Category: GTT Vancouver

GTT Vancouver Summary Notes, Passwords, Security and iOS Ethernet Connection, June 6, 2020 with Link to CCB Podcast Episode

Get Together with Technology (GTT)

Sponsored by the Canadian Council of the Blind (CCB)

Summary Notes:

GTT Vancouver

June 6, 2020

Theme: Passwords, Security and iOS Ethernet Connection, use this link to access the CCB Podcast Episode.

Presenter: Monty Lilburn

monty@bc.cx

This was the final meeting for the Winter/Spring session with the GTT Vancouver group taking the months of July and August off.  Next meeting will be in September, and because the first Saturday in September will be on the Labour Day long weekend the meeting will be bumped to the second Saturday, September 12, 2020.

In this episode Monty talks about passwords, authentication and everything that goes along with it.  Six topics were outlined and discussed:

1; Origin of passwords, Monty started with a brief history of password usage, as well as the use of “shibboleths” to identify those who belong, or don’t belong to a group, community, culture or class of people.  These have often been used in wartime.

2; Identification and authentication, is when someone shows their user name to identify themselves and a means of proving they are who they said they are.

3; Multi factor authentication, for which there are 3 types, A) the knowledge factor, something you know like a PIN, a secret handshake or a password. Monty went into detail on password strength, which relates to length, complexity and unpredictability, and that humans aren’t good at randomness and tend to use repetitiveness, predictable patterns and dates. For example, the most often used password is 1 through 6 which is used 23,000,000 times in a British Cyber Security study. Other popular ones were 1 through 9, the letters Qwerty, the word password and the number 1 7 times.  B) Something you have, or possessions, like a key to a lock, a smart phone or a token generator that generates a random number. C) is something you are, like a fingerprint, retina scan or a body image, relating to biometrics. Two additional factors have since been introduced, location and time.  Banks will track time and location if a transaction happens in Vancouver at 10AM, and again in Frankfort Germany 5 minutes later on the same account.

4; Two-step verification, which introduces security questions or something you have like a cell phone. Sym jacking/porting are security risks that make this less foolproof.

5; Password managers, are databases that store passwords, credit card numbers, PIN’s and other items that secure your information and that need only one password in order to get in. Pros are that you only have one password to remember, they can generate strong random passwords and can store other related info. Cons, not all browsers support their use, all your eggs are in one basket and if you forget that one password you’ve lost all your accounts. One other Con is that it gives thieves one location to target. Monty then discussed the Apple Keychain as a password manager, as well as others like One Password, Last Pass. and Password Safe. The latter one is free, open-source and has been around a long time so has a good proven track record. Android smart devices don’t have a Keychain like Apple does, however do use a similar system called Google Smart Lock. Monty then worked through the prediction that passwords will be dead in 50 years or so, and that they are inherently crackable given enough time and powerful enough computers. Biometrics are a longer lasting way of authenticating users. Monty took several questions on the material presented so far.

6; Password viability, which relates simply to biometrics, length, strength and randomness.

Bonus Information:

In the next section Monty outlined how he managed to connect his iPhone to a network cable in order to avoid the flakiness of Wi-Fi for conference calls like the Zoom call being recorded today. He was connected to a Qwerty keyboard, Blue Yeti microphone and an Ethernet cable through a Lightening to USB Camera adaptor. The $49 adaptor has a Lightening port and a USB 3 port to which Monty connected a 4-port USB hub that allowed him to connect all the above devices to his iPhone. The hub is powered as the iPhone hasn’t the ability to power that many devices.

For more information, please contact your GTT Coordinators:

Albert Ruel                   or                        Kim Kilpatrick

1-877-304-0968,550                      1-877-304-0968,513

albert.GTT@CCBNational.net                GTTProgram@Gmail.com

CCB Backgrounder:

The CCB was founded in 1944 by a coalition of blind war veterans, schools of the blind and local chapters to create a national self-governing organization. The CCB was incorporated by Letters Patent on May 10, 1950 and is a registered charity under the provisions of the Income Tax Act (Canada).

