All News and Views

A high school freshman has introduced a free and lightweight OCR app for IOS devices. Shalin Shah recently released Voice, a free OCR solution which includes a variety of image enhancement techniques, to the iTunes App Store. The app includes a field of view report to indicate when images are in view, adjusts brightness, and corrects skewed or angled images among other features. It's built, in part, using the Google Drive API which recently added optical character recognition as part of its available features. You can try it out now on the iTunes app store and give him feedback via Email at shalinvs@gmail.com.

A free update has been released for users of Jaws 16, and it may be a welcome one to users experiencing frustrations when trying to use Google Docs. In addition to bugs fixed when using Docs, improvements for Internet Explorer, Microsoft Excel, Word, and Outlook, and Skype are also included. The complete list of reported changes is listed below. If you get a chance to test out Google Docs with Jaws 16, let us know what you think.

A short survey has been posted to gain feedback from users of Android's TalkBack screen reader. The one-page survey includes several open-ended questions asking what users like and dislike about Talkback as well as what they feel is the biggest thing that needs to be fixed. Check the link on the post to take the survey.

As announced earlier, audio description tracks for Marvel's Daredevil series on Netflix are now available. Here's how to enable it using some of the most popular devices. Audio description is listed among the list of alternative language tracks, so any Netflix app which supports alternate languages should also support this new feature.

In a move that may have ripple effects across the industry, Netflix will be supplying audio description tracks for many of its original programs, according to a post on its blog. The descriptive audio tracks will start with Marvel's Daredevil series and then spread to other popular titles including House of Cards and Orange is the New Black.
"Netflix is actively committed to increasing the number of audio-visual translations for movies and shows in our English-language catalogues. We are also exploring adding audio description into other languages in the future," according to Tracy Wright, who authored the post on the Netflix US and Canada blog.
Netflix is also planning to work with studios to make audio tracks available for other programs as well as exploring the possibility of tracks for other languages. Have you seen the audio tracks on Daredevil or any other shows yet? Sound off in the comments.

Before I get to this week’s colum, I would like to answer a question and reply to a comment I have received. Louis D asked my opinion about Old Navy. I am not a huge fan of Old Navy. Old Navy’s quality isn’t up to par compared to The Gap and The Banana Republic. If you want your clothes to last for years to come, I wouldn’t shop at Old Navy. That being said, Old Navy is a great place to shop for trendier items. I had a comment regarding this column’s intended targeted audience…. I am a male and while I try to provide some general information in each column that isn’t gender specific, this column’s intended targeted audience is men. Please keep the questions and comments coming and I will try my best to answer them. Now to this week’s column.

The Intel Compute Stick, a snazzy $180 dongle that can turn anything with an HDMI port into a full-fledged Windows computer, made a bit of a splash when it touched down at CES 2015. Now, it's landing for real, preorders have started at Amazon.

The device features a Quad-core 1.33GHz Intel Atom processor with 2GB of RAM and 32GB of solid state storage, running Windows 8.1. It will be available on May 6th, and we can't wait to mess with one to see if it can run with NVDA. Imagine having a computer connected to your TV with a screen reader and everything! If it works, it's exciting to think about all the things we'll do with it. Sighted assistance will be needed to get NVDA started, but that's the only negative thing I can find about it at the moment.

The collective internet has the general opinion that some news comes along in pairs or even threes. Today, on the 5th birthday of the iPad, we'll take a look at a few stories that either directly conflict, or conversely, complement one another.

If you are a low vision user and live in or near New York city, a research team is interested in your feedback on the viability of using smart glasses to attain information. Participants will be compensated for their time and travel costs. We've included the Email below.

APH has released another free update to its Nearby Explorer GPS software for Android devices. This release includes bug fixes and some incremental improvements, including a Voice Search button on the search screen, support for OpenStreetMap for addresses, and support for expressing the distance to nearby places using clock face, such as 11 o'clock. It's available now from Google Play, and we've included the complete changelog below.

We posted earlier about the array of new gestures and commands available in Samsung's forthcoming Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge. While the phones aren't scheduled to be available until April 10, some T-Mobile stores, including a local store we contacted, have the devices on display currently, meaning you can try out the new accessibility features before you buy. If you go to a store and find a phone, you can go to Settings, Accessibility, Vision and enable Galaxy TalkBack. Be sure to enable Galaxy TalkBack as opposed to the Google version. Our previous post lists the gestures that should be available. The Galaxy S6 on T-Mobile should contain the same accessibility features as other carriers. If you're able to try out the phone, let us know what you think in the comments.

