[SC-CSTD] FW: [iDevices] TTJ Documentation for the VoiceOver class on October 11, 2023

Wed Oct 11 23:59:15 UTC 2023

-----Original Message-----
From: idevices at groups.io <idevices at groups.io> On Behalf Of Rita Howells
Sent: Wednesday, October 11, 2023 5:34 PM
To: idevices at groups.io
Subject: [iDevices] TTJ Documentation for the VoiceOver class on October 11, 2023

TTJ Documentation for the VoiceOver class on October 11, 2023

Topics:
Magic Tap gesture, Basic text entry on the on screen keyboard, Typing Styles, Emoji keyboard, Short cut phrases, Dictation options, 

Notes from the voiceover class, October 11, 2023.
Magic Tap:
a two finger double tap gesture will stop or start an action.  This is also called the "Magic Tap" gesture

discussed about the typing modes with the own screen keyboard on the iPhone. Talk about orientation to the letters on the QWERTY keyboard. Talked about how the voiceover cursor moves.
There are several typing modes:  standard, touch, typing, direct, touch typing, and there is also a slide to type option.
The typing mode for the person using voiceover is very much a personal preference. When I work with persons who are using voiceover, I recommend that slide to type is turned off, and the typing mode is set to Touch Typing.  This appears to be, the best for person learning voiceover on their Apple iOS devices.  I also suggest that “reachability” is turned off under settings, accessibility, and touch.
When double-tapping on a textfield, VoiceOver will generally announce that the field is, “Editing,” which means the keyboard is displayed near the bottom of the screen.  If it is a secure text field, like the kind used to input passwords and other sensitive data, VoiceOver will indicate a key pressed with a click sound, as opposed to echoing what is being typed.
The default iOS keyboard is laid out like a tactile Qwerty keyboard.
If you need to type numbers or symbols, double-tap the, “Numbers,” keyboard on the bottom left.  Use the, “Symbols,” keyboard if you need to type a symbol that is not on that keyboard.
As you type, a small strip just above the top of the keyboard, (just above the “I, O, and P letters) will be populated with words that iOS thinks you might be wanting (This is called Predictive text).  Double-tap a suggestion to insert it.  As you get more comfortable with the iOS keyboard, you can explore the different typing modes that VoiceOver offers, and decide what works best for you.

Typing modes:
To increase the ease of use of the iOS keyboard, VoiceOver offers three distinct typing modes, Standard Typing, Touch Typing, and Direct Touch Typing.  This can be changed by turning the rotor to Typing Mode and swiping up and down with one finger until you hear the mode you want.

Standard Typing is the default, where you must navigate to and double-tap or split-tap on keys.

Touch Typing allows you to move to a key and lift your finger to insert the letter that you are on.  This can help to improve typing speed as long as you don’t lift your finger too haphazardly on keys you don’t want to type.
Whenever you have the opportunity to enter text on your iPhone, a keyboard magically appears at the bottom of the screen. There are no actual keys on this keyboard, but there are places where you can tap and your selected character will be entered. Your phone is smart enough to know exactly where you are touching. The layout of the onscreen keyboard varies from app to app, and even with your phone's orientation. So, if you are being asked to enter your email address, look around on the bottom row of the keyboard and you will very likely find an at sign. The Delete key is below the L and the Return key is below the Delete key. In general, the keyboard has three rows of letters but no numbers. To get numbers, activate the Numbers key near the lower left corner of the keyboard. The top row of the Numbers layout has the digits 1 through 0, with the most common punctuation on the other two rows. You can get more punctuation and other characters by activating the Symbols button on the left side of the keyboard. If your Region is set to the United States, two keyboards will be available by default, English (US) and Emoji. Emoji are those little pictures like "smiling face," "red heart," and "face blowing kiss" that are frequently used in text messages and elsewhere. To put emoji characters in your documents, select the Emoji key at the bottom left corner of the keyboard. The Emoji keyboard opens with the Frequently Used category selected. Across the bottom are nine radio buttons representing the nine available categories of emojis. The Next Keyboard key in the bottom left corner will take you back to the English keyboard. If you have more than two keyboards installed, this key will cycle among them. Typing Mode. There are three Typing Modes that control how you select keys from the onscreen keyboard. With VoiceOver enabled, when you first set up a brand-new iPhone, the keyboard Typing Mode is set to Standard Typing. Standard Typing means that you slide a finger around the keyboard until you hear the character you are seeking. VoiceOver will speak the name of each character as your finger glides over it. Then, you can either lift your finger and double-tap anywhere on the screen, or you can split-tap, which is to keep a finger on the letter and tap anywhere else on the screen with a second finger. In either case, VoiceOver will repeat the letter as it is entered so you can be sure it is the one you want. An alternative Typing Mode that is preferred by many blind people is Touch Typing. With Touch Typing enabled, you slide one finger around the keyboard until you find the character you want, then just lift your finger, and that character will be entered. The character that is entered is spoken again, this time in a higher pitch, so you can be assured that you actually got the right character.
There is a third option on the Typing Mode menu called Direct Touch Typing. This option lets you enter a character with a single tap. There is no confirmation beyond the name of the character being spoken when you tap it.
Whenever you are in an app that allows for editing, you can swipe to the edit field and perform a one finger double tap gesture to open the text edit field.  The VoiceOver cursor will be in position one, ready for text to be entered.  Half of the screen will fill up with the on-screen QWERTY keyboard.

