15 iPhone Gestures to Know When Using VoiceOver

By Matthew Bullis

Although there are several more gestures used by Voiceover users, I’ve chosen fifteen of the most common gestures that you’ll want to know to get started. See our blog article on the various VoiceOver tutorials to get started with the interface, and then practice these until they become second-nature.

Terms Defined:

Swipe: a dragging motion across the screen.

Flick: a short brush on the screen, so that your finger is already moving when it touches the screen Use a light touch. You don’t need to press hard to invoke a gesture. Be sure that the IPhone can detect that your fingers are spread apart enough to recognize them as more than one finger.

• Four-finger double tap: start and stop voiceover gesture help

• One-finger single tap: locates an item on the screen

• One finger double tap: selects the last item in focus. You Can also hold one finger on a selected item and tap once with another finger, a split tap, to select that item.

• Two-finger single tap: pauses voiceover speech until something on the screen changes

• Two-finger double tap: answers and hangs up phone calls, pauses and plays music, etc. You can also use this in a text field and then speak, without needing to find the Dictate button

• Two-finger double tap and hold: lets you label an unlabeled button in an app

• Three-finger double tap: turns just the speech component of VoiceOver off, good for using VoiceOver with a braille display, or muting speech while listening to other audio.

• Three-finger triple tap: turns screen curtain on and off, blanks screen against sighted eyes when VO is on, but doesn’t save any battery life. (Turn brightness to zero to save battery life.)

• Two-finger swipe down: reads from where you are to the end of the screen

• Two-finger swipe up, reads the whole screen

• Two-finger back and forth flick: activates a back button on the screen

• Two-finger twist left or right: changes the rotor setting

• Flick up and down with one finger: change the value of the current rotor setting

• Flick left and right with one finger: moves one element at a time on the screen, which is better than just sliding your finger around and missing elements

• Three-finger up down left and right: scrolls through screens, so it’s an opposite gesture for an action, like three-finger left swipe to move one page to the right, like turning actual book pages 

Project Starfish, A Unique Hope for the Future

By: Matthew Bullis
While attending the 29th annual CSUN technology conference in San Diego, one of the stand-out presentations for me was that given by Laura Gillson from Project Starfish.

The presentation’s title: A Creative Approach To Help Bridge The Employment Gap, was not a vague concept, as other similar ideas have been in the past. Rather, these entrepreneurs are blind and visually impaired themselves, and wish to provide meaningful and screen reader-accessible employment for those who are willing to put forth the hard work. The organization works to provide the applicant with the skills needed to conduct themselves in professional settings. While Project Starfish doesn’t exactly supply jobs, they do connect their applicants with companies who are aware of the abilities and talents inherent in the disability community. The contract work is done in the employee’s home using their technology and related skills, and may or may not exceed the earnings limit for Social Security program benefits. Should the applicant wish to enroll with Project Starfish, they will be taken through a process of preparedness, including resume writing, interviewing skills, etc., with the goal of employing them with one of the many contractors who need the skill type provided. Most of the contracted businesses are small start-up companies, and since the majority of this work is done in home, the work can come from, and be performed, anywhere in the world. Project Starfish has been setting up satellite offices in several countries, with more expansion to follow. With an organization with these goals in mind, and with employees who wish to work hard and put forth the effort, I hope this will provide many blind individuals with hours of meaningful work in future.

www.PStarfish.org

Bloom HD App

The use of technology and applications has been vital in helping our teachers create a learning environment for their students. By using apps such as "Bloom HD" they can create new experiences and sensations for each child

By: Opal Limited Price: $3.99 

Description: This app is a sensory tool for many of our teachers. The app gives off a colorful and interactive display that shifts and moves with each touch of the screen. Each touch creates a new wave of circles and a small bell like sound. One of our preschool teachers, Jule Belifuss, had this to say about the app:
"The Bloom HD app is a frequent favorite in our classroom. Our students often have a very light touch and this app is perfect, as only a very light touch is needed. A single, soft bell sound per touch is heard. Simultaneously, a small colored circle appears that grows bigger and bigger.  The drawback is that the contrast between the colored circle and the background decreases as the ball gets bigger. This app is great  for students who are light sensitive, but others may need the classroom lights off for best visibility."

 Bloom HD is compatible for low vision, and  sighted.

