Product Review
iPhone Trick
I was having a lot of trouble using my iPhone. I could not get close to the phone while on a call. The phone display would be shut off by the sensor. This is a useful feature to keep the touch screen from acidently being pressed while holding the phone close to the head. I had to get close to see the address book or mail applications and every time I did I would be able to read the screen. I had to beat the sensor to get a peak.
I found a work around. When the earbuds are plugged in, the screen sensor will not shut off the display. So if I neeed an address while on a call, I plug in my ear phones. I would rather have a preference setting to turn the sensor on or off. Maybe in iPhone 3.0.
Amazon Commits to Kindle Accessibility
Amazon has openly discussed supporting additional accessibility features for low vision users of the Kindle. Some of my requests include:
- Provide low light support – provide a white background for higher contrast.
- Allow for larger font size selections.
- Support font enlargement for lists and menu items.
- Provide text-to-speech support for menu items.
- Ensure that the Author’s Guild does not impact any of the existing text-to-speech features.
I encourage any and all who feel strongly about keeping the text-to-speech feature in Kindle to contact the Author’s Guild via email, or use the below contact information.
The Authors Guild
31 East 32nd Street, 7th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Phone: (212) 563-5904
Fax: (212) 564-5363
The Mythical Apple iPad
There have been many blog posts in the last few days suggesting that Applie is working on a new mobile device. CNET had a very good summary article of these posts this morning. Some of the articles even have mocked up art work suggesting what the device looks like. This mid-sized mobile device is reported to be bigger than an iPhone, but smaller than a Mac Book. Some have named the device, the iPad, a device that’s more portable than notebooks and lacks a keyboard.
It would be great if someone could produce a mobile device that could replace a collection of devices we typically use now. Such a device could be very helpful to low vision users: It would be great if the iPad had these features:
- A higher resolution and larger touch screen to better display images and videos.
- Enhanced touch screen gestures that to eliminate visual buttons, icons and user interface controls.
- Enhanced screen technology to work in both low light and bright light environments.
- Enhanced on-screen keyboard support for application specific situations.
- Superior speech-to-text and text-to-speech application interfaces.
- Higher function zoom application support for all applications.
- A pedestrian and vehicle mode real time GPS application
- Support for Mac OS and the App Store for new applications.
- Support for both Sony and Kindle book reader applications.
- Additional Safari browser shortcuts for low vision users, (such as pop-up tags to jump to primary focus areas of the page).
- Support for assistive technologies for WCAG 2.0.
This would be a really neat device and could reduce the load in our computer bags. Being a gadget nerd, I would buy it if the price were below $500. Apple would really have a hot item. The support for low vision users would benefit all users. Let’s hope the rumors are true.
iPhone 3.0 Accessibility
iPhone Mail screen
Apple has not yet released any iPhone 3.0 accessibility information. I love my iPhone, but I have some recommendations for improving the UI for low vision users.
- In the Mail app, why not allow users to zoom the header of the e-mail message. If a user needs to zoom the body, wouldn’t they need to zoom the header information?
- In the settings, why not allow the user to set the font size for all applications? Why only allow font size settings for just some of the applications?
- Add text to speech. It would be nice to have a screen reader.
- The youTube application could use closed captioning.
- The iPhone screen shuts off when close to your ear, (or face), when talking on the phone. This makes it hard for low vision users to use other applications while talking on the phone. I could plug in the ear phones to stop the screen from shutting off, but wouldn’t it be nice to have a setting to leave the screen on when using the phone?
- The Notes application could use some navigation help for low vision users.
- The Maps application could use a finger gesture magnifier, (like the one used to place the cursor in Mail).
- Maps could use voice navigation. You ask what for? Blind people don’t drive! (I have – it’s fun!) Well I navigate for other drivers a lot.
- I find the Blackberry text typing easier than with the iPhone. The Blackberry has a superior user defined dictionary for text replacement.
- There should be some application standards for button placement. For example, I find the Calendar buttons to close together at the top of the screen. I have trouble touching the “<” previous month button and the Calendars button. They are too close together. In other applications, the buttons are too small.
- Some of the application providers have selected low contrast UI elements. Standards are needed for this as well.
- It would be great if the App Store would designate applications as having met an “Accessibility” standard. Apple could help WIA write this standard.
Google Chrome – Some Nice New Features
Originally posted September 4, 2008
Jason Hiner of ZDNet posted a list of nice features of the beta Google Chrome web browser. I agree with his list of five best new features. I do have a couple of accessibility observations though.
- New Tab Page – features a page that shows thumbnails of your most visited Web sites, a list of your recent bookmarks, and a search box that allows you to search your history. Hopefully, the history tab has accessibility alt tag support for the thumbnails. This tab could be a handy navigation aid.
- Web Application Support – allows you to create desktop, start menu or quick launch icons for your web applications. Hopefully these icons are 508 compliant. This could be very helpful.
I hope this browser has assistive technology for the blind. The increased speed could help make usability better for the sighted and those with disabilities.
Nice Feature Contrasting Information
Originally posted August 29, 2008
Using contrasting gray scale to contrast information is very helpful. I like this use of contrasting color by the Safari browser team at Apple. Notice that the search words are highlighted in white and the first word found is in yellow. All other text has a gray background. This helps put things in context and helps the user find the search word quickly. This same feature could be used for other applications:
- Text editors – could use contrasting colors to help highlight the script construct being edited.
- Word processors – could use gray scale contrast to highlight the sentence and paragraph being edited or selected.
- Web Browsers – could highlight only the text or object being viewed, (as defined by the mouse pointer location).
- Photo editing software – could brighten the pixel area being edited and dim the rest of the photo.
- Code debuggers – could highlight the trace walk-back item and dim the other statements.
You get the idea. This feature should be optional. For many low vision users, contrast is a great way to pin-point something and make it obvious.