Lanyards and Mobile Phones

I'm fortunate to have enough dexterity to seldom need assistance using my mobile phone. As mentioned before, I have chosen cases that have features giving me a greater ability to securely hold the device. A phone from October of 2004, that I still have and is sitting right next to me on the desk as I write this, was one of the earlier phones with a built-in modem, very minimal Internet access and texting capabilities. I had it set up on a free phone plan provided by SaskTel to any member of the Canadian Paraplegic Association. I had to purchase the phone out right, which certainly brings to light how expensive cell phones are when you don't get them at a discount rate because of a contract. Since it has served me 11 years I think I got my money's worth.

That said, this was a flip phone before any type of Internet connectivity or advanced communication was available in a mobile device for your average consumer. It is a really nice compact, streamlined unit that fits in just about any pocket. Unfortunately, because of the smooth, round lines and perfectly fitting halves, it was pretty difficult for me to reliably hold on to or flip open when receiving a call. Unless I had somewhat long fingernails I had a difficult time prying open the phone to use it. At the time of its primary use, it was simply for emergency purposes so I seldom needed to get at it in a hurry.

Adding a lanyard to the built in bar, as seen in the photo below, made it easier to keep it nearby for immediate access, as well as one additional place to hold on to the phone while prying it open for use. For my purposes I found the lanyard to remove the streamlined nature of the phone and make it more difficult to put in or remove from a pocket when it was not around my neck. Because of this the lanyard did not stay attached to the quick connector for very long. It was nice to be able to leave a quick connector attached for the times I did want the lanyard on it.

Not everyone has the benefit of the dexterity that I enjoy while others have more dexterity. New phones tend not to have a place intended for a lanyard as the flip phone pictured above does. Not so long ago I saw a brilliant improvisation on Brenda's phone (she happens to work at the CPA) and on Delynne's phone (who also works at the CPA and brought the idea for last week's post regarding the adapted makeup brush). Their adaptation was simply to feed the lanyard around their case, looped from the headphone opening to the camera's opening. Ingenious and universal for just about any smart phone out there.

If you choose the right lanyard, with a very tough but thin cord as the one used on both of these phones (it's the same lanyard, switched from one phone to the next for demonstration purposes), it won't affect the fit of the phone in the case. One of the two that I saw even fit well with the legendary Otterbox case for an iPhone. By legendary I mean that they fit incredibly precisely, better than some of the knockoff cases I have seen and used.

I love simple, inexpensive solutions to make it easier to enjoy technology everyone else is enjoying, without a complicated custom-made adaptation. This lanyard came with a terrible a.m. radio in the shape of a Saskatchewan Roughriders helmet, attached as a prize to a bottle of Wiser's Deluxe. Wouldn't want to lose my radio while listening to a Rider game and drinking my whiskey.

Source: Discount stores and eBay are the best places to find a lanyard that best meets your needs.

Touch Screens and Styluses

The series on productivity began with an old school pen in a writing splint, jumped forward to the technology of voice-to-text and this week will look at touch screens and styluses. But, the cat is out of the bag. I am not an Apple fan.

There are many reasons, and the purpose of this post is not to be a debate on brands, but a discussion about what I have perceived to be the advantages from a dexterity-disabled individual. Many of the pinch or spread gestures, multiple finger-tip gestures and even full palm-press gestures required to activate certain motions on iOS devices can be very difficult, if not impossible, to execute for me. Both Android and iOS have some built-in accessibility features but I find the Android features to be more advantageous to the dexterity and motor skills challenged. Most importantly, when you cannot perform the shortcut gesture in Android there is a workaround. From my experience and experimentation some gestures on iOS devices are the only way to perform a task or complete an action.

What I have observed with a Android devices, personally, is that there is almost always a built-in or free work around that is not cumbersome. Two examples I feel worth noting are in the Google Maps app and the OEM camera. Where a pinch to zoom gesture is required in Google Maps a tap and slide, with one finger, will perform the same action of zooming in or out of a map. The same can be said for rotating and other frequently used gestures. Secondly, the OEM camera with Android devices allows you to simply turn on a voice command that allows you to take a photo. When activated simply saying "shoot", "capture" or "smile" will activate the camera. This has enabled me to make photos from angles I would never be able to make them from with my DSLR.