The purpose of the CCB is to give people with vision loss a distinctive and unique perspective before governments.  CCB deals with the ongoing effects of vision loss by encouraging active living and rehabilitation through peer support and social and recreational activities.

CCB promotes measures to conserve sight, create a close relationship with the sighted community and provide employment opportunities.

The CCB recognizes that vision loss has no boundaries with respect to gender, income, ethnicity, culture, other disabilities or age.

The CCB understands in many instances vision loss is preventable and sometimes is symptomatic of other health issues.  For the 21st century, the CCB is committed to an integrated proactive health approach for early detection to improve the quality of life for all Canadians.

As the largest membership organization of the blind and partially sighted in Canada the CCB is the “Voice of the Blind™”.

GTT is an exciting initiative of the Canadian Council of the Blind, founded in Ottawa in 2011 by Kim Kilpatrick and Ellen Goodman.  GTT aims to help people who are blind or have low vision in their exploration of low vision and blindness related access technology.  Through involvement with GTT participants can learn from and discuss assistive technology with others walking the same path of discovery.

GTT is made up of blindness related assistive technology users, and those who have an interest in using assistive technology designed to help blind and vision impaired people level the playing field.  GTT groups interact through social media, and periodically meet in-person or by teleconference to share their passions for assistive technology and to learn what others can offer from their individual perspectives.

CCB National Office

100-20 James Street Ottawa ON  K2P 0T6

Toll Free: 1-877-304-0968 Email: info@ccbnational.net URL: www.ccbnational.net

 

 

GTT New Westminster and Vancouver Summary Notes, Bluetooth Keyboards, February 20 and March 3, 2018

Get Together with Technology (GTT)

New Westminster and Vancouver Meetings

 

A Chapter of the Canadian Council of the Blind

in partnership with

Blind Beginnings and

Vancouver Community College

 

Summary Notes

February 20 in New Westminster and March 3 in Vancouver, 2018

 

Attendance at both meetings totaled 17

 

Summary Notes on Bluetooth keyboards

 

John Ogilvie lead both discussions:

There are Bluetooth keyboards available for the IPhone and IPad.  Some are smaller and fold in half, and others are larger.

Using the keyboard, means you don’t have to use the touch screen and gestures

There are various keyboards which are slightly different

Quick Nav – left and right arrow together puts you in or out of this mode

When we are writing we turn it off, but when we’re reading we turn it on.

Swiping left and right with quicknav on is just using your arrow keys

To get to the top of the screen – control up arrow, or control down arrow to get to the bottom

When it says actions available you can use your up and down arrows to hear what options there are

Double tap on the keyboard is up and down arrow together

Hitting 2 takes you to level 2 headings

Option key with left or right arrow is to go back one word or forward one word – when writing

Command key is like the control key on a PC

Keyboard help allows you to touch any key on the keyboard to figure out where the keys are.

Control option K turns on the keyboard help

To exit keyboard help press Escape

Control option A is read from where your cursor is onwards

Mail

Control up arrow to top of mail

Right arrow will take you through each of your messages

Hit control to stop it from reading

Attachments are always at the bottom of the Emails and you can get there by doing a control down arrow

Up and down arrow together to select or open

Hold down an arrow can skip you forward or back quickly

Roter on the keyboard is up arrow with left arrow, or up arrow with eright arrow and then just arrow up or down to read.

When you are going through the list of your Emails you will hear actions available.  When you hear actions available you arrow up and down to hear the options.  Select more to get to reply

 

When you are moving your arrow to the right it puts your cursor to the right of the character, and when you are arrowing left, it puts your cursor to the left of the character

Option left and right brings you from one screen to the next

Skype

Works similarily to navigate around

Search button on the keyboard – type in what you are searching for

Use QuickNav to look through the options to find the one you want and select it with up and down arrow together

 

next meeting: March 20, 2018

Facebook – using the GTT group

 

For more information about GTT contact:

Shawn Marsolais                  Albert Ruel

Shawn@BlindBeginnings.ca         Albert.GTT@CCBNational.net

604-434-7243                        1-877-304-0968 Ext. 550

 

