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Your weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs.
Show Notes:
Humanware Prodigi Duo Video Magnifier with Brian Goemmer
Texting 911 soon available for those who need it http://bit.ly/1fdTqx4
Government exploring new technology to safeguard blind voters’ privacy http://bit.ly/1egvJEJ
Assistive Tech Made For Farmers | Gizmodo Australia http://bit.ly/1fdOzMw
AbleGamers Charity Announces The Year’s Best Accessibility Achievements | GamePolitics http://bit.ly/1fdQ4Kz
Web Accessibility Training for Developers Tickets – Eventbrite http://bit.ly/MmdWSG
IRS.gov Accessibility http://1.usa.gov/1i4IItT
A Toast to GW Micro | Serotek http://bit.ly/1i4Ih2I
Two New iPhone Models to Have Screens Bigger Than 4.5″ and 5″ http://bit.ly/Mm9K5q
Rubbermaid Commercial Products – Rubbermaid Safety : 6282 Audio Guard® Warning Mechanism, Deluxe Unit http://bit.ly/Mm7nzB
Words+ http://bit.ly/Mm5Zgv
App: Braille Sonar www.AppleVis.com
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——transcript follows—–
BRIAN GOMER: Hi, this is Brian Gomer, and I’m the sales manager of Lab Computers, and this is your Assistive Technology Update.
WADE WINGLER: Hi, this is Wade Wingler with the INDATA Project at Easter Seals Crossroads in Indiana with your Assistive Technology Update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up-to-date on the latest developments in the field of technology, designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs. Welcome to episode number 140 of Assistive Technology Update. It’s scheduled to be released on January 31 of 2014. Today my guest is Brian Gomer who’s going to talk to us about the new Humanware Prodigi Duo Video Magnifier. It’s a desktop; it’s a portable; it’s both. It does some pretty cool stuff.
I’ve got some stories that have to do with 911 texting and Canada. Interesting ways that people are using assistive technology on the farm in Australia. Some awards from able gamers about accessibility in the videogame market. An interesting thing that we are going to make available to teach web developers how to make their content more accessible. We hope that you will check out the show notes on our website at eastersealstech.com or give us a call on our listener line and tell us what’s in your assistive technology toolbox or ask a question or give us some feedback. You can reach us at 317-721-7124 or you can shoot us a note on Twitter @INDATAProject.
I found an article from the Vancouver Sun in Canada that talks about how texting for 911 emergencies will soon be available for people who are deaf, hard of hearing or have speech challenges. The way the system is set up is that individuals will make a voice call to 911, but if they have free for registered their cell phone number with carriers, then that was called will immediately be converted into a text called whereby the person can then report their emergency. I hear lots of things going on in the US and Canada and elsewhere in the world about texting and 911 and how that makes that critical service accessible to folks who are deaf, hard of hearing or have speech challenges. I think that’s pretty interesting what’s happening in Canada. I’ll pop a link into the show notes. You can learn more about what’s happening in Canada for folks who need to text 911.
Not too long ago, we featured some guests were talking about accessibility in voting. With elections coming up, that’s a really important thing here in the US. However I just found an article in Malta Today talking about people who are blind or visually impaired in the country of Malta who are advocating for the ability to have someone help them in the voting booth with casting their vote. This really kind of struck my attention because here in the US and I think in the UK, we take for granted a lot of the freedoms that aren’t afforded folks who have disabilities who wants to vote and participate in the political process; however, it seems to me from reading this article that in Malta, if you are blind or need some assistance with your vote, at somebody from the election committee, the electoral commission, or the political party, has to help you in assisting with your voting process if you need an accommodation. As opposed to having somebody that you know and trust go into the both with you and help. There’s some political wrangling about whether or not the political parties think that that’s fair or appropriate. It’s interesting, and it to be by surprise that in Malta come and I assume other areas of the world, if you need assistance in voting, you may not have the assistive technology that makes it independent or at least the ability to have somebody of your choice in the voting booth with you. I’ll pop a link in the show notes over to maltatoday.com and you can read more about what’s happening in Malta with folks who are blind or visually impaired and wants to vote.
