[Trainer-Talk] {Spam?} From Applevis: The Accessibility Bugs Introduced and Resolved in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14 for Blind and Low Vision Users

[David Goldfield]

  The Accessibility Bugs Introduced and Resolved in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14
  for Blind and Low Vision Users

Submitted byAppleVison Wednesday, September 16, 2020 - 04:49.

iOS 14 and iPadOS 14 will be released to the public on 16 September, 
2020. This post contains details of the VoiceOver, low vision, and 
braille bugs which we believe will be introduced in these releases; as 
well as details of the pre-existing bugs which we believe to be resolved.

As is our routine practice, each new bug has been given a severity 
rating; these ratings are based upon what we believe to be the 
implications for accessing and using features and functionality and the 
level of impact on the overall user experience, as well as whether or 
not there is an effective workaround for the issue. However, as these 
ratings are subjective, it is very possible that they may not reflect 
your own opinion or use case. Accordingly, we strongly recommend that 
you read through this post and any replies before updating—as this will 
allow you to make an informed decision on whether to install iOS 14 and 
iPadOS 14 when they become available.

As we always stress, we can make no claims on the completeness or 
accuracy of our testing. We have only a small team of testers, and it is 
simply impossible for us to test all devices, configurations, 
applications, and use cases. Some of the bugs listed below will be 
specific to a certain device, configuration or use case. Consequently, 
it is entirely likely that you will not encounter all of what we list; 
and it is also probable that you will encounter bugs or regressions that 
we did not identify during our testing.

To help us ensure that the information on this page is as complete and 
accurate as possible, we would appreciate feedback from those who have 
installed iOS 14 or iPadOS 14 —both to confirm whether they are 
encountering the same problems (or have found workarounds), as well as 
to let us know of any additional issues that are not on this list. Of 
course, it’s even more important that you let Apple know of any 
additional bugs that you find (they already know about the ones 
currently listed here and are actively working on resolving them).This 
post 
<https://www.applevis.com/blog/found-accessibility-bug-ios-ipados-macos-watchos-or-tvos-here-s-how-let-apple-know-and-why-you>explains 
why you should report bugs directly to Apple, as well as the best ways 
to do so.

With all of the preamble out of the way, here are the new bugs for blind 
and low vision users which we believe to be present in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14:


      Serious Bugs

At this time, we are currently unaware of any bugs which we would 
consider to be “serious” for blind or low vision users in iOS 14 or 
iPadOS 14.


