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Panel – Brian Norton, Belva Smith, Josh Anderson, Wade Wingler Q1 Adjustable Keyguards Q2 AT Available at College Q3 Better Way to Type Math Equations Q4 Lose App Layout When I Reset My iPad Q5 Titan Note Q6 Ideal AT Solution
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WADE WINGLER: Welcome to ATFAQ, Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions with your host Brian Norton, Director of Assistive Technology at Easter Seals Crossroads. This is a show in which we address your questions about assistive technology, the hardware, software, tools and gadgets that help people with disabilities lead more independent and fulfilling lives. Have a question you’d like answered on our show? Send a tweet with the hashtag #ATFAQ, call our listener line at 317-721-7124, or send us an email at tech@eastersealscrossroads.org. The world of assistive technology has questions, and we have answers. And now here’s your host, Brian Norton.
BRIAN NORTON: Hello and welcome to ATFAQ episode 52. My name is Brian Norton and I’m the host of the show. Today I’m happy to be in the studio with several of my friends and colleagues. We have with us Belva Smith. You want to say hi?
BELVA SMITH: Hello, and I’m super happy to be in the studio today too.
BRIAN NORTON: Are you? Are you super super happy? Excellent. Belva is the vision team leader at Easter Seals crossroads.
BELVA SMITH: I thought he was going to say I was the whole vision team.
WADE WINGLER: Welcome to ATFAQ, Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions with your host Brian Norton, Director of Assistive Technology at Easter Seals Crossroads. This is a show in which we address your questions about assistive technology, the hardware, software, tools and gadgets that help people with disabilities lead more independent and fulfilling lives. Have a question you’d like answered on our show? Send a tweet with the hashtag #ATFAQ, call our listener line at 317-721-7124, or send us an email at tech@eastersealscrossroads.org. The world of assistive technology has questions, and we have answers. And now here’s your host, Brian Norton.
BRIAN NORTON: Hello and welcome to ATFAQ episode 52. My name is Brian Norton and I’m the host of the show. Today I’m happy to be in the studio with several of my friends and colleagues. We have with us Belva Smith. You want to say hi?
BELVA SMITH: Hello, and I’m super happy to be in the studio today too.
BRIAN NORTON: Are you? Are you super super happy? Excellent. Belva is the vision team leader at Easter Seals crossroads.
BELVA SMITH: I thought he was going to say I was the whole vision team.
BRIAN NORTON: Not yet, just maybe. Vision team leader here at Easter Seals crossroads. We also have Josh Anderson.
JOSH ANDERSON: Hi everybody. I’m super happy to be here.
BRIAN NORTON: Josh is the manager of our clinical AT program. And Wade Wingler.
WADE WINGLER: Hello everybody. I suppose I’m supposed to be happy to be here since everybody else is super happy.
BRIAN NORTON: Wade is the popular host of AT update podcast that we do here at Easter Seals crossroads, but he is also our audio engineer and contributor.
WADE WINGLER: I’m the nerd.
BRIAN NORTON: He spends all day here. For folks who are new listeners to the show, to give you information about how the show works, we receive feedback and come across various assistive technology related questions throughout the week. We take all those and that’s how we create our show. We’re looking for content all the time. If you guys have questions, you can give us a call on our listener line at 317-721-7124. You can email us at tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Or send us a tweet with the hashtag ATFAQ. You can send us your questions through any of those channels. We are monitoring those and really do want to hear from you guys. We want to know what you have on your mind, if you have questions. Let us know. It’s a great way to provide that.
The other thing I asked that you do is as we go through question we have in the show today, we are also looking for feedback. We are going to talk about what we think about these particular questions, give answers that we think we have, but we are looking for your feedback. If you guys have run across some of the situation we are going to talk about today, let us know, provide us feedback. You can get a hold of us in the same three ways: the listener line, email address, or Twitter, hashtag #ATFAQ. We will monitor for feedback and include those things in the show as well.
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The first thing that we are going to do is jump into feedback from last week’s show, or several of our shows. You can comment on either the last show we released or previous shows as well. Belva, you mentioned that you some feedback about a question we had a few weeks back about office 365 and JAWS. Can you refresh us about what that was?