I’m looking at an article from Gizmodo Australia. It’s written by Sarah Hendren. It talks about assistive technology made for farmers. The visual is pretty interesting. It shows a man’s leg with a mucky rubber boots on one foot and then it shows a titanium prosthetic leg on the other side. It’s a nod to modern farmer article that talks about the future of prosthetics for farmers. In the article, it talks about a lot of different needs related to that, but then it goes our friend Therese Willkomm, who is an assistive technology researcher and my counterpart at the University of New Hampshire, she talks about her wish list for assistive technology for farmers. It includes things like a titanium wrist and elbow unit that doesn’t break, cables that won’t fray, quick release harnesses, a foot that bans when it gets caught in the weeds, moisture control and protection during hot or cold weather, or a prosthetic leg that allows a farmer to Neil. When I think about assistive technology, I find myself a lot of times considering the high tech anymore urban standard every day sort of encounters with the need for assistive technology, but this kind of opened my eyes a little bit to think about how assistive technology might be implemented more on the farm. The article also mentions the National Agrability Project, so I’m going to include a link in the show notes so you can find not only the article but a link to National Agrability. Those guys do stuff with this sort of situation all the time. Check our show notes for the link.
Our friends over at AbleGamers have announced their list of the year’s best accessibility achievements for 2013. I have all kinds of awards, things for media champion, innovator, device, publisher, Indie game, and mainstream game of the year. Some of the folks who were honored this year by them include Paradox Interactive, which was honored with the Includification Award. The best media champion of the year was Paul Nyheart of HDFilms. SpecialEffect is honored as the Best Innovator for helping with advancements for children with disabilities in the UK. StinkyBoard was honored as the Best New Device or Peripheral. It is a device designed to allow gamers to use the abilities and their feet to add additional flexibility in the control schemes of any video game. Several others are listed here. I’ll pop a link in the show notes over to the blog post where you can read more about the AbleGamers year’s best accessibility achievements for folks who are into assistive technology and videogames.
Does the Hashtag #A11Y mean anything to you? Are you a web developer and are you interested in us at the technology and accessibility? While on February 25, from 11 o’clock to 4 o’clock Eastern time, right here at the INDATA Project, you’re going to host a webinar on web accessibility training for developers. Dennis Lembree of EasyChirp fame is going to spend the entire day with us, at least from 11 to 4, talking about how developers can make their web content more accessible. There is no cost for the webinar, and I’m going to pop a link into the show notes so you can figure out how to register and how to participate that day. We look forward to seeing you to learn more about web accessibility training for developers.
Here in the US, we are coming up on tax time. Our friends over at Top Tech Tidbits remind us that the IRS has all kinds of resources related to IRS accessibility. If you’re interested in some general information, accessible forms, ASL videos, or accessibility features of the IRS website, check our show notes. We’ve got a link where you can learn more about all that stuff just in time to get your taxes done.
And what I considered to be a pretty classy maneuver, the folks over at Serotek have a blog post called “A Toast to GW Micro.” Their CEO, Michael Fox, said “There is a misconception that in an industry with very few players, there must surely be a great deal of animosity between companies. In reality, nothing is further from the truth. While I’ve only been CEO of Serotek since August 2013, I’ve had the pleasure of interacting with representatives of numerous companies within the assistive technology industry for the past 11 years. Without a doubt, the folks at the GW Micro stand out for their class, their sincerity, and their dedication to serving the needs of the blind community.” This was in response to the news that we broke just a couple of weeks ago that GW Micro is now partnering with Microsoft to make their screen reader, Window Eyes, available at no cost. I will pop a link to the show notes over to the Serotek blog post and toast to you for being so kind with your words about GW Micro.
