I find that when I am trying to read very small sized text the free LED light app can be incredibly useful. It can act as a torch and also has a flashing option and SOS setting!. Just double tap the touch screen to turn it on providing you are not using VoiceOver – when you have select the icon first and then double tap. The menu items can be read back with voice. The battery drains pretty quickly if the light is used for too long.
Jane – Researcher
“I use the free university iPhone bus timetable and map app when I am in a hurry and need to find my way about. It also has my timetable and modules.”
Nicole – Engineering
“I would like to see a strip highlighter for text with and without TTS. It would highlight a line but the user needs to have the choice of how many lines can be highlighted. I don’t use any strategies like this at the moment but I have worked with individuals who are VI [visually impaired] and use similar strategies for reading.”
ClaroRead and TextHelp Read and Write can be used with the text to speech turned off and just use the settings for highlighted words, phrases and sentences.
However, if you do not need text to speech then there is the option to use an overlay such as the Claro screen ruler separate from ClaroRead or the free FX software T-bar, which is also available in Arabic.
Anirban – Computer Science
“I use Zoomtext a lot for reading and assignments when the screen reader is the most useful thing. I use the printer and scanner, although now I do not use the scanner so much as most of it is on line – I have large fonts and mouse pointer but usually read things with a screen reader as it saves my eyes.”
Amber – Nursing
YouTube Video link to ZoomText Tips and Tricks #10 – Using the SpeakIt Tool
You can personalise your mouse pointer in Zoomtext and there are several free downloads such as ‘Philip’s Large Coloured Cursors‘ that allow you use a colour and size of pointer that makes it easier to see and Dolphin Computer Access offer Windows High Visibility Mouse Pointers.
“I have discovered that the Kobo e-reader can open protected (DRM’d) epubs from libraries. They are synced by connecting the device to a PC with Adobe Digital Editions installed. But as far as I know it has no TTS.”
The Kobo wifi has adjustable fonts and views but these can depend on the book that has been downloaded.
Using the free Calibre ebook management service is another alternative when documents need to be converted to an accessible format
Neil – Psychology
“I would find that when I am reading poilicies which have so much text to read, I go to the summary and then use the find and just go to the specific bit. If you know you need a specific item such as ‘consent’ – then use Ctrl +F [Command +F], add the word to the search box and find it directly.”
Amber – nursing.
This week, I talked with Dan Russell, a search anthropologist at Google, about the time he spends with random people studying how they search for stuff. One statistic blew my mind. 90 percent of people in their studies don’t know how to use CTRL/Command + F to find a word in a document or web page! I probably use that trick 20 times per day and yet the vast majority of people don’t use it at all. (Alexis Madrigal)