[Electronics-talk] Hi allNeed some help

[Becky]

I need some help ASAP. I just purchase a Mack laptop. My windows laptop broke. Having trouble with it. Some reason it will not get out of table formate and will not connect to my wireless.
Becky

Sent from my iPhone

On Apr 7, 2013, at 6:21 PM, "Fred Wurtzel" <f.wurtzel at att.net> wrote:

Hello,

I really like your list of "shortcomings."  I agree that it would be a better device if the things you list were available.  Having said that, I am a goggle-eyed Apple enthusiast.  It isn't popular or cool to be a raving fan of very much these days, but for me, someone who remembers when cassette tapes were first available for general use, I find my iPod an absolutely amazing device.

Just last night, I was able to listen to the final 4 games.  I listened to the local broadcast from Wichita and the ESPN Dial broadcast from Atlanta, on my iPod.  They were not broadcast locally.  The Dial version of the Michigan game was fantastic.


Not to run on, but I'll run on a little more.  Being able to get restaurant guides, having a word processor, a bill identifier, a music player a clock and timer, and on and on and on, never mind news, Twitter and email all in my shirt pocket is so science-fiction for me.  I'm so glad to have lived long enough to have seen these advancements for blind people.  

I will be shoulder to shoulder with you to continue to advocate for progress and not backslide in accessibility, but to see how far we have come is such a delight for me.

Warm Regards,

Fred

-----Original Message-----
From: Electronics-talk [mailto:electronics-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Christopher Chaltain
Sent: Sunday, April 07, 2013 3:07 AM
To: Discussion of accessible electronics and appliances
Subject: Re: [Electronics-talk] Good article on android versus iOS accessibility.

Well, I think statements like "paled in comparison" and "left a lot to be desired", although they are historically accurate, indicate a bias since they could have been reworded or just not mentioned altogether because the article is a current comparison and not a historical comparison. Like I said, it seemed like a fair assessment to me, and I agree, he's very clear he's a happy iPhone user, so he isn't hiding anything. I don't have a problem with this bias, and maybe I shouldn't even call it a bias, but the article is written by someone who clearly sees Android as the challenger.

Some shortcomings I see with the iPhone with respect to accessibility
include:

* The problem with Voice Over and call volumes. (I see quite a few iPhone users recommending that people use their headphones when making a call where they'll need to also access something on their iPhone, like the dial pad.)
* The inability to accurately label objects. (I know this used to work, but it's pretty obvious something was broken in IOS 6, and this still hasn't' been fixed.)
* VoiceOver doesn't announce the state of calendars in the built in calendar app, so you can't tell which calendars you've selected to be displayed. (Again, this used to work but still hasn't been addressed in multiple updates to IOS 6.)
* The lack of a user definable pronunciation dictionary for Voice Over.
* The inability to use other speech synthesizers or even have apps share common speech synthesizers.

Other short comings I see in the iPhone that aren't related to accessibility include:

* The fact that I can't access the file system on my iPhone or access it as a removable volume from my PC. This forces me to use iTunes and other cumbersome work arounds to get data on and off my phone.
* The lack of SD card support.
* The limited number of form factors, no keyboard option for example.
* The inability to change defaults, such as making Chrome my default browser instead of Safari. In fact, this is why Mozilla isn't interested in porting Firefox to IOS.

Note that I don't expect the iPhone or it's accessibility to be perfect, and I'm not saying the issues with the iPhone's accessibility are on the same par with the accessibility issues that still exist on Android, but I just want to point out that the iPhone and it's accessibility isn't perfect, at least in my opinion.

I also don't think that Android's accessibility will ever be on par with Apple's, let alone surpass it. It's chasing, and as long as it's chasing it'll never catch Apple. The reason the progress in Android's accessibility has been so dramatic over the last few years is that it's coming from such a low point. Apple's accessibility is a more integral part of the operating system, and they aren't sitting still. The only way Android will catch up and pass IOS with respect to accessibility is if there's a paradigm change or Google comes up with something that is as innovative as what Apple came up with when they came out with VoiceOver for the touch screen.

