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Re: insight re Android accessibility from a blind user

for

From: Jonathan C. Cohn
Date: Apr 8, 2013 10:33AM

Records unless Fleksy has changed price again, it is now free. I used it to type this message.
nt from my iPhone

On Apr 8, 2013, at 12:28 PM, Jim Allan < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

> Birkir,
> You don't always have access to a keyboard. I have a friend, who is totally
> blind, who uses Fleksy (http://fleksy.com/) and is up to 20 words per
> minutes on the touch screen keyboard. She says it is a bit pricy $15, but
> well worth the speed. I watched, slack jawed in amazement, as she typed a
> long sentence and didn't hit any letter correctly. She said the sentence
> would read "......" and that is exactly what it said.
>
> Jim
>
>
> On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 8:11 PM, Birkir R. Gunnarsson <
> <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>
>> I thought I was of the same opinion as you guys, and I am by no means
>> an Apple fan (I don't like to commit to one technology or one way of
>> doing things)in any way, but once I did pick up the iPhone and
>> listened to one podcast on how to use it, it truly became simple for
>> me (this was the iPhone 4, tested nothing before that).
>> The thing with touchscreen devices and devices like the iPhone, is
>> that Apple pretty much had to invent a touchscreen accessible
>> interface from scratch, none of us have ever used a touchscreen device
>> ever, and we deep down are afraid that it is impossible (well,
>> speaking for myself anyway).
>> Now, once you pick up an iPhone, turn on Voiceover by triple clicking
>> the round home button on the bottom, you really just have to remember
>> flicking a finger to the right to go to next item on the page, left to
>> go to previous item, double tap to activate an item, press the round
>> home button to go back (a bit like the escapte key), and flick up or
>> down with a finger to invoke special actions (like delete in the mail
>> app).
>> There are a few extra gestures that are more advanced, and they take
>> time, but this is pretty much all you have to remember initially.
>> I do agree that Apple have not done a great job of teaching the
>> touchscreen with Voiceover users how to operate the phone, I found
>> podcasts from Vision Australia that got me into it, but I do give
>> Apple credit for having done pretty well with inventing a pretty
>> usable touchscreen interface more or less out of the blue.
>> I still can't stand touch typing, use external Bluetooth keyboard,
>> braille display or the braille touch app for input most of the time,
>> and I am not in any way saying this is perfect, but if you dig up an
>> iPhone, the podcast, and just go for an hour of two of experimenting,
>> you might be surprised (you might not, I am not saying what worked for
>> me will or will not work for someone else, but I do recognize the
>> feeling that this possibly cannot work, but then it was quickly
>> dismissed when I started playing).
>> So definitely don't be shy to give it a shot, and see if you like it.
>> No guarantee that you will or you should, but you might.
>> Cheers
>> -B
>> P.s. just to reiterate it, I don't want to be associated with
>> everything is so wonderful from Apple crowd. This is not perfect and I
>> can see how people have issues with their overly tight control over
>> their interface (for one thing I have, along with their dealers in
>> Iceland, been trying to get Apple to install an Icelandic TTS voice on
>> their iOS line of devices for years .. they do not allow third party
>> TTS apps except inside applications, but so far with absolutely no
>> feedback, success or glimpse of hope, and it irritates me to no end
>> that a company assumes this tight a control over its interface, making
>> it unusable to a whole nation).
>>
>> On 4/7/13, Lucy Greco < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>>> Thanks for the assurance that it's not just me smile I hate some of
>> these
>>> new devices.
>>>
>>> Lucia Greco
>>> Web Access Analyst
>>> IST-Campus Technology Services
>>> University of California, Berkeley
>>> (510) 289-6008 skype: lucia1-greco
>>> http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
>>> Follow me on twitter @accessaces
>>>
>>>
>>>