iFocus 11Vision Accessibility Features in iOS
Seminars@Hadley
iFocus 11: Tips for Using Vision Accessibility Features in iOS
Presented by
Douglas Walker
Moderated by
Larry Muffett
You're listening to Seminars@Hadley. This seminar is iFocus 11: Tips for Using Vision Accessibility Features in iOS presented by Douglas Walker, moderated by Larry Muffett.
Larry Muffett
Welcome to Seminars@Hadley. My name is Larry Muffett. I'm a member of Hadley Seminars team and I also work in Curricular Affairs. Today's seminar topic is iFocus 11: Tips for Using the Vision Accessibility Features in iOS. Our presenter today is Hadley technology instructor and tech guru Douglas Walker. Today, Douglas will be presenting the 11th in our quarterly series of using iOS devices. So I'm going to welcome back Douglas and we'll get right under way. Welcome, Douglas.
Douglas Walker
Alright, we are back for our quarterly iFocus 11 seminar. And as usual, we have a ton of stuff to cover. Today's seminar will actually have two segments. In our first segment, we’ll focus on our old friend, Siri, and some of the really great ways that Siri can help to make our lives so much easier. In our second segment, we will take a look at two of my favorite features, and these are the dictation feature and Safari Reader. Now, we will take a break in the middle in at the end of today's seminar so that we have plenty of time to answer all of your questions. Okay, so let's go ahead and get started.
Now, I am finding myself using Siri more and more to complete tons of different tasks. And Siri has become so much more reliable and responsive since it first found its way onto our iDevices. Now, Apple likes to call Siri our iPhone's personal assistant. And with Siri, we’re able to do things like setup reminders, get walking directions, we are able to place a phone call, and even send a text message. And today, of course, we will be using Siri to accomplish all of those tasks. So how about we go ahead and jump right in.
I tell you, one of my favorite features in iOS is reminders. It is something that I use pretty much every single day to help me to keep track of all of those little tasks that I just can't seem to keep in my head anymore. Now, I like to think of reminders as my little sticky notes. Instead of having sticky notes posted everywhere, I have my Reminders app on my iPhone, and that really does help to keep me to remember pretty much just about everything.
Now, we aren't going to be totally exploring the Reminders app today because we are going to be looking at how to use Siri to set up our reminders. And we'll also take a look at how to use Siri to check all of our upcoming reminders as well. Now, Siri is super easy to use. All we need to do to activate Siri is to just hold down our Home button which is a small round button at the bottom center of our screen. So how about we take a look at exactly how all this works.
Okay, I have my iPhone right here in front of me, and as I said our Home button is located right here in the bottom center of our screen. So all we need to do to activate Siri is to just hold down our Home button until we hear two tones. Now, after we hear these two tones, we can then just lift our finger off of our Home button and then just speak a reminder. We can say something like, remind me to pick up my laundry today at 3:00. Now, when we stop talking, Siri will confirm our reminder by saying, okay, I'll remind you. Now, a reminder confirmation will be presented to us on our screen that time, and we can just walk right flick through our screen to check out our reminder.
Okay, so it sounds pretty easy, right. Well, it really is. So how about we gave it a try. We will just hold down our Home button to activate Siri, and we’ll set up our reminder to pick up our laundry today at 3:00. So let’s just hold down our Home button here. Remind me to pick up my laundry today at 3:00.
Siri
Okay, I’ll remind you.
Douglas Walker
Great. Siri announced that we will be reminded, and our reminder is now presented to us here on our screen. So how about we just right flick through our screen to see what we have. We’ll just first touch near the top of our screen to get us oriented. So we’ll just touch.
Siri
Remind me to pick up my laundry today at 3:00. Tab to edit button.
Douglas Walker
Okay,and here’s what Siri heard us say. Now, it can be quite interesting at times as to what Siri thinks we have said. However, in this case Siri has been pretty accurate. This is exactly what we want. So we’ll just right flick from here. So we’ll just right flick.
Siri
Okay, I’ll remind you.
Douglas Walker
Great. And this is our confirmation from Siri that we heard earlier, so we’ll just right flick from here.
Siri
Reminder, Monday, August 24, 2015. Heading.
Douglas Walker
And this is the date of our reminder, and this looks right for me. So we’ll just right flick from here.
Siri
Pick up my laundry 3:00 PM.
Douglas Walker
Great, and here we find the title and the time of our reminder. And again, it is just what we want. So we’ll just right flick one more time. So we’ll just right flick.
Siri
Remove button.