On 04/06/2013 09:53 AM, Jim Barbour wrote:
> Hey Christopher,
> 
> I'm also a long time iPhone user who tries out Android from time to 
> time because I like knowing what's out there.  As I mentioned already, 
> Marco's article aligns pretty well with my own experiences.
> 
> I'd really be curious to know other people's thoughts on  shortcomings 
> in the iPhone.  The ones I can think of are speed, price, lack of 
> physical keyboard, lack of ability to install my own keyboards, and 
> some features i would only get by jailbreaking the iPhone.  Do you 
> find other shortcomings in the iPhone?
> 
> I'm not sure how you find bias in his article.  It does seem clear.
> that he likes the iPhone better than Android. However, it would be 
> pretty hard to find someone who "likes them both equally."  I think 
> the history he points out is pretty valid, and doesn't necessarily 
> indicate bias.  I suspect Marco and I would agree that the iPhone is 
> still ahead of android on accessibility, but that android is making 
> accessibility progress much faster than the iPhone is.  If Google can 
> keep it up, then android will soon equal or surpass the iPhone.  My 
> big question is can Google keep it up?
> 
> Jim
> 
> On Sat, Apr 06, 2013 at 01:50:31AM -0500, Christopher Chaltain wrote:
>> Looks like a good summary of some points where Android's 
>> accessibility isn't up to par with Apple's. He's going beyond just 
>> some accessibility issues though, and some of the issues he brings up 
>> won't be important to every smart phone user.
>> 
>> He seems pretty happy with his iPhone, so I wonder why he's even 
>> looking at Android. The historical points he brings up about 
>> Android's lack of accessibility reads like there might be a bias here 
>> against Android, although I suspect his evaluation was pretty fair. 
>> If your only criteria in comparing the two platforms is going to be 
>> accessibility then I think it's pretty well understood that Apple has 
>> the lead here, and there's no reason to switch. I think it would be 
>> more interesting to hear from someone who has a compelling reason to 
>> use Android and how accessible they find the platform.
>> 
>> I also note that he didn't point out a single short coming of the 
>> iPhone and it's accessibility. I'd be curious to know how Android 
>> handles some of the situations where I find the iPhone lacking.
>> 
>> On 04/05/2013 10:05 PM, Jim Barbour wrote:
>>> This article tracked pretty well with my results on android. I'd be curious how others felt.
>>> 
>>> Jim
>>> 
>>> Switching to Android full-time – an experiment | Marco’s 
>>> accessibility blog 
>>> http://www.marcozehe.de/2013/04/05/switching-to-android-full-time-an
>>> -experiment/
>>> 
>>> A few weeks ago, I decided to conduct an experiment. I wanted to determine if Android 4.2.2 “Jelly Bean” was finally ready for me to switch to full-time, away from an iPhone.
>>> 
>>> Background
>>> 
>>> I’ve been an iPhone user for four years, ever since the original iPhone 3G S came out with VoiceOver support in June 2009. What Apple did back then was revolutionary, completely opening up a wealth of apps and services to people with vision impairments without the need to purchase extra assistive technologies at prices that were again the amount of the phone they were supposed to make accessible. Instead, VoiceOver, the screen reader for iOS, was bundled with the operating system for free.
>>> 
>>> At the same time, Google also announced first steps in accessibility for Android. But this paled by comparison, offering little more than a command shell for the Android platform with some speech output.
>>> 
>>> Later, TalkBack came about and gave at least some access to Android apps in Android 2.x. However, this access was still very limited compared to Apple’s model, as Jamie Teh points out in a blog post.
>>> 
>>> In October 2011, Android 4.0 AKA Ice Cream Sandwich came out, and compared to what was offered in previous versions, was a big step forward in terms of accessibility. Not quite there yet, as this AFB review spells out, it offered touch screen access for the first time, more than two years after Apple came out with VoiceOver, and with a model that still left a lot to be desired.
>>> 
>>> The biggest step forward came in June 2012, when Google announced Android 4.1 AKA Jelly Bean. With it came a revised model of touch screen access, called Explore By Touch, that closely resembles the model Apple, and now also Microsoft, have employed. Similar gestures allow for easy transition between platforms.
>>> 
>>> We had just started work on accessible Firefox for Android, and Jelly Bean meant that we had to add quite some magic to make it work. But we did, and the warm reception and good feedback from the blind and low vision community has been humbling and inspirational!
>>> 
>>> So when with Android 4.2, and especially the 4.2.2 updates, the gesture recognition seemed to solidify and become more reliable, I decided that it was time to give Android a serious chance to replace my iPhone as my regular smartphone device. I was also inspired by this MACWORLD podcast episode, where Andy Ihnatko talks about his switch from an iPhone 4S to an Android device, not from an accessibility, but from a general usability point of view. After all, Android has matured quite a bit, and I wanted to take advantage of that and finally use Firefox for Android full-time!
>>> 
>>> First steps
>>> 
>>> So on the 23rd of March, I got my shiny new Nexus 4. I decided to go for a Google phone because those get the latest updates of Android fastest. Moreover, they come with a stock user interface, nothing home-grown like the HTC Sense or Samsung Galaxy devices have. On my partner’s HTC One, for example, a TalkBack user cannot even use the dial pad to enter a phone number.
>>> 
>>> The hardware is quite OK. The phone feels solid, the glass surface on the front and back feel smooth and pleasant to the touch. The phone quality is a bit muffled both on the sending as well as the receiving end. My best friend who has a slight hearing problem had trouble understanding me. The speaker on the back also leaves a bit to be desired, esp since the speaker in the iPhone 4S that I am used to is quite good. I also found out during the course of my testing that I have occasional problems with Wifi connections becoming very slow, download rates plunging or downloads breaking up alltogether. Deleting and re-adding the access point entry seems to have, at least temporarily, fixed the issue. This is also being discussed lively in the Android project issue tracker, so is nothing specific to my device alone.
>>> 
>>> I was betrayed of the initial setup experience. No matter what I tried, the gesture that was described in the Jelly Bean accessibility guide for both the Nexus 4 and Nexus 7 devices, didn’t work. TalkBack would not start at all. So my sighted partner had to do that setup for me. We could then turn on TalkBack. After an update to Jelly Bean 4.2.2, we could also enable the quick button and gesture sequence to turn on TalkBack while the phone is running regularly. This experience did not leave that good of an impression with me.
>>> 
>>> Setting up accounts was a breeze. To be more flexible, I got my calendars and contacts off of iCloud and store them in an OwnCloud installation at my web space provider’s server. I didn’t want to go the Google Contacts route beca