I could make the photo from that angle with a DSLR, but the nice shallow depth of field it is able to produce means that accuracy of focusing is very specific and, without looking through the viewfinder, I would not be able to nail focus, such as on the tip of those little styluses above. It is my hope that my future DSLR will have Wi-Fi connectivity with a smart phone so that I can preview the photo and focus before making the photo with the DSLR. Essentially, live view of what the camera is seeing on your device's screen.

If you are unsatisfied with the Android OEM voice command camera function there are multiple free apps that will enable this function for you. There are apps available in the iTunes Store for iOS but you are going to have to pay for it. If it means you'll be able to make photos more easily, then it is worth it but, at what point do you stand against paying extra just because you are disabled? We do that far too often because there are no other options, and I, for one, am tired of it.

The main focus of this post is interacting with the touchscreens. Touchscreens are seen by many disabled individuals as a significant improvement in the ease of use of current communications technology. For many, the strength or finger stiffness required to use tactile buttons, such as those found on older style flip phones or earlier generation Blackberries, is not to be found. With touchscreens the lightest contact with the screen completes the input action you are trying to make. Sometimes, however, that input is too easy to make and with somewhat clumsy hands and poor grip on the device the wrong button may be pressed accidentally. That is why my current phone is a nice large Samsung Galaxy Note II, with a very grippy two-layer plastic and rubber case. I explored Otterbox cases but found them to be made of plastic that is too slippery. The one pictured above was $17 on eBay.

For many purposes, especially those involving the necessity for very accurate input, I prefer to use a stylus. The S Pen that comes with the Note series is specific to the device and, when withdrawn from its built-in sheath, activates many additional functions and methods of inputting data with great accuracy. I use a stylus for almost every interaction I have with our iPod Touch, the first touchscreen device we have owned, which is now used mainly for for our iOS proprietary alarm clock and a few small games. The small screen on the iPod Touch requires me to use a device that allows for greater input accuracy.

As much as touchscreens have made technology easier for many, they do have their aspects that make them imperfect for some individuals with a disability that affects their motor function. If you, as an able-bodied person, wish to experience what it is like for us try using your touchscreen device by holding it with an oven mitt on your hand that is holding the device. Then, for your input hand, tap the screen with the side of your thumb or first knuckle of one of your fingers, with your fingers curled in a loose fist. That is analogous to what it is like for someone with paralyzed hands.

Next week we will look at another tried and true input method, not mice, but trackballs.

Source: Electronics stores, eBay, Deal Extreme, and other online retailers.

Voice to Text

Continuing our productivity series, which began with my writing splint, will look at touch screens and styluses, and conclude with trackballs, we will look at voice-to-text technology.

Since 1998 I have been using voice-to-text software. It was very much in it's infancy. Version 2 of Dragon Dictate by Nuance Software was my preferred program at that time, their other being Dragon Naturally Speaking, which is what I'm using now. Dragon Dictate was a bit less capable at the writing aspect, but had greater control over cursor movement and other command functions. It no longer exists, but Naturally Speaking has integrated much of Dictate's functions.

At the time, NaturallySpeaking was designed to interpret full sentences, as it is now, but it was not terribly accurate. I even had a voice profile trained to dictate exam answers to a personal voice recorder that could later be plugged in to the computer, played and spit out my recording as text. I never trusted it because, even if the teacher or instructor could listen to the audio file, one inaccurately typed negative would have completely changed my answer. Now, one misspoken word or missed error can make for an undecipherable statement or wonderful laughing fit, as my best friend will confirm. This is especially true when chatting quickly and inaccurately, possibly after the intake of beverages that may result in reduced annunciation.

At that time, for the computer to accurately recognize what I was saying, it took at least four hours of training to start to show any semblance of accuracy and consistency. The best microphones available at the time, the one pictured above, were quite expensive and paled in sound quality to the $17 USB connected headset I'm using right now. The computers of the time were slow and it was a measly 266 MHz Intel processor with a 6 GB hard drive and probably 256 MB of RAM that first powered the software I used. The laptop I had the software installed on had a 200 MHz processor, 2 GB hard drive and likely 128 MB of RAM. To say that dictation was smooth and effortless would be a lie. After a completed phrase or sentence a pause was required to allow the auto correct box to appear with the 10 options given to choose from, hopefully one of which was what you actually said if the program got it wrong on the first try. It was tedious at times.