The delete key on the on screen, keyboard, ax like a backspace key.  It deletes the character directly to the left.
It is important to become familiar with the layout of the keyboard.

The Period Shortcut, and the Auto Capitalization features:   These two features will save you valuable time by avoiding unnecessary taps in your on screen keyboard.  These can be used in any text Field, whether in an email, message, in a Text Message Edit field, or anywhere else where an Editable text field is present.

Related to the on screen keyboard:  there are the letters, keyboard, a Numbers, keyboard, symbols, keyboard, and an emoji keyboard.  These can be located on the bottom left-hand side on the on screen keyboard.  You have to tap the Numbers keyboard in order to get the symbols keyboard to show as an option.

Shortcut Phrases:
You can use just a couple of letters to create a shortcut which will automatically populate the Edit field with commonly used phrases, names, email addresses, etc.
Emojis can be added to the Short Cut Phrases list.
Text Replacement Shortcut.
Open Settings,Go to General, go to Keyboard, go to “Text Replacement.
Steps To Set A Shortcut For Text Phrases,  Period Shortcut, And Jumping To The Top After Scrolling Through Multiple Screens: 
Note:  If you are using VoiceOver:  when the instructions say "Tap on an item", perform a one finger double tap.
You can set your own short cut phrases such asEML for your e-mail address, ADR for your complete home address, etc. There are already some built in short cut phrases such as OMY for on my way.
in settings, general, keyboard,  under Text Replacement.
1. Open the Settings app on your iOS device.
2. Go to General section.
3. Next, click on Keyboard setting.
4. Now click on Text Replacement.
5. As text replacement opens, you can find the list of phrases and their corresponding shortcuts. Now to add a new shortcut, tap on the + sign located on the top right corner of the app screen.
6. Now in the Phrase field, type the text whose shortcut is to be created. In the Shortcut field, type the abbreviation.

Emoji’s:
When you activate the emoji keyboard, there is an option to search the emojis, which makes it easier than swiping through many emojis to find the one you want.
An Emoji is a small digital image or icon use to express an idea or emotion.
Some examples of Emoji‘s are: 😎 🐱 🍎 
When you are in any editable text field on an Apple iOS Device, you can find the wide variety of Emoji’s from activating the Emoji icon on the on screen keyboard. The Emoji button is located in the far bottom left corner when the on screen keyboard is visible.
When you activate the Emoji button, you will encounter a series of tabs at the bottom of your screen. Such as Frequently Used Category, Smileys and People Category, Animals and Nature Category, Food and DrinkCategory, Activity Category, Travel and Places Category, Objects Category, Symbols Category, Flags Category, etc.
Also, there is a very handy “Search” feature available, once you open the Emoji keyboard. The Search is located just past the Send Button above Emoji’s that are currently showing. If you tap on the Search within the Emoji keyboard showing, you can type the name of an image that you want: such as, “heart”. Several Emoji’s matching “heart” will appear: such as red heart, smiling face with hearts, blue heart, heart with arrow through it, etc. You can tap on that Emoji that you want and it will autofill in the text area of the Edit field.

Dictation:
If you would rather speak than type, you can use the iOS dictation feature.  To dictate text, perform a magic tap, when you are in an editable textfield (a magic tap is a two-finger double-tap) and start speaking when you hear a ding sound.  Perform a second magic tap when you’re done speaking, and the text will then be inserted and spoken by VoiceOver.  In addition to words, you can also dictate punctuation and line breaks.
There are two ways to dictate text in to the editable text field. There is a dictate button located on the on screen keyboard directly to the right of the space bar.  You can activate this with a one finger double tap to stop and start dictation.  You can also perform a two finger magic tap, which is a two finger. Double tap, when you are in an editable text field, wait for the beep, then you can start dictating.
Remember to use punctuation. Then perform a two finger double tap to stop dictating.  It is critical that you review what you have typed and or dictated before sending text that you have entered into the editable text field area.
The keyboard defaults to a period shortcut, when you enter the space bar twice.  It also capitalizes the first letter of the next word automatically.
There are also options of AutoCorrect, and predictive text, as you are entering text into an editable text field.  Rita suggests that you leave these options on.  They become extremely valuable when you are entering text, as options to assist you in correcting mis-typed words.
When you are in an editable text field, you can perform a one finger double tap gesture, which will jump the voiceover cursor to the beginning of the document.  You can also one finger double tap to jump the VoiceOver cursor to the end of the document.  VoiceOver will announce the position of where you are in terms of the beginning, or the end of the document.

When you are running voiceover, and you have dictated or typed text in an edit field, there is an option, called the voiceover rotor.  You can turn the virtual rotor to navigate by, words, lines, etc.  If you have something incorrectly entered in the text, you can turn the rotor to the location of the incorrect word or character, and then delete that incorrect entry, and then type the correct word or character.
When you are dictating, voiceover has the capability of inferring natural speech, and is getting better all the time.  You can also dictate certain emojis such as smiling face, winking face, ❤️, etc.

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