BELVA SMITH: I don’t remember the question. I was hoping you were going to refresh me on the question. What I was going to add to that is – the question was related to using JAWS with Outlook 365 and how different was it going to be. The person that I spoke to said, “I’m not noticing much of a difference.” The reason was because when you purchase 365, you have two options: one is to install and run it from the cloud; the other is to install it like an application on your computer. Most of the folks that I know that are using it with a screen reader that even the folks at Freedom Scientific, are installing the application version. They’re not using the cloud version. It’s 365, it’s out there, and can be used in access to the cloud, but it’s also installed directly on your computer. When you do that, it functions pretty much the same as other versions of office.
BRIAN NORTON: I went back and it was in episode 48. The question was how does Outlook in 365 work differently than Outlook 2010, there be any JAWS issues. So you are saying if you install the application, there will be less issue.
BELVA SMITH: Yes. You can use it either way. You can use as a web-based, but then you’re going to be using it, as Wade mentioned during that episode, you’re going to be using more Internet strokes than regular keystrokes.
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BRIAN NORTON: Great. The second bit of feedback that we got this past week was, I think in our last show we had mentioned about JAWS and Zoom text, we had a question talking about those things and were mentioning pricing as we were trying to answer the question from our last episode. At one time there was some special pricing at the NFB and ACB conferences. The person mentioned that there was some incorrect info come to be about the cost with that. Again, we are not really sure what the cost is –
BELVA SMITH: Under $100.
BRIAN NORTON: I would say if you’re interested in the cost, you can call Freedom Scientific, or VFO now since they are all under one umbrella, and talk about the cost. I do believe there are some discounts if you have previous licensed versions, there is an upgrade which will give you a discounted cost but maybe not to the degree that you had at those previous conferences.
BELVA SMITH: I think I misspoke during the episode as I was listening to the playback on it. I said at all the conferences they have those discounts. That is not true, for example ATIA bitter offer those discounts. The NFB and ACB conference that they offer it at that I am most aware of. It’s under $100, $79.
BRIAN NORTON: We will probably have to wait and see if they are offered at future conferences. I would probably say that was one where it was at that particular conference because it was right here and now and that’s when all of those changes are coming along.
BELVA SMITH: They were really pushing to get people on board with the newer version.
BRIAN NORTON: I think we recently had some friends from VFO come over and talk to us about software, just to our clinical team. On our clinical team here at Easter Seals crossroads, we are doing assessments for folks where we are in the weeds and trenches with folks trying to figure out what their needs are and helping them accommodate those needs. We just had a representative come out and talk to us about those changes and new software. You are right. The push is to get people on the most current version of their software because there’s been a lot of changes, it sounds like, with their software as they have updated it. They are streamlining it and hopefully coming out with a product line that is a little bit more –
BELVA SMITH: Compatible.
BRIAN NORTON: You’re not going to have as many issues as maybe you had in the past. Getting things to play nicely in the sandbox together. That’ll be interesting to see.
BELVA SMITH: Compatible.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s a more concise way to say it.
BELVA SMITH: It might be a good time to throw out that while those folks were here with us, they did mention that if you happen to be using Fusion and you don’t have an SMA, it would be a good idea to get the SMA before the beginning of May.
BRIAN NORTON: Because they are going to release a new version.
BELVA SMITH: Correct.
BRIAN NORTON: Excellent. Feedback can’t be listening to the questions we have. If you’re interested in our show, go back and listen to previous shows. If you have feedback regarding those, we will put those on the show as well.
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The next thing we will do is jump into our first question. Our first question is, I’m looking for a custom key guard that is adaptable over time for a student that needs to start small and have more and more keys available to them as they get better and better at using the keyboard itself. I think there was a question as to this was a computer keyboard. At least from our perspective, was it a computer keyboard that they are talking about or was it and augmentative communication device keyboard that they were needing. I think we landed on an augmentative communication device.
WADE WINGLER: I think it go either way. I think you might have situations where a computer keyboard you might want to restrict certain keys, like if you’re just using arrow keys or number keys for math programs or whatever and you want to keep folks off the function keys. They could be AugCom too. I think it could go either way.
BELVA SMITH: If it is a computer keyboard, and the first thing I thought of was – and I can think of the name of it – the blue keyboard that has the —
BRIAN NORTON: You’re talking about the Intellikeys USB keyboard.
BELVA SMITH: Is that still available and compatible with Windows 10?
BRIAN NORTON: I believe you can still get the USB version. I’m pretty sure the software works.
BELVA SMITH: If so, that’s a great option. It doesn’t have a guard but it does have the different –
BRIAN NORTON: It does come with guards. You to buy them separately. It did have guards, should have guards that you can buy in a five pack that goes with the five standard keyboard that it typically has.