GTT New Westminster and Vancouver Overview

  • GTT New Westminster/ Vancouver is a chapter of the Canadian Council of the Blind (CCB).
  • GTT New Westminster and Vancouver promote a self-help learning experience by holding monthly meetings to assist participants with assistive technology.
  • Each meeting consists of a feature technology topic, questions and answers about technology, and one-on-one training where possible.
  • Participants are encouraged to come to each meeting even if they are not interested in the feature topic because questions on any technology are welcome. The more participants the better able we will be equipped with the talent and experience to help each other.
  • There are GTT groups across Canada as well as a national GTT monthly toll free teleconference. You may subscribe to the National GTT blog to get email notices of teleconferences and notes from other GTT chapters. Visit:

http://www.gttprogram.wordpress.com/

There is a form at the bottom of that web page to enter your email.

 

National GTT Email Support List

CCB sponsors a GTT email support list to provide help and support with technology for blind and low vision Canadians.  To subscribe to the email list, send an empty email to:

GTTsupport+subscribe@groups.io

 

[End of Document]

 

CCB-GTT New Westminster Summary Notes, Using the Safari Web Browser on iDevices, April 19, 2017

Get Together with Technology (GTT)
New Westminster Meeting

A Chapter of the Canadian Council of the Blind in partnership with Blind Beginnings

Summary Notes
April 19, 2017

Present: Shawn, Albert, Peg, Mary, John, Carol, Pat, Fay, Louise and Kiyo

Safari is the native Web browser on iPhones/iPads/iPods and Mac computers.
A web browser is used for accessing web pages on the Internet.
It is the Apple equivalent to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.
You can download Firefox or Google Chrome on your iDevice but Safari will always be the default browser.
Unlike with the Microsoft Windows platform, you can’t change the default web browser on iDevices.
The Safari icon is usually found in the Doc at the bottom of your phone, however it can be moved to other locations on the Home Screen.
When you open/launch Safari it will open to the last site you visited, not a default homepage like can be established in PC web browsers.
To type/dictate a new web site or a search string you will find the Address bar at the top of the page, and you can conduct a one finger double tap to bring focus to it.
Once you are focussed on the Address Bar you can type/dictate the direct address of the site you want to visit, or you can type/dictate key words to conduct a web search.
Once you type/dictate the relevant text, conduct a one finger double tap on the “Go or Search” icon in the bottom right corner of the device to activate the search.
If you want to copy the URL of the web page you are on, conduct a one finger double tap on the Address Bar and the text contained therein will be highlighted. Activate the Share Button on the Safari Doc and one finger swipe right to find the Copy Button, then one finger double Tap it and a copy of the URL will be moved to the clipboard ready for pasting where ever you need it.

Gestures:

One Finger Double Tap;
The one finger double tap activates/launches/selects/opens items.
To activate the Play Button in any audio player or on YouTube you must conduct a one finger double tap on the button. Once the audio is playing the Magic Tap will pause/resume playing. If ever you find that music or your audio book starts playing without you tapping the relevant button, you may have accidently conducted a Magic Tap, so repeat the action and it will pause the audio again.
To activate an Edit Field you must conduct a one finger double tap, then you will be able to type/dictate.
When VoiceOver says that Actions are available it means you have options and you can flick up and down with one finger to hear the options.

Magic Tap;
The Two finger double tap is called the “Magic Tap” because you can use it for many things including dictating, turning off or on music or audio books, or answering or hanging up a phone.
You must be in the edit field and in edit mode in order for the two finger double tap gesture to open the microphone so that you can dictate.
You must be outside of the edit fields in order to have the two finger double tap answer/hang-up the phone or play/pause audio.

Siri/Dictation;
Siri and dictation are related, but not the same. Siri gives you very little time to dictate your request/instructions before she thinks you are finished, and Dictation allows you time to stop and think during dictation.

