC6LKVGIH6EEPTQIKJSBA5CNFSM4HJOZJB2YY3PNVWWK3TUL52HS4DFVREXG43VMVBW63LNMVXHJKTDN5WW2ZLOORPWSZGOD6DSCTA#issuecomment-528949580> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AB4AXEFU352I53S4FLQPVOTQIKJSBANCNFSM4HJOZJBQ> .

Answer 28 · 2019-09-07T04:54:24.000Z

I don't have answers for these two questions right now. I will see if I can find out.
Thanks,
Shou-Ching

Answer 29 · 2019-09-07T04:57:13.000Z

Hi, if the answer to the second question is “yes”, that’ll suffice for everyone. Thanks (won’t close this issue for a while). From: SCSchilling1 <notifications@github.com> Sent: Friday, September 6, 2019 9:54 PM To: nvaccess/nvda <nvda@noreply.github.com> Cc: Joseph Lee <joseph.lee22590@gmail.com>; Comment <comment@noreply.github.com> Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] On Windows 10 1903 NVDA starts after logon even when this is disabled (#9528) I don't have answers for these two questions right now. I will see if I can find out. Thanks, Shou-Ching — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#9528?email_source=notifications&email_token=AB4AXEG3FDL5LQBTIWYT7ZTQIMXYHA5CNFSM4HJOZJB2YY3PNVWWK3TUL52HS4DFVREXG43VMVBW63LNMVXHJKTDN5WW2ZLOORPWSZGOD6EQGRY#issuecomment-529072967> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AB4AXECMTAQN75XJGXLSWITQIMXYHANCNFSM4HJOZJBQ> .

Answer 30 · 2019-09-11T07:45:43.000Z

I wonder, does toggling NVDA"s start at logon and after logon help if done from the ease of access center? Control panel > ease of access > sign in settings

Answer 31 · 2019-09-12T02:34:29.000Z

Hi, No, that didn’t work when I tried it before. Thanks, Brandon

…

On Sep 11, 2019, at 3:45 AM, Leonard de Ruijter ***@***.***> wrote: I wonder, does toggling NVDA"s start at logon and after logon help if done from the ease of access center? Control panel > ease of access > sign in settings — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#9528?email_source=notifications&email_token=AD6UHRXYMWCMLDFRTSURKVLQJCO3NA5CNFSM4HJOZJB2YY3PNVWWK3TUL52HS4DFVREXG43VMVBW63LNMVXHJKTDN5WW2ZLOORPWSZGOD6NS4YI#issuecomment-530263649>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AD6UHRU4O3OYI5HNLQZGMELQJCO3NANCNFSM4HJOZJBQ>.

Answer 32 · 2019-10-03T16:08:49.000Z

Hi everyone, Even though we don't know yet whether the fix for this issue will get backported to 1903/1909, I believe I've identified the cause of the issue, which Joseph was asking about. Back in 1903 preview build 18334 there was a known issue where if Magnifier was set to docked mode, and set to load after sign in the machine would enter a reboot loop. I think this only happened if Magnifier was also set to start at sign in. Do you notice the trend? The immediate issue was fixed in the following build, but the fix to that bug caused this to start screen readers when they shouldn't. There isn't much more we as users can really do at this point and it comes down to the fact that Microsoft needs to do more thorough testing. Sincerely, Brandon Tyson

…

Sent from my iPhone On Sep 11, 2019, at 3:45 AM, Leonard de Ruijter <notifications@github.com> wrote: I wonder, does toggling NVDA"s start at logon and after logon help if done from the ease of access center? Control panel > ease of access > sign in settings — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

Answer 33 · 2019-10-03T18:20:11.000Z

Hi, everyone,
Thanks for your patience. I don't have anything to update. I am monitoring this issue closely and will post an update in three weeks or so.

Thanks,
Shou-Ching Schilling
Windows Accessibility Community Champ

Answer 34 · 2019-10-24T18:07:37.000Z

Hi,

Resolved via KB4522355 (build 18362.449) based on changelog for the optional cumulative update. Closing as fixed externally.

Thanks.

Answer 35 · 2019-10-24T21:34:14.000Z

Thank you for bringing this issue to our attention.
As Joseph said, the fix is in KB4522355 (OS Build 18362.449),
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4522355

Shou-Ching
Windows Accessibility Champ