How many medium bananas does it take to equal one cup? Or how many teaspoons will you get from one small clove of garlic? A page on About.com includes this information and more for over 600 common and not so common foods in one simple table. It's sorted alphabetically and very easy to navigate. Select the link on this post to visit the page.

Amazon wants to make ordering every day necessities from its website as easy as clicking a button. We're not talking about the Buy Now button on the Amazon website here. This new device is an actual Bluetooth button, known as the Dash.

Dash.

A Dash is a small Wi-Fi button for different items that you hang in your house. When you are ready to buy an item, like detergent, you just click the button and the product order goes straight to your Amazon shopping cart. Several brand-name products already have their own buttons, including Bounty paper towels, Clorox disinfecting wipes, Gatorade and Kraft mac and cheese.

No word on how much it will cost, but it's now available for Prime members. Non-Prime subscribers will eventually be able to sign up for the device as well. If you're interested, click the provided link and let us know what you think.

If you need a book, cheap phone case or just about any household item, Amazon has you covered. But if you need a gardener, electrician or a private tutor to help you brush up on your Spanish, then before now, you’d need to look elsewhere. Thanks to Amazon Home Services, you’ll be able to easily and efficiently find the right person for the job.

There are a number of sites that simply advertise the services of others, but Amazon assumes responsibility for the entire process of matching the right professional with the job.

At this time, Amazon Home Services is quite limited. It’s a US-only enterprise for now, and whether you’ll be able to find a suitable candidate to complete the required job depends largely on where you live. For Seattle, San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles, you’ll probably be able to find somebody to help with any task, from mowing the lawn to ridding your computer of viruses, although in most areas, coverage is described either as Light or Coming Soon.

If you do live in an area selling services, then for a limited time, Amazon is offering a $20 Amazon.com gift card to anybody buying a service costing more than $99.

Amazon is not the first to create a marketplace for professionals to link up with those who require their assistance, but given the company’s experience and general reputation, one can assume both professionals and consumers will go with the Amazon brand.

To learn more about Amazon Home Services, click the provided link and let us know what you think.

According to Media Access Australia, Samsung has introduced several new accessibility features with the pending release of the Galaxy S6 and S6 Active. The phones, which will be introduced on April 10, include an enhanced version of the TalkBack screen reader called Galaxy TalkBack, which feature a laundry list of additional gestures. For example, swiping up or down, which previously performed the same action as swiping left or right, will use the "most recent contextual menu option" according to the user guide - PDF. We're not exactly sure how this will work in practice, but the duplicated gestures were seen as a waste to many.

Several of the new gestures center around a new text selection mode which includes ways to select, cut, and paste text. Users can also pause and resume speech using a gesture as well as media playback. A two finger triple tap will speak the current date and time, battery status, and mode, with the exact information that is spoken configurable from the settings menu.

In my last column, I showed you how to find inexpensive clothes for a good price. Now, I will discuss two basic fashion guidelines and one basic thing we all should know about our skin.

Another big assistive technology merger appears to be in the works. ABiSee, well-known for its line of scanning and reading machines including the Eye-Pal Ace, and Freedom Scientific, makers of the JAWS for Windows screen reader, video magnifiers, and the Focus braille displays has joined forces according to a press release. According to the release, Freedom Scientific will begin distributing ABiSe's line of reading products and ABISee founder Leon Reznik will become a member of the Freedom Scientific team. We've reached out in an attempt to get more details on this developing story and included the full press release below.

It's been a little more than a week since we last dove into the whirlpool of Apple news and events. And you would think, with pre orders for the Apple Watch still weeks away, it would have been quiet during that time. Well, um, not so much it seems.

Following on the heels of their Newsline app, the National Federation of the Blind has released their second app into the iOS App Store. NFB Connect provides access to commonly requested information such as publications like the Braille Monitor and Future Reflections, a search tool to find a local chapter, and notifications for breaking news items among other features. Browse upcoming events, and read posts from NFB blogs. The free app is available now from the App Store.

I love finding a bargain. Who doesn’t? If you shop wisely, you don’t have to break the bank to feel and look marvelous!! Before I go on, let me tell you the difference between cheap and Inexpensive clothes. To me, cheap clothes are poor quality. They typically fade, shrink, pill up and don't last. However, Inexpensive clothes are good quality clothes that will last. Please don’t be fooled….. There are some designer brands that make cheap clothes. My clothes are relatively Inexpensive. I can't afford to buy cheap clothes.