Do you wish that your iPhone was a little bit bigger and a little bit easier to see? I always enjoy the Apple rumor mills that talk about things that might be coming out with Apple products. However this rumor comes from the Wall Street Journal. They indicated that there is information that leads them to believe that there might be a 5” or 5.5” or even larger screen iPhone coming out. IPhones to bully come out in the summertime. They get an ounce in June or September, so keep your eyes open for a new iPhone that might be bigger and give you just a little more screen real estate. Check our show notes and I’ll pop a link into the OS 10 Daily article that talks about the bigger iPhones to come.
ANNOUNCER: Caution: Wet Floor. Caution: Wet Floor.
WADE WINGLER: And what you’re hearing there is a safety cone. Interestingly enough, that’s true. I recently stepped into the lobby of our building, and it’s been very wet and snowy here recently, and there was a safety cone near the elevators to let people know that the floors were what and had some melting ice and snow on them. Our maintenance guy, then, has installed one of these Rubbermaid Commercial Audio Guard Warning Device which is basically a little device that sits on top of a regular cone that tells you that the floor is what, but it flashes and speaks when you get near it. It’s got a motion detector. Apparently the thing has several preprogrammed messages, the ability to record your own message, and it costs around $30 or so. So if you would like for your safety cones to talk for folks who are blind or visually impaired or otherwise can use that audio description, check our show notes. We’ll have a link.
If you’re somebody who has used the Words+ Easy Keys program in the past, and you’ve been saddened that it’s no longer available, while it seems that that may have changed. Apparently a new company has purchased Words+ and has resumed operations under that name and is making Easy Keys available. It works under Windows 8 and the details are still unclear, but if you head on over to Words-Plus.com, you’ll see that there’s information there where you can contact them and find out more. I’ll stick a link in the show notes where you can find the email address, the phone number and can learn more about what’s happening with Words+
Each week one of our partners tells us what’s happening in the ever-changing world of apps. So here’s an App Worth Mentioning.
SCOTT DAVERT: With this week’s App Worth Mentioning, I’m Scott Davert from AppleVis.com. Today I’m talking about an app called Braille Sonar. Braille Sonar is an app for iDevices that cost $2.99 and the US App Store. For those who are learning braille, it’s actually a really good reference to. For those who are first learning the letters, and gives you the six bad representation of each letter, but for those who are trying to learn contracted braille in North America, which is basically a form of shorthand that most people who are advanced braille users use, this app will allow you to type in a word and then will give you the signs that are using that word along with a visual representation of the different dot makeups of that word or phrase. The best part about this app is that it is also totally voice over accessible so if you can’t see the graphic, that’s okay, there’s an audio representation of it. It’s a really good reference tool for those who are wishing to learn braille. If you’d like more information on this app, check out its app entry in the US App Store, and if you’d like more information on software or hardware related to iDevices or Apple products, related to blindness and low vision, feel free to visit us over at AppleVis.com. For this week’s App Worth Mentioning, I’m Scott Davert.
WADE WINGLER: So for the first time, I think I have a bunch of equipment piled up in my studio that’s not recording equipment. I’ve got a table with kind of a really cool looking CCTV that we are going to talk about. It’s a little bit more than just your grandfather’s video magnifier, but standing right here next to me with this CCTV ready to go is Brian Gomer who some Lab Computers. Brian, my friend, how are you?
BRIAN GOMER: Doing well. How about yourself?
WADE WINGLER: Good, good. Thank you for making the trip up here. We’re recording this in January where the weather in Indiana and Kentucky is not really good. It’s real cold outside. We appreciate you making the trip appear to show us the Prodigi and the Prodigi Duo from Humanware. I’ve been in the business of assistive technology for a lot of years, and on my very first day on the job, I was introduced to video magnifiers, and old CCTV that had just a couple of features. It made stuff bigger, and made stuff smaller, and maybe inverted the color and had some reference lines or the exact that. My staff and I spent some time with you this morning on this new CCTV from Humanware that does a lot of cool stuff. This isn’t your grandfather’s CCTV – or maybe it would be something that your grandfather might use. But tell me a little bit about this Prodigi and go get into the Prodigi Duo part from Humanware because it’s pretty cool.