Rotor;
Activate the Rotor by placing two fingers on the screen and turning them as if you were turning a radio knob. Ensure your fingers aren’t too close together or it will think it is just one finger.
Use your rotor to select characters, words, lines, headings, links, etc.
Once a Rotor item is selected, the one finger flick up and down moves the focus point forward or back by the selected movement unit, like, characters, words, lines, headings, links, etc.
Once you land on an actionable item the one finger double tap will activate/select the item.
The one finger flick up takes the focus to the beginning of the character/word/line, and the one finger flick down takes the focus to the back of the character/word/line. This is important for Back Spacing over text you want to delete.

Two finger flick up or down;
The Two finger flick down will start VoiceOver reading from where the focus is.
The Two finger flick up will send the cursor to the top of the screen/page and start VoiceOver reading from there.

Google Operators:
Put quotation marks around multiple words that should appear in specific order that you are looking for, for example, “Joe Bloe” so that only Joe Bloe will show up in the results. Otherwise, all the Joe’s and all the Bloe’s will show up.
Add a plus sign after the search string to add two things together in a search term, for example if you are looking for Joe Bloe in Vancouver you would do the following:
“Joe Bloe” +Vancouver
You can also use a minus symbol to exclude something in a search term, for example, if you are looking for Joe Bloe and don’t want the Vancouver one to show up you would replace the above + sign with a minus sign, and all Joe Bloe’s outside of Vancouver should appear.
If your initial search term is too generic you may get too many results, so try to be really specific in your search terms.

Two finger scrub;
At the top left corner is a back button that takes you back to the screen you were at before, including lists of email messages, Contact profiles, web pages or Twitter/Facebook posts.
The Two finger scrub like the print letter Z done quickly is attached to the Back Button and will also usually take you back to the screen you were on before.

Saving Favourites;
You can save a site to your favourites by selecting the Share Button on the Safari Doc at the bottom of all web pages you will visit. It is found just above the home button at the bottom of the screen.
Swiping through the list of options you will find several actionable items including air drop which allows you to share with someone in the room who also has an iDevice, message – allows you to send the link to the site to somebody else through text, mail – allows you to Email somebody the link, notes allows you to save it in a note, Twitter/Facebook – allows you to post to those social media sites, add to favourites – allows you to include that page to a list of your favourites, add bookmark – sets a bookmark in the Bookmarks list, add to reading list – allows you to access it without being on the Internet, add to home screen – allows you to save it to your home screen as an icon.
In the above list you can double tap on Add to Home Screen, and that will allow you to edit the name before flicking left to double tap on the Add/Save Button and it will be saved to your Home Screen for easy access to that web page.

PC Web Browsing:
Hold down the Alt and type the letter D to bring focus to the Address Bar in Firefox or Internet Explorer. When you land there the URL for that web page is selected, so just hold down the Control key and type the letter C to copy it to the clipboard for pasting in a document or email message.

Possible topics for future meetings that resulted from this talk:
Rotor on iDevices,
Tips for searching in a browser,
Gestures with voiceover,
How to set up your home screens,
Text editing – copying, cutting and pasting.

Topic for the May 17 meeting will be rotor and gestures with VoiceOver.
Albert will check if we can designate a donation to our public library for CELA.

Respectfully submitted by Shawn Marsolais and Albert Ruel

GTT New Westminster and Vancouver Summary Notes, Making TV Accessible, February 15 and March 4, 2017

Get Together with Technology (GTT)
New Westminster and Vancouver Meetings

Sponsored by the Canadian Council of the Blind in partnership with Blind Beginnings

Summary Notes
Feb. 15 and March 4, 2017

Making TV Accessible

Feb 15 in New Westminster:
Present: Albert, Matthew, Ryan, Fay, Carol, John, Bill, Karim, Pat.
March 4 in Vancouver:
Present: Sean H, Ryan, Monty, Rita, Betty, Maria, John

Starting out with TV in general:
• Antenna or cable was the traditional way, but now you can access TV over digital, the internet, or satellite.
• IP TV is internet protocol television.
• Something like YouTube or Netflics uses an application to stream video from the internet.
• IP TV is similar in that it uses an app to access a server that broadcasts traditional live TV channels (CTV, CBC, Global, etc.).
• You need to subscribe to the service, and get some hardware like ChromeCast, Apple TV or the xBox.

