COOL BLIND TECH

Nova Launcher, which we wrote about a few months ago has just received a major 4.0 version release. If you look at the Play Store page for the app , you will find that the changes are mostly visual redesigns which align with the material philosophies of Android 5.0. read more

Late last month, We wrote about a brand new version of Talkback , Google’s screen reader for mobile devices. Fresh out of the Googleplex, it tried to fool us by using a minor version number which in reality included numerous major enhancements. read more

So, let’s start things off with a couple of questions… When was the last time you as a blind or visually impaired person went into your mobile carrier’s store and purchased a new device? What was the experience like? Was it smooth as silk or was it a bit awkward? If the latter, that’s typical when a sighted sales rep deals with a blind or visually impaired person. The experience I had yesterday, on the other hand could not have gone better, and I’d like to share it with you folks as an example of what the ideal interaction should be like between a blind/visually impaired customer and their mobile carrier.

By this point, Android users are quite accustomed to the version number of their beloved screen reader jumping from minor to major numbers without much consolation. For example, our jump from 3.5.x to 4.0 only introduced lollipop specific device compatibility, nothing too tangible for the average user. read more