BRIAN GOMER: Well we definitely would like to think your grandfather would use it just based on ease of use. It is a very simple use of a CCTV. It does not use an XY tray unlike traditional CCTV’s. It actually takes a picture of the item and organizes it properly. There’s no movement of left or right unlike a traditional CCTV. You actually just sit back and read, making things easier. That was the whole idea behind the Prodigi. It does take a picture, it does use something called a trackpad, trackpad being a little two inch by three inch square. You move your finger around on the page actually to view the page you’re trying to quantify. It does have three other buns, one being a back button, a refund, and then just your power button.
WADE WINGLER: As I’m looking at this thing, but the look at the trackpad, it kind of reminds me of a laptop computer where a lot of folks are familiar with that technology. You put your finger down on it and you move it around and it follows her finger and that allows you to control things on it. It looks sleek and stylish and kind of familiar to me as a computer nerd.
BRIAN GOMER: Yes, it’s definitely sleek and smooth and just like a typical computer trackpad for sure.
WADE WINGLER: Okay, and I’m looking at the side of it, I see some connections. I see something that looks like maybe a headphone jack and some USB connections. Why does a CCTV need that? One of those for?
BRIAN GOMER: Well, this is completely new as far as on a CCTV. This is running the android operating system, so there are two USB ports. What they will allow you to do is hook up either a keyboard or a mouse to the device. Some folks might wonder why, will you might want to use a mouse rather than using the trackpad. It may be easier for you. You can also use the keyboard because getting a little bit further, but it does have Wi-Fi in the device and you might have to put in a network key to that effect as well.
WADE WINGLER: Wait a minute, we’re talking about CCTV here, video magnifiers, and you’re telling me it’s running android and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth?
BRIAN GOMER: Yes, we just keep coming out with different tech specs that it has for sure.
WADE WINGLER: But I think in the end we’re going to get to the pets factor that it gives you a lot more functionality and it doesn’t have to be terribly complicated.
BRIAN GOMER: No, that is the whole thing. This is Humanware’s way of making things simple and easy, and that is the whole process behind this device: it’s simple and easy. As we say, you want your grandfather to use it for sure.
WADE WINGLER: I want to come back to upgradability and some of the more technical things, but talk to me about the out of the box experience. Let’s say somebody has one of these CCTV’s, they get it out of the box, what the going to do for them? How are they going to use it? What’s it like for maybe my grandfather who gets this thing out and starts messing with it?
BRIAN GOMER: Well, it’s definitely different than a typical CCTV where you get it out, you put a paper underneath it, and it just magnifies. This was developed by — it is an optical company that has developed a wizard for Humanware for this particular CCTV. The wizard allows us to experience the correct settings: how far you need to be from the CCTV; what height unique the monitor set at; exactly how to swipe with that trackpad; the buttons do. You actually go through scenarios in order for you to make sure you get what these buns and what these wipes do. When complete the wizard, you have your CCTV completely set up ready for you with your settings, York magnification levels that you need to use this device to her all you need to do is put the paper down and read it. When we get done with this wizard, we want to change something, we can absolutely go back through the wizard or sections of the wizard because he might forget how to use one of those swipes and we can go back to that wizard and learn how that all works.
WADE WINGLER: So the idea is somebody can be fairly independent when they get one of these devices. In the past, and may have taken a few hours to sit down in front of the CCTV maybe with an assistive technology professional to figure out some of those things. Now I don’t want you to tell me that were driving away the drive of the AT professional, because that’s how we make our living here, but it really does sound like there’s a lot of independence for users who get this thing out and is trying to figure out how to use it on their own for the first time.