How accessible is it:

• AE-BC internet corp is the only one Monty knows of, in terms of IP TV provider
• The are an internet service provider.
• They buy their bandwidth in bulk from bigger companies, so you are using the same infrastructure, but when you phone up customer service, you are talking to AE-BC.
• Internet plans are potentially cheaper, unlimited downloads as well.
• So you need the internet to have IP TV service.

So how do we watch it:

• They can sell you an Android cypher bar, which is a small Android box that plugs into the wall, and into your tv through HDMI, and it has USB inputs and a couple different audio outputs.
• It is about six inches by two inches, almost the size of a small braille display.
• Last year that box was the main option, it cost 200 dollars, and you had to buy it.
• Monty found that he could use talkback, the android accessible screen reader that is built in to the box.
• It did not work one hundred percent, but it was a partially talking set top box.
• The iPhone app was not 100 percent accessible either, but Monty was able to move up and down the navigation menu and choose the channel he was looking for, and he was able to toggle descriptive video on and off (however, the descriptive video was not working on shows he knew it was available on), so that was one drawback. He was also not able to get descriptive video on the iOS app.
• So you get the basic 40 local channels for free, and they allow you to bundle extra channels just like shaw and Telus.
• So that concludes the description of live TV over the internet.
• Participants gave information on Shaw Free Range TV, which is a similar internet TV service that is offered to shaw customers.

Moving on to Apple TV:

• It is a box you hook up to your TV with Voiceover – you can use Netflicks, Show Me, Crave TV, – has its own App store.
• Apple TV can only get info from the Internet – not from your regular cable TV. All cable TV menus are still not accessible.
• There is a device you can use to connect the Apple TV to your stereo to allow you to access the audio of the Apple TV programming.
• Google also makes the ChromeCast – is cheaper and everything is done through your smart phone.
• Shaw cable is starting to offer the ChromeCasts service in the Vancouver and Calgary areas, and are planning to go nationwide with it soon.
• Siri is available on the new Apple TV as well.
• You can ask Siri to go find a movie on NetFlics or iTunes or a song on YouTube.
• You can set triple click to turn off and on Voiceover on the Apple TV.
• You can turn on audio description so that any program you play that has audio-description will play automatically.
• You can use a Bluetooth keyboard instead of the apple TV remote.
• Price ranges from $150 – $250 depending on the amount of storage you want, 32, 64 or 128 GB.

Microsoft Xbox:

• Xbox also allows you to use Narrator to access Netflicks etc.

Tutorial Podcasts:

• Podcast providers like CoolBlindTech.com and David Woodbridge offer many opportunities to learn about the many apps and devices available.

Tell Me More TV:

• Another subscription service that is currently available is Tell Me More – everything is in described TV – like AMI for $7 per month – watch on Internet. They are working on an app
• Use the PromoCode Tellmemore17 and you’ll get $25 percent off

Topic for the next New Westminster meeting, March 15 will be GPS:

• We will play a podcast on Nearby Explorer.

The topic for April Vancouver and New Westminster meetings:

• Dropbox will be the focus, both a lecture component and then a hands on signing up for and installing Dropbox component. Bring your laptop computer or smart phone so you can receive the support you need.

GTT Vancouver and New Westminster Summary Notes, GPS and OrCam, September and October Meetings, 2016

GTT Vancouver
Summary Notes

Topic: GPS and the OrCam

Session 1, GPS and the OrCam
Date: Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Present: 16 participants; Shawn, Corey, Lilo, Nora, John, Louise, Fay, Carol, Pat, Mary, Lynn, Peg, Ryan, Albert, Clement, and Barry from OrCam

Session 2, GPS
Date: Wednesday, October 19, 2016
Present: 8 participants; Shawn, Albert, Geri, John, Fay, Carol, Louise, Kari-Lyn

First Saturday Meeting which dealt with GPS,
Date: Saturday, October 22, 2016 at VCC
Present: 24 participants; John, Jeremy, Nora, Rita, Tammy, John, Peg, Bev, Pat, Bridget, Mary, Mo, Richard, Perry, Icy, Tracey, Shawn, Sean, Matthew, Monty, Cathy, Becky, Owen and Anna