BELVA SMITH: I thought of that one and also found a website, www.fentek/in.com. I guess they will customize a keyboard guard and even sell the keyboards with the guards. They have a list of keyboards that they have available and can customize.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s cool.
JOSH ANDERSON: Nice.
BRIAN NORTON: It sounds like your website I found which is turning point technology. Turning point technology allows you – they are to have some keyboards that are readily available or you can even search for keyboards through their site as well. Whether it is a computer or AugCom device, they have a variety of different ones available, either Apple or Windows, even calculators, things for iPads and kisses and stuff like that. They seem to have quite a few options available for you. It seems to be laid out well for you to search for those things.
WADE WINGLER: Back in the day, we used to make them. They’re not that terribly hard to make. You take a piece of plexiglass, cut it to the size of the device or a little bit bigger, and you can take a magic marker and draw circles or squares around the different keys, get a drill press and drove them smaller than the key itself that you are trying to hit, and take a blowtorch and flame them out. That’ll smooth off the edges. We’ve made the before and you can use Velcro or dual lock to attach them to the device. It’s not a super easy thing to do but it’s not that hard either to make your own, and you can create custom key guards for anything you want.
JOSH ANDERSON: Depending on what they need it for. If it’s for someone with a cognitive impairment that just needed to learn the keyboard piece by piece, you could take a piece of paper over the keys you don’t want them to touch.
BELVA SMITH: I was thinking cardboard.
JOSH ANDERSON: Something like that. Something you just have laying around. It would cost money or anything like that. If you need something to make sure they are not accidentally hitting those keys, and mobility challenge, it’s something totally different. If you’re just trying to have them learn the keyboard piece by piece and keep out some of the other information, paper, cardboard, anything you can cover it up with.
WADE WINGLER: I don’t know about apps but if you look at traditional augmentative communication systems, like the Prentke Romich website right now for the accent 1000. They have a bunch of different key guards available for a 1628 all the way to a 144 location key guard that you can get. They range from $145-$225 apiece, but they have a lot of different options. Based on the question, I wonder if they’re asking about a key guard that grows and shrinks and expands and changes. I don’t know about anything that would be a successful key guard that would change in size.
BRIAN NORTON: You would almost have to swap them out.
WADE WINGLER: I think you would.
BRIAN NORTON: I was also taking 3-D printing. With 3-D printers, you can print just about anything. I don’t know how you would design it. I guess you would have to get good at the designer software that needs to be able to trade those images to send to the computer. I assume that could be done at very low cost.
BELVA SMITH: It sounds like it would be pretty easy.
BRIAN NORTON: Just a wrap that question up, I think there are places where you can get some premade, either through the manufacturer or some of these others where you can go out and get some manufactured key guards that are specific for different types of keyboards and devices. You might be able to create your own. Wade mentioned – we’ve done that in the past are our fabrication lab where you just take your piece of plexiglass and mark it up with marker and drill out the holes yourself, create your own. That’s a fairly inexpensive way to go about doing it. 3-D printing might be an option. I think there are lots of options for you to be able to create your own key guard and, over time, expanded. The only thing I would say might be not possible is to find one that is changeable. I think you would have to create one that would work for now, and when things need to change you would have to create a different one or a new keyboard made by yourself or find a different one made by the manufacturer. Hopefully that answers your question.
As our listeners are listening, if you have feedback, maybe have a different resource that we didn’t mention, give us a shout out. You can send us a voicemail at our listener line at 317-721-7124. We would love to hear from you. Let us know if you have other resources that would help this person address their key guard needs.
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Our next question came in via email. The question is, I’m headed to college next fall and wanted to know what I should be asking the disability services office about accessibility and assistive technology. I use a solo literacy sweet software and high school right now and want to make sure I have something comparable available in college. What you think, as far as accessibility and assistance of knowledge available on your campus?
BELVA SMITH: I think they just ask that question. You sit down with the folks in disability services and say to them exactly what they just said. During high school, I used this particular software and I used it to help me with ABC, so I knew something comparable. What it is it you’re going to offer that is comparable, or is there not anything that you offer? So then they can look at what the options are that the school does have to offer. If they don’t have anything that’s going to accommodate them the way that they are used to being accommodated, and they are going to need to reach out to another source to get it.
Aren’t almost all of the college is now offering the Read and Write Gold?
