Tech Talk: Help Your Devices Help You

Tech Talk: Help Your Devices Help You

Senses such as vision and hearing may gradually, or even acutely, weaken as we age. Sometimes, we’re born with disabilities that rob us of these senses.

I recently had an acute onset of reduced hearing in my ear and am now hard-of-hearing or HoH.

Even before I stepped into the doctor’s office for diagnosis and treatment — with the help of the HoH community and the uber-geeks from around the world as I researched on the internet — I had set up my smartphone, computers and tablet so I could communicate and remain connected. Anyone can benefit from these useful settings that are already built into your devices, just waiting to be discovered.

Choices
Since the internet first became a household word in the late ‘90s, accessibility means more than just the quality of easy access.

Whether you sport Apple’s iPhone/iPad, or a smartphone/tablet based on Google’s Android operating system and sold by Google, Samsung, Motorola, LG and others, you might want to try out these helpful accessibility features. After all, most of us paid good money for our devices, so we might as well make the experience more comfortable and enjoyable.

Of course, if manufacturers included manuals with their electronic gadgets like the good ol’ days, we wouldn’t be having this conversation in the first place. Sure, you can download the manual or get help from a product website, but those seem like a catch-22 scenario waiting to happen.

Due to the abundance of device manufacturers and with each having a slightly different look, it’s not possible to describe every accessibility option. Instead, see the accompanying story to get started in the right direction. Once you start exploring, you’ll quickly get the hang of it.

After you find the Settings app for your device, Accessibility will be a menu item within the scrollable list. Tapping on Accessibility from the settings menu should reveal other items, categorized by the challenges they aid (Vision, Hearing, Touch).

Many accessibility items operate like a toggle switch;  tapping an item turns that feature On, tapping it again turns it Off or leads to another sub-menu which ultimately will lead to a toggle switch for that item. In other words, once you see something that may improve usability for you (such as enlarging the letters or icons on your screen), turn on the toggle switch, assess the result and turn it back off if it doesn’t help. Repeat the process with other accessibility items that catch your fancy. Unless you throw your device against the wall out of frustration, you won’t break the device just by toggling accessibility items; explore without fear and follow onscreen directions.

Using built-in accessibility features is part of digital literacy. To learn more about digital literacy, please join me from the comfort of your home on Thursday, May 27  starting at 9 a.m. for my organization’s 5th Annual Living in the Digital World Senior Expo, this year again a liv stream webinar to keep you safe. You can find more information at EmpowerSeniors.org. I hope to see you in the digital world.

 

Tak’s Daily Accessibility Features
Turning on Live Caption on my smartphone, an accessibility item exclusive to Google’s smartphones, provides closed caption for anything with audio (YouTube video, audio and video calls made over the internet using an app, and now transcribes cellular phone calls in real-time). Recently, Google has enabled Live Caption for its Chrome web browser across the board on personal computers, smartphones, tablets and Chromebooks (*Chromebook users need to wait a little while longer). I have tested this and it really works on anything that has audio playing within the Chrome browser, including audio and video calls made over the internet.

Google’s “Live Transcribe” app, also available for non-Google Android smartphones, transcribes in-person communication and also gives alerts for environmental noises (fire alarms, knocking, water running). Google currently doesn’t have this app for iPhone/iPad. One way to mimic its utility is by using the Notes app on iPhone/iPad. Tap on the microphone icon on the virtual keyboard so the app can transcribe what you and your companion say in real time.

About the author

Tak Sato, author of Boomer's Tech Talk column, is a founder of the Cleveland-area nonprofit, Center for Aging in the Digital World (empowerseniors.org). The organization teaches digital literacy to people 50+ through the free Discover Digital Literacy program.

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