BRIAN GOMER: Absolutely, yes, there’s definitely some tools there for you to learn how to use it.
WADE WINGLER: That’s great. When we’re looking at this device, it’s got a 24 inch screen on this particular model. Is that right, or is this a 20 inch screen?
BRIAN GOMER: This is actually the 20. The 24 would actually make it a whole lot bigger for sure.
WADE WINGLER: Yeah, absolutely. We’ve got a piece of paper on under it, and we zoomed in on some text. Give me some of the basic features that you might expect on the standard CCTV that are also on this device.
BRIAN GOMER: It does have a live mode so you are able to experience it just like a regular traditional video magnifier, but it does have the ability, like right now, when you’re looking at the page, it says put your page here, so it’s waiting for us to take a picture. Within two seconds it will take that picture. When it takes a picture that organizes the text. When organizes the text it allows us – like I said, we do not have to move left or right or any other direction, we can just scroll up or down votes and that trackpad. We can use the trackpad just to move around, we could just look at the page directly as a full page and just magnified a page completely on that route as well.
WADE WINGLER: So that would work really well if you are looking at a can of soup or something that needed to see a bigger version as opposed to have it organized in some way.
BRIAN GOMER: Absolutely yes, because you still have some tools or you may not want to just read with this device. You may want to use it for some other fashions for sure. There are the abilities there. The other big key within this device is once it has taken the picture and once it has completed the organizing of the page – as I said, this is a very quick process though. I don’t want people to think this is a long-term weight Process. It’s very quick and easy. When this all takes place, it also puts the text in a technology called Diamond Edge. Diamond Edge is completely new on the CCTV. What Diamond Edge allows it to do is look crystal clear the matter what the magnification level is. We can boost it up to 80x and we still have crystal clear smooth edges unlike the block things that we got used to.
WADE WINGLER: And that’s because it’s doing an OCR, right? It’s taking a picture of it and giving you actual text.
BRIAN GOMER: It has done an OCR of the page. So it’s OCR, we know that there could be errors within it as well. That’s something to look at whatever the AT evaluators come in and they make sure that I won’t freak people out whatever they do find errors. I think that’s important for folks to know.
WADE WINGLER: And if there are errors, you can go back into the live mode or the original image and get a zoomed image of what it looked like.
BRIAN GOMER: Absolutely, for sure.
WADE WINGLER: And it talks.
BRIAN GOMER: It does talk. We’ll skip the idea of it talking just yet. We’re just looking at the page and showing you how crystal clear and smooth it is. Is we’re scrolling and actually reading the page, we can hit that play button, the left fun, and it will just start reading directly from that page for us as well.
WADE WINGLER: So can we get it to talk to us?
BRIAN GOMER: Yes.
PRODIGI: Small bullet. About INDATA. The INDATA Project at Easter Seals Crossroads provides information and access to assistive technology at no charge to Hoosiers with disabilities.
BRIAN GOMER: So that is one of our voices. It does have two voices as well. We can change voices from a mail to a female voice within the device. All I did was he put the page in, we let it OCR it, we had play and it immediately started reading that page to us.
WADE WINGLER: That’s pretty cool. So what I’m seeing so far is a traditional desktop magnifier that has some of the features that I’ve seen for years and expected. It has the Diamond Edge which makes the OCR text more clear when you zoom in. I’ll tell you, the thing that kind of blew my mind when we were in our lab earlier was we were talking about desktop versus portables, and this one can’t decide which it is.
BRIAN GOMER: And really can’t decide which one it is. It comes in basically to type models, one being a desktop model and one called a Duo model. The desktop model just sits flat on a traditional CCTV with a screen and a tray underneath it, but not a tray, just a flat table. The dual model actually has a tablet in the back of it. The android tablet sits in the back, we can actually unlock it and we can carry that’s tablet around with us and have a handheld CCTV with all the features that we had within the actual regular desktop Prodigi. We can have the Diamond Edge. We can have a talk to us. We can do all of this within an actual portable model, which is unbelievable.
