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Apple unveils new accessibility features

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Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#121

Post by Barbing »

miki123211 wrote: post #112
chipotle_coyote wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's history with accessibility is, on the whole, pretty good. I strongly suspect that the "coming soon" part of this means "after we integrate Google Gemini models into the system," so I don't think you should use the current state of Siri as a yardstick. (I actually have decent luck with the current Siri, but I don't push it very much and have sort of adapted myself to its limitations; on the flip side, I have a…

Coming soon very likely means iOS 27. This has been the typical pattern for Apple for the last few years. The flashy features are announced at WWDC, accessibility has a dedicated, earlier press release. Before this practice, accessibility announcements would usually be tucked in some WWDC slide that most people wouldn't even notice.

The thing that disappointed me about this amazing announcement was “coming later this year“. They should probably give us dates for a little while at least until we get the (I just would not wanna promise anything. Except “available for download this Friday“ once the gold master is passing tests.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#122

Post by Barbing »

freedomben wrote: post #53
mohsen1 wrote: post #6

Fun fact: This video was made accessible to sighted people because no blind person would ever listen to voice at that speed. Honestly if you ever observe a blind person using computers you'd impressed how they can listen to audio at unimaginable speeds.

Indeed, and not just fast, but often heavily robotic (which many sighted people struggle to understand even at 1.5x). I remember reading about a blind person who learned how to do echo-location using sound, and it seemed like such a cool superpower, that one of these days I'm going to take the plunge and unplug my monitor and start learning how to really use the tools. I worked with a blind person a few years back wh…

> blind person who learned how to do echo-location using sound

RIP kid https://youtu.be/fnH7AIwhpik

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#123

Post by satvikpendem »

mohsen1 wrote: post #6

Fun fact: This video was made accessible to sighted people because no blind person would ever listen to voice at that speed. Honestly if you ever observe a blind person using computers you'd impressed how they can listen to audio at unimaginable speeds.

I listen to a lot of podcasts and YouTube videos at 3x or 4x speed now, having slowly built up the skill over a few years. It's pretty nice now and saves time, and it's remarkable how well the human brain can adapt to such input.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#124

Post by embedding-shape »

jchw wrote: post #29
embedding-shape wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Honestly if you ever observe a blind person using computers you'd impressed how they can listen to audio at unimaginable speeds. Even better, fire up Orca (or whatever screenreader application your OS comes with) yourself and try to use your computer while shutting your eyes, kind of eye-opening (no pun intended) what kind of experience these sort of users typically get. And also, you quickly start to understand wh…

When I was at Google, I'd periodically test our (internal-only) app with Chromevox with the display off. It's not that it sounded like it would be easy, but it really is a challenge, and I can only imagine the muscle memory built up over time of trying to work around accessibility bugs and strange behaviors. Unfortunately it seems impossible to get all that much funding for accessibility work :/ I wonder what ever ha…

> I wonder what ever happened to the Newton accessibility bus intended to supplement Wayland...

Hm, never heard about it, but now I'm wondering too. I just finished implementing proper accessibility support for my native app toolkit for Linux, macOS and Windows, but only done it for X11 so far, I was just gonna get started with Wayland. What is the accessibility story on Wayland, couldn't people rely on the same protocols as with X11? That was my impression, but haven't really dig into yet.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#125

Post by brador »

satvikpendem wrote: post #123
mohsen1 wrote: post #6

Fun fact: This video was made accessible to sighted people because no blind person would ever listen to voice at that speed. Honestly if you ever observe a blind person using computers you'd impressed how they can listen to audio at unimaginable speeds.

I listen to a lot of podcasts and YouTube videos at 3x or 4x speed now, having slowly built up the skill over a few years. It's pretty nice now and saves time, and it's remarkable how well the human brain can adapt to such input.

You recall nothing and you know it. You're just wasting time you could use for something useful or meaningful in your life. Kids call it "Anxiety cope" but I don't agree.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#126

Post by thrownthatway »

mohsen1 wrote: post #6

Fun fact: This video was made accessible to sighted people because no blind person would ever listen to voice at that speed. Honestly if you ever observe a blind person using computers you'd impressed how they can listen to audio at unimaginable speeds.

Twenty years ago I took a level 1 tech support call from a visually impairment guy and it took about 3.2 seconds to realise his condition was no impediment for using a computer because of the screen reader tech he was using.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#127

Post by thrownthatway »

Aboutplants wrote: post #72
isityettime wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it takes quite a lot of practice to reach this speed. It's not rare among blind developers, but I think it still takes a lot of work to get there. Pretty impressive! I wish more people would watch videos like this just because having a realistic idea of how blind people do certain tasks can help you move from pity or even compassion to a more productive kind of understanding. I think sometimes when you haven'…

I listen to a lot of podcasts and listen at 1.5-2.0 speed and it’s to the point that I literally cannot stand listening to 1.0 speed anymore as they go too slowly (depending on the content of course).

Except Marc Andreessen, I can’t decode his speech at 2x

Maybe it’s just a matter of practice.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#128

Post by runjake »

Aboutplants wrote: post #72
isityettime wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it takes quite a lot of practice to reach this speed. It's not rare among blind developers, but I think it still takes a lot of work to get there. Pretty impressive! I wish more people would watch videos like this just because having a realistic idea of how blind people do certain tasks can help you move from pity or even compassion to a more productive kind of understanding. I think sometimes when you haven'…

I listen to a lot of podcasts and listen at 1.5-2.0 speed and it’s to the point that I literally cannot stand listening to 1.0 speed anymore as they go too slowly (depending on the content of course).

I am jealous. I can't listen and retain most podcasts at more than 1.0x. I even disable the podcast player functionality that eliminates pauses and silent sections.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#129

Post by a012 »

satvikpendem wrote: post #123
mohsen1 wrote: post #6

Fun fact: This video was made accessible to sighted people because no blind person would ever listen to voice at that speed. Honestly if you ever observe a blind person using computers you'd impressed how they can listen to audio at unimaginable speeds.

I listen to a lot of podcasts and YouTube videos at 3x or 4x speed now, having slowly built up the skill over a few years. It's pretty nice now and saves time, and it's remarkable how well the human brain can adapt to such input.

I’m the opposite, I can’t stand the fast speaking videos. But I also speed up 1.2x to 1.5x if the videos were too slow.

Re: Apple unveils new accessibility features

#130

Post by kps »

c0wb0yc0d3r wrote: post #19
nechuchelo wrote: post #4

This looks like a genuinely useful application of LLMs. I wish more companies focused on how they can help humans instead of replacing us or squeezing us as hard as possible in the name of productivity.

I think we should reserve judgment until this lands in the hands of the people it helps. My experience is limited to my elderly parents who have trouble seeing. With the text size Apple allows them to set it to, their phones are unreadable. Text runs off the screen in every app, 1st and 3rd party. In their bill example, the user is told to confirm with the provider. Why not offer to call the number on the bill? Inste…

Yeah, I used to use iOS with text one step above the default size, and text was often cut off.

I have a problem with astigmatic halation that makes ‘dark mode’ difficult to read. Since iOS 26, multiple aspects of the system have been made dark only, contrary to the system setting. Writing text correctly should be the lowest of low-hanging fruit.

I suspect this is more of a flashy ‘AI’ promotion rather than reflective of any real commitment.

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