What is GPS – Global Positioning System?
• What is it and how does it work?
• -type of technology that tells someone or something where it is on planet earth
• relies on a series of satellites in the sky
• there used to be 24, now there are many more
• your technology communicates, gets a message to tell you where you are in relation to the satellite
• The accuracy ranges from 1 metre in military technology to 2-3 metres, or as bad as five, depending on the service provider

History and Evolution
• Satellites were used initially for GPS
• GPS is used for anything that does long distance travel
• Nowadays everybody has GPS – it now is enhanced by Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cell towers, and satellites.
• Some store maps so you can look at them even when there is no satellite signal or data connection.
• Portable GPS started in the late 90’s and were the size of back-packs and Laptops.
• The trekker was a PDA with special software added which was very expensive. Came with many components and wires to connect everything.
• It was full featured, would tell you points of interest, could browse a route, and was a very handy device. It had no Internet connection and relied on satellites. So, if it was rainy or cloudy it’s difficult to reach the satellites and would not work.
• Trekker Breeze had some improvements but was harder to relabel points of interest.
• At this point they started integrating GPS into note takers you could carry your one device.
• Freedom Scientific included it in the Pacmate which no longer exists. They used infrared for the receiver which meant you had to line it up perfectly in order to work.
• Then there was the BrailleNote which included GPS. You could add additional software for another $1500 which came with maps and a receiver. They used Bluetooth – Wi-Fi___33 without Internet – good for about 30 feet. This was more stable connection.
• Then BrrailleSense added GPS. Worked reasonably well.
• At the same time GPS were starting to be integrated into cars
• Then we started integrating into phones.
• Using 3G and cell networks.
• Apple came up with Maps on the IPhone so you did not need to purchase additional software.
• Google came up with google maps
• Now there is location tracking with phones.
• The more things you have transmitting on your phone the easier it will be for the GPS to work.
• Blue tooth will suck your battery life faster when turned on.

GPS apps – BlindSquare, Apple Maps, Navacon, Smartphone GPS, Seeing Eye, Nearby Explorer, AuTour.
• Google Maps, Apple Maps, and AuTour are free
• You do need data on your phone to use GPS on the go
• You may want an external battery pack or a phone case that charges it twice
• When you ask Siri to take you somewhere the phone will automatically use Apple Maps. Whenever you choose Get Directions uses Apple Maps
• Tell it to find a place and get directions or ask Siri to take you somewhere – tracking isn’t bad and directions usually will get you there.
• Apple maps will tell you when to switch lanes so it can be helpful if you are trying to help navigate for your driver
• Google Maps is more refined, better control, and you can do more stuff with it.
• You can find it in the app store, it’s free, and includes transit stops locally but not for every system.
• Five options driving walking, transit, biking, and ride services
• When you open google maps it opens a menu with an edit field. You can dictate as long as you have good service and your environment isn’t too loud.
• Menu will get you into settings, save your location
• When you click query you get a search field, recent history will give you the last places you’ve searched for, explore food and drinks, gas stations, pharmacy’s, nearby.
• Maps on the Trekker could be 2 years old but Google Maps are updated regularly.
• Not every business will show up but if you enter an address it will be able to find those smaller businesses
• You need location services on for GPS to work.

Seeing Eye has a look around arm that will tell you what is in each direction. It updates every 15 seconds which is why it sucks the battery so fast.
• Once it catches where you are it will tell you what is to your southeast or northwest. It will tell you what street is running from your left to right, or behind to forward.
• Seeing Eye uses worldwide maps. It pulls from foursquare or google maps.
• You can pay $13 per month, $60 per year, or buy it outright for $300.
• You can create routes, mark points of interest.

BlindSquare won’t give you turn by turn instruction
• It has a “look around” arm to see what is nearby
• It has a 15 minute sleep timer

Nearby Explorer is less than a third of the money but does pretty much the same as Seeing Eye.
• Both give route options, virtual walk abouts, include buses
• It also has a “look around” arm
• Nearby Explorer is $109. Covers North America. Downloads 4 gigs of maps into your phone and uses google maps and apple maps. It requires a lot of storage.