      Moderate Bugs

  * On occasions, there may be a ‘lag’ in VoiceOver speech; or your
    device might feel generally less responsive than it was on iOS 13.
    It should be noted that not all of our testers experienced this
    issue, and we believe the severity of the issue is likely somewhat
    subjective. One workaround is to switch to a VoiceOver voice that
    does not exhibit this behaviour, though this may take some trial and
    error to find a voice that works for you. A slightly more involved
    workaround is to add a second voice to VoiceOver's language rotor;
    set the voice in that secondary language to your preferred voice;
    then use the rotor to switch to your preferred voice in the
    secondary language. Our experience indicates that the latter
    workaround can make VoiceOver and your device more responsive, even
    though you are still using the same voice - just not as the
    "default" language. It has also been suggested that deleting and
    re-downloading your preferred VoiceOver voice can resolve this behavior.
  * On some web pages in Safari, you may find that VoiceOver focus will
    spontaneously ‘jump’. This behaviour does not appear to be
    widespread, but can make navigation difficult and confusing when it
    does occur. One example of this behaviour can typically be seen with
    Google search results when using the VoiceOver rotor to navigate by
    heading. Similar behaviour has also been noticed inside some apps.
    Our suspicion is that this is when an app uses HTML in the code that
    generates the page. One example of this behaviour in an app is the
    App Store app. In this app, if you go to the Today tab; double tap
    on “My Account”; and then double-tap on your name, the contents of
    the ‘Account’ page and many that it link to are extremely difficult
    to navigate due to VoiceOver focus constantly ‘jumping’.
  * When editing a typed note using a braille display, information about
    the text field will randomly display and cause VoiceOver to wrongly
    show the cursor at the top of the document.
  * The ‘Radio’ tab in the native Music app contains some graphical UI
    elements which are not recognized by VoiceOver and can interfere
    with the movement of VoiceOver focus when swiping through the
    contents of this tab. This behaviour may understandably have you
    assume that there is nothing more on this screen, when in fact there
    is. To fully discover everything which is accessible on this screen,
    we recommend that you make use of the 3 finger swipe up or down to
    scroll the screen contents and explore using a combination of touch,
    the scroll bar, and swiping. Additionally, you are likely to
    encounter a number of “Play” and “Schedule” buttons on this tab,
    where the UI element they are associated with is not recognized or
    spoken by VoiceOver.
  * There are a number of issues with the new widgets introduced with
    iOS 14 and iPadOS 14. In some cases, this results in VoiceOver focus
    getting ‘stuck’ when swiping through widgets on the Today view or
    the Today view not scrolling to make all widgets accessible to
    VoiceOver. Also, on occasions, the VoiceOver rotor's Action menu may
    not be present or work as expected on stacked widgets.
  * The performance of Apple's new VoiceOver recognition features is
    inconsistent and unreliable, particularly that of Screen
    Recognition. It should be noted that these features are a
    work-in-progress, and your mileage may vary. As things are now, you
    should expect to find that there will be situations where having one
    or more of these features enabled will provide a worse experience
    than having them disabled.
  * The Detected Text feature that's part of the VoiceOver Recognition
    features does not work with braille displays.


      Minor Bugs

  * There are situations system-wide where you will find that some
    VoiceOver voices will announce punctuation such as apostrophes and
    quotation marks when they should not be spoken. One workaround is to
    switch to a voice that does not exhibit this behaviour. A slightly
    more involved workaround is to add a second voice to VoiceOver's
    language rotor; set the voice in that secondary language to your
    preferred voice; then use the rotor to switch to your preferred
    voice in the secondary language. Note that it may take some trial
    and error to find a voice that will behave as expected for your
    specific region and language needs.
  * After assigning a braille display command to VoiceOver Recognition,
    pressing the command will not toggle the feature.
  * When using a braille display, after modifying the layout of the Home
    screen (such as adding or deleting an app), pressing space with dots
    4-5-6 no longer functions.
  * On occasions, when editing the Today view, it is not possible to
    swipe to the ‘Done’ and ‘Add Widget' buttons located at the top of
    the screen (note that they can be located by touch).
  * On occasions, when editing the App Library screen available on iOS
    14, it is not possible to swipe to the ‘Done’ button located at the
    top of the screen (note that it can be located by touch).
  * On occasions, VoiceOver will not announce “Control Center” when the
    Control Center is activated.
  * In the Translate app that's new in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14, , the
    ‘drag’ options available from the VoiceOver rotor when on translated
    items do not work.
  * VoiceOver speaks “New line” when announcing the languages in the new
    Translate app. For example, “Spanish Spain” is spoken as “Spanish.
    New line. Spain.”
  * In the Translate app, there is an unlabelled UI element on the
    Listen screen. If you activate the ‘Listen’ button and swipe to
    explore the screen, you will notice a dimmed text field, a 'Close’
    button, as well as an element that is not identified by VoiceOver
    and which does not appear to do anything when activated.
  * On iPhone or iPod touch and in the last page of a Home screen
    folder, performing a three-finger swipe to the left will wrongly
    load the App Library.
  * When navigating the App Library on iPhone or iPod touch using the
    Containers option from VoiceOver's rotor, the page does not scroll
    beyond what is currently visually on screen.
  * When running a Shortcut that prompts the user to select from a menu,
    VoiceOver users are unable to dismiss the menu with a gesture
    (something which can be done when VoiceOver is not enabled).