National Library Service's BARD iOS App

By Matthew Bullis

Near the same time iOS7 was released, the National Library Service released its talking book reading app--BARD--for the line of i-devices. BARD stands for Braille and Audio Reading Download. Prior to this application’s release, users of the digital talking book program had to order cartridges through the mail, or download desired books from the BARD site to thumb drives for use in the player. Now it is possible (once you sign up for an account) to access content solely through the iPhone. Everything provided through this interface is free, and the app is well-designed. Because of the population it serves, which is U.S. visually-impaired residents, there is an extensive help file which is always accessible from within the app. It’s recommended that users read this through as they may learn tips and tricks for a better experience. More talking books are being added daily, both new titles, as well as older conversions from cassettes. These books are unique to the blind population, as many of the narrators read exclusively for the talking book program. Since contracted braille files (instead of "letter-for-letter" uncontracted braille) are also part of the collection, users with a connectable braille display can enjoy these titles as well. VoiceOver cannot read contracted braille, so users without a display will be limited to the talking books. This first version is quite robust and the NLS team are committed to making sure that problems are fixed, and that updates are forthcoming.

Which VoiceOver Tutorial Should You Use to Get Started?

By Matthew Bullis

At this writing, there are three ways you can learn about how to use VoiceOver on the I device of your choice. Apple has a built-in practice gesture area, where you can make a gesture and find out what it’s supposed to do. This also works if you’ve paired a braille display and need to know what combinations of keys do. Then came VOStarter at the end of 2012. This app presented a menu of choices where you could either progress through the tutorial, learning about different gestures, or practice the ones you’re not too sure of. Now LookTel, who released a great money identifier and a bar code scanner/item identifier, releases VOTutorial, which is a screen by screen test with long descriptions of how to perform needed gestures. It even includes two games for gesture practice, basketball and crack the safe. With all of these app choices, and with only one of them, VOStarter, costing a dollar, you’d do well to use all three applications. Each one has something that none of the others do. Apple’s practice screen lets you find out a gesture the other way round, after you make it, and the games are enjoyable for more than one play inside of VOTutorial, and VOStarter has screens on more advanced gestures that VOTutorial doesn’t cover. With all three applications, there are multiple ways to absorb the material and the learning curve of VoiceOver itself.

Sendero GPS LookAround

By Matthew Bullis

App Details

By:  Sendero Group, LLC

Price:  $4.99

Devices:  Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.  Requires iOS 4.2 or later.

Description:  This $5 app is aptly named, as it’s not actually a complete GPS solution. It will tell you where you are, and you can ascertain the nearest cross street, but you cannot get step-by-step directions to where you want to go. Simply shake the phone and get localized information, sorted by category if you like. You’ll not be able to input an address and find the distance to that point though. LookAround is just what it does, so that you can apply what the app tells you to your surroundings. Use this as one of several tools in your mobility arsenal. You’ll probably want a more robust solution if you’re doing a lot of navigating to unfamiliar places.

Sendero GPS LookAround is compatible for blind, low vision, and sighted.

Pros

• Low price of $5 to get information about your surroundings
• Accessibility will always be built in, since Sendero is a blindness-specific company

Cons

• Not a complete GPS solution
• Does not include turn-by-turn navigation
• Unable to put in an address and be directed to it

Review of V O Starter for the Iphone

By Matthew Bullis

App Details

By:  Michael Doise

Price:  $0.99

Devices:  Compatible with iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, iPod touch (3rd, 4th, and 5th generation), and iPad.  Requires iOS 5.0 or later.  This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Description:  This $.99 app, pronounced V O Starter, available in the App Store, lets new users to the VoiceOver interface get to know how VoiceOver changes the way you interact with the screen. With a step-by-step user wizard, plus a menu interface to alternatively let you choose the practice session you wish, you can learn how to use different gestures to make the most of your IPhone or I device experience. This app is what really should be included in Apple’s Practice Gestures part of the operating system, since the existing practice area necessitates you knowing something about gestures already, in order to get into that screen.

If you’re relatively comfortable with the use of VoiceOver, perhaps you’ve not come across pickers or switches before. VOStarter has a screen for those features to let you test those out. You get a challenge when you’re using the entering text screen, since VoiceOver doesn’t speak the exact thing you’re supposed to type in, including the space character and the exclamation point, but you do get the hang of learning how to type and select characters. Apart from this small stumbling block, you learn quite a lot about how to control your I device with VoiceOver, and there’s not too much else to say, except that this app teaches you well and quickly, so you can continue on and be productive in other ways.

VOStarter is compatible for blind and low vision.

Pros

• Covers the use of a few gestures that the Looktel app does not

Cons

• Not free like Apple's gesture screen or the Looktel app
• Trouble with the typing screen for new users
• No games to test your practice