WADE WINGLER: So if we’re thinking about my grandfather who is a retired engineer, he may be sitting at the kitchen table reading a book or something like that? What he decides to go off to the shop in the afternoon to tinker around with things, he would just grab the tablet portion of this magnifier and take the portable one with him out to the shop, right?
BRIAN GOMER: That’s exactly what he would be able to do.
WADE WINGLER: You said it’s a tablet. Tell me a little bit about the features of that tablet. Is it full-blown check my email, or is it not quite there yet?
BRIAN GOMER: At the moment it is completely locked with the Prodigi software in it. There is definitely some upgradability that’s going to be in the works at some point or another that will allow us to have some of those unlock features, a browser, some of the things. We had to get that all accessible and clean and working for the individual first. This is round one, three months in the making of a CCTV with android that is fully upgradable. It’s moving, but not as fast as everybody would like edge to move for sure.
WADE WINGLER: Of course, we want it all now. I like to joke that my daughter is part of the generation that stand in front of the microwave and yells hurry up! The tablet that’s here is like a Samsung tablet, right? It’s built by Humanware.
BRIAN GOMER: It is a tablet built by Humanware. It actually has two cameras built into it. It has a two megapixel and a four megapixel to make sure you get a crystal clear image when you’re looking at it. It is a true tablet by Humanware on that route.
WADE WINGLER: That’s cool, and the fact that they control the hardware I think is probably a good thing in terms of making sure that the upgrades can be predictable and work well and those kind of things.
BRIAN GOMER: Yeah, they’re definitely going to be tested with low vision users in mind.
WADE WINGLER: That’s pretty cool. Okay, talk cost to me. I know we have a range of features here and cost depending on what we get.
BRIAN GOMER: The actual desktop model is uniquely price. You get a high definition CCTV with OCR and talking, everything, and it is $2000. The desktop is definitely in of the price. When you go to the dual model with now gets you portability, it gets you all the features of the diamond edge and everything else, it’s going to be right around $2900 for it.
WADE WINGLER: So a standard desktop without the portable features is around $2000, but if you want to grab the android tablets and take it with you, that’s around $3000.
BRIAN GOMER: Yes.
WADE WINGLER: Now if folks are interested in seeing this in person, I know we’re doing just audio today which doesn’t really do it justice. But if they want to learn more, that they want to have exposure to one of these devices, who do they call? Where do they go on the web? What do they do?
BRIAN GOMER: They can definitely call me directly, and I can come out and show that to them. That’s one of the services that we do offer. And as well as Humanware’s website which is www.Humanware.com. Or as I said, I am a direct representative for them and do go out on the road. My phone number is 502-447-2458.
WADE WINGLER: And for our listeners who aren’t in central Indiana, there are also Humanware reps who might cover their geography.
BRIAN GOMER: Absolutely.
WADE WINGLER: Because although you might want to go to London to demo this thing, that’s probably not part of the charter, right?
BRIAN GOMER: I want to go somewhere warm, that’s for sure.
WADE WINGLER: Exactly. Well, Brian, thank you for coming out and hanging out with us today. Thank you for showing us this Prodigi and the Prodigi dual. I think it’s pretty cool, and I think as I watch the landscape and the horizon of assistive technology, I think this is definitely where things are going. I love the functionality of this.
BRIAN GOMER: Thank you for having me.
WADE WINGLER: Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? Call our listener line at 317-721-7124. Looking for show notes from today’s show? Head on over to EasterSealstech.com. Shoot us a note on Twitter @INDATAProject, or check us out on Facebook. That was your assistance technology update. I’m Wade Wingler with the INDATA Project at Easter Seals Crossroads in Indiana.