If you encounter any additional accessibility bugs in iOS 14 or iPadOS 
14, please let others know by posting a reply below. When doing so, 
please provide as much information as possible so that others know 
exactly what to expect; when and where the problem occurs; and any 
possible workarounds you have found.


      Accessibility Improvements in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14

Our testing suggests that the following pre-existing accessibility bugs 
have been resolved or partially addressed in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14:

  * Apple has continued to make improvements in regard to the
    consistency and reliability of behavior when both Dark Mode and
    Smart Invert are enabled. There are still situations system-wide
    where the colors used may not be optimal or consistent in behavior,
    but our experience suggests that these are fewer in number. The
    color inversion of websites in Safari also appears to be improved;
    and our suspicion is that in some cases where this does not work as
    desired, it is actually due to the website rather than iOS and iPadOS.
  * When deleting text from a text field, the audio and haptic feedback
    that follows each deletion is no longer that which should indicate
    that you have reached the start of the text field (unless you
    actually have).
  * When answering a phone call using the 2-finger Double-Tap ('Magic
    Tap') gesture, the vibrations which accompany the ringer now stop as
    soon as the gesture is performed.
  * When listening to an audio file in the Files app, flicking up or
    down on the playback scrubber control will now move the playback
    position.
  * You can now navigate by line when composing a message in the Mail
    app, although there is no audible feedback as you would expect (and
    is what you hear when navigating by character or word).
  * Apple has made some improvements in regard to the frequency and
    number of situations in which VoiceOver focus will spontaneously
    'jump' to another UI element. There are still some occasions when
    this does happen (most notably the behavior in Safari and some apps
    mentioned in our list of new moderate bugs), but this issue appears
    to be much improved.
  * The Edit menu in VoiceOver's rotor is now more consistently and
    reliably present when VoiceOver focus is in a text field.
  * The Two-Finger Double-Tap ('Magic Tap') gesture once again reliably
    works to pause and resume audio playback in Safari.

If you encounter any additional fixes or improvements during your own 
use of iOS 14 or iPadOS 14, please let us know by posting a reply below.


      Changes in Behavior

As is common with major operating system updates, Apple has made some 
changes in functionality or behaviour in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14. As 
sometimes changes in behavior can reasonably be mistaken as bugs, below 
are a list of the changes we are currently aware of:

  * When editing the Home screen, it is no longer possible to drag
    multiple folders at the same time or to drag an app and a folder.
  * When on the Today View, you may find that VoiceOver indicates that
    the Actions menu is available for some widgets when it in fact is
    not. This is because some third party widgets built before iOS 14 do
    not have any actions for VoiceOver to execute, including the Edit
    action.

If you know of other changes which you believe should be included here, 
please let us know by posting a comment below.


      In Closing

We have been compiling these lists of new bugs for every major iOS 
release since iOS 7. In our opinion, iOS 14 and iPadOS 14 are an 
improvement over iOS 13 and introduce no new serious issues for blind 
and low vision users. However, there are certain to be more issues 
discovered and shared after we post this; so, if you haven't already 
upgraded, we would strongly recommend that you take a few moments to 
read through any replies to this post before doing so.

When posting in the comments, we ask that you please keep discussion 
on-topic and related specifically to accessibility bugs introduced or 
resolved in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14. In the past, our announcement posts 
about yearly major iOS updates usually receive well over 100 replies; 
making it all the more important that readers be able to quickly 
navigate through the comments to find the information they need. 
Additionally, when posting, please remember that the decision about 
whether or not to install a software update is an individual one; and 
that everyone's situation is different and there is no right or wrong 
answer.

Finally, we want to take this opportunity to publicly thank Apple's 
Accessibility Team for their timely response to most of the bug reports 
filed by our team during the beta cycle. As always, it's been clear from 
our experience that the Accessibility Team has strived to ensure that 
iOS and iPadOS offer the best possible experience to blind and low 
vision users.

-- 
David Goldfield,
Blindness Assistive Technology Specialist
JAWS Certified, 2019

WWW.DavidGoldfield.org