Douglas Walker
Okay, here we find a remove button. And if we want, we can just single finger double tap to cancel this reminder. Now, we are not going to delete this reminder. However, if we were to activate this remove button, we would be presented with a confirmation screen to make sure that we really do want to delete it. But we want to keep this reminder. So we can just tap our Home button to close this confirmation screen. And we’ll just tap our Home button here. Alright, our reminder has been set and it can be found in our Reminders app.
Now, we mentioned earlier that we’re not going to be exploring our Reminders app. However, we are going to check out how to use Siri to see our upcoming reminders. But first, let’s take a look and one of my favorite reminder features. And this is how to set up a reminder for when we arrive at or when we believe a location. We can set up a reminder by saying something like, remind me when I leave here to call my wife, or we can say, remind me when I get home to feed of the chinchilla. That was kind of awkward but anyway, you get the idea. So how about we go ahead and set up this kind of a reminder. We will set up a reminder to call my wife when I leave this location so how about we do it. We’ll just hold and release ourHome button again, remind me to call my wife when I leave here.
Siri
One sec, I’ll remind you when you leave here.
Douglas Walker
There you go. Siri has confirmed our reminder, and I’ll get an alert when I leave this location to call my wife. So how cool is that? Okay, so the last thing we’re going to look at is how to confirm or to use Siri to check our reminders for us, and it is super easy. All we need to do is hold down our Home button to activate Siri. And then we’ll just ask Siri to check our reminders. Okay, let’s give it a try. We will just hold down our Home button to activate Siri here, check my reminders.
Siri
Here they are. The first one is pick up my laundry, and then call my wife. Those are all the reminders you have.
Douglas Walker
Alright. And there you go. Siri of course read all of our upcoming reminders and it is as easy as that. I really did like this reminders feature. It makes it just so much easy to keep up with everything on my to-do list. Okay, so the next thing that we will have Siri help us do is to get walking directions to a destination. Now, I am so happy that we’re covering this topic because it has been one of our most requested topics ever. And this one is all about how to take advantage of the Apple Maps to get walking directions to a landmark or an address.
Okay, we’ll look at just how easy it is to get walking directions and we’ll get our directions again by using Siri. Now, we’re going to activate Siri in exactly the same way. We’ll just hold down our Home button until we hear our two tones. And then we’ll just say the destination for where we would like to get our walking directions. We’ll say something like, give me walking directions to McDonald’s. Now, once we stop talking, Siri will perform a search for our destination. In this case, of course, we’re looking for McDonald’s, so our Maps app will open and we will be presented with a map with our walking directions to McDonald’s. So how about we give it a try. We’ll just hold down our Home button to activate Siri and we’ll get directions to McDonald’s. So let’s just do it. We’ll hold down this Home button, give me walking directions to McDonald’s.
Siri
Getting walking directions to McDonald’s. Map’s current location, 130…
Douglas Walker
Alright, we paused it there. So our Maps app has opened, and we have been presented with a map that displays our walking directions or our route to McDonald’s here. That’s pretty great. Now, we aren’t going to have time, of course, in today’s seminar to totally explore our Maps app. However, we are going to take a look at a couple of really handy features in the Maps app before we actually start our navigation. Now, we’ll need to begin our walking the directions by activating our Start button, and our Start button is located in the bottom center of our map app here. So let’s go ahead and just touch the bottom center of our screen to find our Start button, and we’ll just touch.
Siri
Start button.
Douglas Walker
Now, we will activate this button in just a bit. However, let’s just left flick a couple of times until we find our View as List button. So we’ll just left flick.
Siri
Tracking Off button. Change tracking options.
Douglas Walker
Okay, here’s our Tracking button. Now, our Tracking button is not currently activated. However, if it were activated, we would periodically be given our current location as we walk which could be really handy. So this is something that we’ll just kind of need to play around with to see if it’s something that we want to use in the future. Okay, so how about we just left flick again. So we’ll just left flick.
Siri
View as List button.
Douglas Walker
Alright, here’s our View as List button. Now, activating this button will bring up a step-by-step list of our walking directions to our destination. Now, we aren’t going to have time to explore our View as List feature, but I tell you, this can be a great way to review or to help get comfortable with the route before we actually walk it, and that’s pretty cool. How about we go ahead and began our navigation to our destination. So we’ll just need to again find that Start button down here. We know it’s located in the bottom center of our screen here. So we will just touch our Start button.
Siri
Start button.
Douglas Walker
And you guessed it, we will just single finger double tap to activate this this Start button. So we’ll go ahead and single finger double tap.
Siri
Starting walking directions to McDonald’s. Proceed to Birdsaw Street. Then in 150 feet, take a left on13th Street.