Now, except for pausing when I want to see what it interpreted the last thing I said was, I can speak multiple sentences without pausing and get near-perfect accuracy. In fact, the more I say and the larger the words I use, the more accurate it is. More letters means there are fewer words with those sounds and syllables so the likelihood of it being accurate increases. It really does encourage sophisticated writing which is not a problem for me.

A sluggish computer with growing software was only marginally faster than standard typing. As with so many computer-related things the data is always pushing the boundaries of the hardware. Video files keep getting bigger with the unbelievable 4K resolution that is now emerging, video games keep requiring better video cards and sound cards, additional hard drive space and other hardware requirements. Digital cameras continue to produce higher megapixel files (the megapixel race is over, please do not any longer be fooled into thinking that more megapixels means a better camera, but I digress) which requires more hard drive space. What once seemed like far more computer than you would ever need becomes laughable as inadequate within five years for most current applications.

There was a long period of time that I ceased using the software which came at the time I decided to upgrade my computer. You see, the hundreds of hours I had spent refining and updating my voice file caused it to increase in size to 8 MB. This is still in the time of 56.6 K modems and floppy disk drives. No available media could store that one voice file to be transferred to the new computer. Only 100 MB zip drives, which were outside my budget. As a result of not wanting to start from scratch, I stopped using the software for some time until I was encouraged to explore it, again.

The training time had diminished vastly, the accuracy after a mere 30 minutes of training was nearly perfect and, with a few features disabled, the hardware could keep up to the software to make for fluid writing. Now I keep the program running all the time and even flip on the microphone for a quick comment online.

I won't deny that I feel a little bit of jealousy when I think about the effectiveness of Google Voice, and even Siri for people who have never even used it before. Without any training, and only an Internet connection, these services are remarkably effective at accurately converting almost anyone's speech to accurate text. No hundreds of hours of training and refinement, just effective software. However, I have been enjoying the benefit of this technology a lot longer than most people and even those who have had smart phones much longer that I have seen amazed when I effectively use Google Voice.

Where these new technologies fail is in their ability to be customized. Dragon NaturallySpeaking can accurately insert any and all punctuation, navigate throughout a body of text or window, even add phrases specific to your needs. Three of my more common trained phrases are D700 (my camera), Help-Portrait and Jay. Without training you are most likely to get "D 700", "help portrait" and "J". By training them I save myself multiple words on a regular basis. In the case of Help-Portrait, to get those results without training, I would have to say 'cap help no space hyphen no space cap portrait. Until you get your brain wrapped around that it is a little bit confusing.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking can also be told to assume you have an accent when you begin the initial training. This way it can accurately write those words that you may not speak perfectly if English is your second language or you come from somewhere that people tend to have a strong accent. And, as much as I mourn the rapid decline of proper English usage, there is even a profile or two identified as teen-speak which can include and adapt to numerous slang terms and acronyms. There is a glimmer of hope, though, as the auto punctuate function might just assist a few people to learn appropriate places to insert dashes, commas or even a semicolon.

After 16 years of using this software my brain is thoroughly trained to use it. When I was on the verge of making a decision between upgrading my current Dragon NaturallySpeaking or switching to Windows' built-in dictation software I had a very difficult time using the variations of commands in the Windows version. I'm not saying the Windows software is not effective, but after that long of using a certain program it is well ingrained in my brain. My wife will attest, the occasional time she replies to an e-mail or text for me, that I often speak the punctuation as I do using this software when I am telling her what I would like my reply to say. The point is that if you do decide to give the software a try do your research and choose one because once your brain is trained it'll be like learning another language to switch between software. I think I have done a fairly will good job, when I think while using it, between dictating using Dragon NaturallySpeaking or dictating on my phone using Google Voice.

Source: The software can be purchased online or in most stores that sell computers. The microphone I use was purchased from DealExtreme. When searching for a microphone read reviews to see how effective it is at dictation as some are better than others for that purpose.