AuTour is a new free app
• You can point your phone at something and it will tell you what you are pointed at
• Radar will scan what’s around you 360 degrees. Beam tells you what you are pointed at.

Seeing assistant move, Lite and paid versions available
• -has a suite of applications, colour detector, light detector
• -it is an app, somewhere around nine or ten dollars
• -reason it is ten and not one hundred, is because it does not pay map companies to license expensive maps from third parties
• -instead it makes use of a project called OpenStreet Map, a project where people all over the world, have designed the map for the company
• anywhere people go, they log their current location, and open street map shares it with the rest of the users
• takes advantage of free mapping from countries
• -not as good as the ones that use really detailed third party maps, but probably about 90% as good, and much more affordable
• -don’t always need a data connection, but will need to download maps at some point
• -the presenter demonstrates the app to the group
• the presenter shows a point close to our location that he added to the open map
• the presenter hits the where am I button, gives a slightly different address, but that is probably the closest address to this classroom
• This app can also identify cross streets
• now giving an example of a route
• the presenter goes to all categories, clicks entertainment, to see what is around, and looks for close by restaurants
• clicks actions, hits add to track
• the app also tells you by clock face where your destination is, so as you approach it will say the place is at 11 clock, 10 o’clock, and so on, orienting you to the building
• calculate a turn by turn route
• start point, my location, end point, restaurant, route type, fastest
• designate and track route
• -drawbacks
• the simulate location feature
• tell your phone where you will be in the future, choose a place, and it can simulate that location, and then you can explore that area in the same way you would with the app if you were actually there
• this feature stopped working in parts of the app, however when the presenter contacted the developers, they were receptive and thanked him for pointing out the error

Which is the best GPS App:

Blind Square is inexpensive
• Accessible overlay that uses the compass, apple maps, transit app and makes it accessible
• Tells you where you are in relation to your destination but no turn by turn directions

• Ask your I-phone to find directions to an address
• Choose whether you are driving, walking and then it will talk you through the directions
• I-Beacon technology requires Bluetooth which will work indoors
• GPS doesn’t work in a mall
• Tap with 4 fingers at the bottom of the screen brings cursor to bottom or at top of the screen brings you to the top
• Four Square – you can pull up the restaurant where you are and rate your meal. The more places you check in at, the more places end up on Four Square
• Blind Square uses four square
• You can search for arts and entertainment, food, residences, shops, outdoor and recreation, colleges and universities, etc
• Sometimes it will tell you about a restaurant that is now closed

Nearby Explorer – need more than a 16 gig phone – a bit more expensive but does give turn by turn directions
• Costs more than Blind Square but less than Seeing Eye.
• Increase or decrease radius to hear what is closer or father away
• You can turn on a setting to tell you every street you cross, city boundaries, addresses, etc. You can choose as little or as much as you want
• Guidance can be turned on to give you guidance to get to your location
• Nearby Explorer was developed by American Printing House and it has been running on Android for 4 years.
• Once you have maps loaded on the app and you use only onboard apps, you don’t need data

Seeing Eye requires data for maps which is why it doesn’t require as much space.

OrCam demo from Barry Underwood
• Comes with glasses with a small camera attached. The camera can attach to any set of glasses
• Once the device is turned on, you hit the single button which is a trigger to take a photo of what you are looking at.
• You can also use your finger and point to the document and it will also take a picture and start reading

The next meeting topic is to be determined

November 23 will be the next Daytime GTT Vancouver Meeting at Blind Beginnings.
December 3 will be the next Saturday GTT Vancouver Meeting at VCC

GTT Vancouver Summary Notes, The JAWS Screen Reader, August 17, 2016

Summary Notes
GTT Vancouver

Date: August 17, 2016

Present: Seven members attended;

Screen Reading technology is a way of converting text on the screen into synthesized voices. Screen readers only read pure text. Images, or text embedded into a photo will not be read.