Douglas Walker
Alright, so our directions have started. And if we were to begin walking down Birdsaw Street, as soon as we reached 13th Street like we heard, we would be told the direction that we need to turn. And we would then be given the distance to our next to turn. And it really is as easy as that. Now, remember we will still need to have good orientation and mobility skills while we travel. And our Maps app is not meant to take the place of common sense here. However, our navigation can really help to give us more information about our route and really help to give us more confidence as we travel.
Now of course we will not be walking this route today, and if we don’t turn off our walking directions or navigation, we will keep getting prompted for our walking directions to McDonald’s, and that can get to be a bit annoying. So it’s really easy to stop or turn off our navigation, and we will once again use Siri to do this. All we have to do is just hold down our Home button again until we hear our two tones. Then we’ll ask Siri to stop our navigation. So how about we do just that. We will just hold down ourHome button here, stop navigation.
Siri
Okay, I’ve stopped navigating.
Douglas Walker
And there you go. Our navigation has been stopped. It really is just so handy to be able to get walking directions by using Siri and really great to be able to explore our route before we actually walk it. Okay, so the next thing that Siri is going to help us do today is to send a text message. Now, we should have the whole Siri routine down by now. So to send a text message by using Siri, we will again hold down our Home button until we hearour two tones. And then we can simply say the word text along with the name of the person that we want to text.
Now, we could say the person’s phone number if we’d like. However, it is easiest to text a person that we already have in our Contacts app. That way, we can just speak the person’s name. Now, if you aren’t familiar with how to add a person to your Contacts app, it’s your lucky day because we have an iFocus video called Adding a New Contact. So you might want to check out that video, and we’ll talk a little about where you’re able to find all of our iFocus videos in just a bit.
Okay, just to recap, after week press and hold our Home button, we’ll hear our two tones. And if I’m wanting to maybe text my wife, I will just need to say text Kim Walker. Now, after we finish speaking, Siri will confirm by saying, okay, what do you want to say to Kim Walker. Now, it is a good idea to know what you want to say before you actually activate Siri. Otherwise, you might find yourself stumbling over your words or getting a bit tongue tied. Now, after Siri says, okay, what do you want to say to Kim Walker, we will hear two tones. And then we can just speak our message. So how about we just say, this is a test. I know, kind of boring. But anyway, after we speak our message, Siri will say your message to Kim Walker says this is a test. And then, Siri will say do you want me to send it.
Now, we can either send it by saying yes, or if we change our mind and decide not to send it for some reason, we I could just say cancel. And of course Siri won’t not send it, and our text message, of course, will be canceled. So how about we go ahead and give it a try. We will just hold down our Home button to activate Siri, and we’ll send my wife a text. So let’s go ahead and do it, text Kim Walker.
Siri
Okay. What do you want to say to Kim Walker?
Douglas Walker
This is a test.
Siri
Your message to Kim Walker says, this is a test.Ready to send it?
Douglas Walker
Yes.
Siri
I’ll send it.
Douglas Walker
Alright. We heard Siri announce, okay, I’ll send it. Then we heard that all familiar sending tone that lets us know that our text has been sent. It is as easy as that to send a text message by using Siri. For me, it really is the easiest way to send a text message. Okay, we’re down to our last a Siri topic for today. And, of course, this is one of the most common tasks we will actually do with our phone. And we will be using Siri to help us place a phone call. Now, we’ll again hold our Home button to activate Siri. And after we here our two tones, we can either speak the phone number that we want to call, or if the person we’re calling is in our contacts list, we can’t just simply speak the person’s name.
Again, if I’m calling my wife, I would just need to say call Kim Walker. Now, after we finish speaking, Siri will confirm by saying calling Kim Walker. And then our phone app is going to open, and our phone will call Kim Walker. So how about we give it a try. We’ll just hold down our Home button to activate Siri here. Now, since we’ve already bugged my wife by sending her a rather meaningless text, how about we just call my work number instead. This is pretty sad, I’ll be calling myself. Anyway, just for demonstration purposes, how about we give it a try. So let’s just hold down our Home button here, call Douglas Walker.
Siri
Calling Douglas Walker.
Douglas Walker
And it should roll to voicemail here – Hello, you’ve reached the number of Douglas Walker, the Access Technology Information Specialist here at Hadley. Please leave your name, number and the time zone from which you’re calling, and I will call you back as soon as possible. Thanks. Please leave a message at the tone. When finished, you may hang up or press pound for an additional options – Okay, so now I’m leaving myself a voicemail. Apparently, I must be busy at the moment.