JAWS is one of the 3 competitive PC screen readers on the market. Window Eyes and NVDA are the other two. Window Eyes is now owned by the same company that owns JAWS, and NVDA is a free, open source screen reader.

JAWS has been around since the early 90’ and is currently developed by Freedom Scientific.

It was designed primarily for the work environment – Word, Excel, Outlook – the Microsoft Office Suite.
• JAWS comes in two versions – home and professional.
• It is the screen reader that is most recommended and where the most support is available

Firefox is better than Internet Explorer with JAWS, and possibly even in general.

Many of the keyboard commands you use with JAWS are not specific to JAWS, as they are native to the Windows Operating System:
• Not all keyboard commands use the JAWS/Insert key.
• Control alt page up or page down will temporarily speed or slow down speech in JAWS but not globally across the computer. When you exit the program it will reset to the original speed.
• Some keys do different things when you have Navigation Quick Keys turned on when browsing the internet.

Forms mode on the Internet:
• You have to hit enter or the Space Bar before you can start typing in the edit boxes. When you hit the Enter key after typing your search string it will activate the Search Button and conduct the search.
• The second type of edit field is a multi-line edit box. You can use the Enter key to add a new line. You have to tab to the Search/Next button to move things forward.

Quick Navigation keys – single letters that will move your cursor to different places on the screen. To turn Navigation Quick KEYS ON OR OFF HOLD DOWN THE JAWS KEY AND PRESS THE LETTER Z. :
• H is for all Headings, and the first 6 numbers on the number row will access Level 1 through 6 Headings.
• L is for list.
• I is for items within a list.
• U is for unvisited links.
• V is for visited links.
• T is for tables.
• F is for form fields, but for clarification a form field is a button, edit box, check box, radio button, etc. so it’s not as specific as the other keys listed.
• E is for edit boxes.
• B is for button.
• X is for checkbox – use space bar to select the item you want to check.
• C is for combo boxes.
• M is for frames – skips past ad frames.
• K is for markers, and Control shift K will set a marker in a specific spot. They may not remain when Web-sites are updated or changed.
• Control f – Jaws find – type a phrase you are looking for and it will bring you there

Also, three more useful keys:
• Jaws Key + f7 brings up a list of links.
• Jaws key + f5 brings up a list box of form controls.
• Jaws key + f6 brings up a list of headings

Other JAWS resources:
• FS Reader is a DAISY Player that installs when JAWS is installed on your computer, and that can be used to play the JAWS Tutorial/Help files.
• Had is a Text Editor that installs when JAWS is installed on your computer. It has a Spellchecker built-in, so if you don’t have MS Word this can be used to create documents, or to read RTF and TXT files.
• JAWS key plus F1 will show you things dependent on where you are. If you are on a Web page it will list all the quick Navigation keys. Escape key will get you out of this mode.
• JAWS Key plus Number Row 1 will turn on and off Keyboard Help, it is a toggle. You can then press any key or key combination to find out what the keys are and JAWS will explain their function.
• JAWS key plus the letter H will give you a list of keys you can use where you are – Type Escape to exit this window.

JAWS key plus the letter J will launch the Jaws Menu, Options, utilities, languages, about, and help:
• Press the Alt Key to open the Menu Bar, then down arrow through the Options Menu to Basics, there you will find the following adjustable items;
Tutor messages helps by telling you your jaws command options and how to activate them. You can turn this on or off.
Access keys – you can turn this off if you know all your commands and don’t need a reminder
• Tutorials are in the Jaws menu under help – You will find Training audio files that will play in FS Reader.
• The PC cursor is your regular cursor on the screen, or the curser that types letters in your documents, web pages etc.
• Jaws cursor doesn’t show up it’s just where you are on the screen, and is otherwise known as your Mouse Curser.
• JAWS Key plus Escape refreshes the screen visually to show them where you are.

Topic for next time – GPS Technology
September 21, 2016

Other ideas that were suggested:
• Overview of Safari on the IPhone.
• Cover the GTT Facebook Group.
• Backing Up along with storage options such as One Drive or Dropbox – Cloud storage