BRIAN NORTON: To me, it depends on the size of the school. Some of the bigger state institutions – we are Indiana, so you think about IU, Purdue, Ball State, IEPY, a lot of these bigger institutions, Indiana State. There are several large colleges here in Indiana. I think you’re going to find some assistance technology available on campus. I think depending on the size of your university, it might be a standalone office that you can get all the questions answered, either the disability office, adaptive education office. If you are at a smaller private school car you might be talking to your admission counselors because they should know. I know I went to a school, Anderson University, which is in Anderson Indiana, a small private school. They had a learning center where I would be able to ask those types of questions. I know the admissions office would have directed me over there if I have question.
I think you’re right. The first thing is you need to be willing to ask those questions. I think the biggest thing for folks is they don’t know what they’re getting into when they leave high school and go to college. It’s a completely different process and there are supports you do get in K-12 that you don’t get when you go to college.
BELVA SMITH: In K-12, you don’t have to ask for things like you do when you get into college. You then have to speak up because no one is going to come tap on your shoulder. I think it’s really important. Also, the sooner the better. As soon as you know which college you’re going to go to, start asking right then.
BRIAN NORTON: In that K-12 environment, I think you still ask, but there is a process and a system around you in the IEP, or individualized education plan, to help folks have a forum to be able to ask the question they need to ask. When you get to college, if you don’t ask and don’t know where to go, you just don’t get any accommodations.
BRIAN NORTON: I agree. I’m guessing don’t ask. But it’s typically your parents or someone doing the speaking for you. In college, you’re going to have to be the one that does that speaking.
JOSH ANDERSON: Make sure you ask how the software is delivered, because sometimes it would be something you can download from their technology services. Sometimes it’s loaded on a computer in a lab. Sometimes so many computers will have it. Just make sure you know how to be able to access that to make it a whole lot easier. Also, really important when talking to – very important, make sure you do talk to disability services. If you have accommodations in the classroom, the professors have to know about that or they can pretty much say no.
WADE WINGLER: Absolutely. I think it’s important to not only speak up for yourself but to be informed about your products and assistance to what he needs. When you look at the solo suite from Don Johnson, it includes a text reader, a word production system, a talking word processor, and a graphic organizer. If you go to a college admissions office or disability services office and say I want the solo literacy software, they may not know what you’re talking about, but if you say I really use word prediction and I need a graphic organizer, you may not use the text reader or the talking word processor in that particular package. Know the generic terms for the technology you’re using and be able to describe how you use it. They may say, well, we don’t have that but we do have these other programs to offer you the same kind of thing.
If you are in Indiana – we have a lot of listeners in Indiana – and you want a list of the disability services offices, we have one of those we keep on our website. If you go to www.eastersealstech.com/college, it’ll have a listing of all of the disability services offices at all universities and the state of Indiana appeared I don’t know if other AT act project to that, but I’m pretty sure that if you called your local assistance technology act project, they can direct you to the disability services office in any of the colleges in the United States. You can get that list, if you’re looking for your local AT act project, at our website www.eastersealstech.com/states. That’ll take you to a listing of all of the AT acts in the country and territories.
BRIAN NORTON: I think that’s really important. At most universities, when you were saying about using solo suite and the different things that it can do for somebody, I college a lot of times they are offering some free things to you. I know if you go to IU, you can download a version of read and write gold which is similar to solo suite. It has some of the same things but is not exactly the same thing. The tools don’t necessarily work exactly the same way that you might be used to with solos we just because you are more familiar with the software. There will probably be a learning curve to that. Knowing that you can not only get that but having them know that you’re going to need that, and then who’s going to train you on how to use it and get you comfortable with the software, would be a good thing to know.
BELVA SMITH: I think your study habits are going to be different as a college student. You are probably going to have longer study periods – and maybe I’m wrong – then you did when you were K-12, so you may want to reach out to your local VR office, vocational rehabilitation, to see if they can provide you with any additional technology that you might need for longer reading periods and stuff like that.
WADE WINGLER: I think another interesting factor is, if you have been using it, in this example solo literacy suite in high school, and the college goes back and says we use read and write gold or Kurzweil, I think there are benefits to using the same tool that you used in high school because you will have a quick a learning curve. But on the other hand, maybe it’s time to learn new tools. It’s a growth experience to say now I can use two different tools to do that. I think you’re going to experience something similar when you move into the workplace. You may have an employer that wants to use something different yet. I can see argument on both sides of using the tool I’m best with because I’m going to perform the best, and I can also see argument for it’s also good to learn new things.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s a great point.
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BRIAN NORTON: Don’t forget, if you have some feedback, some additional information for our college student about accessibility and assistive technology that’s available on campuses, maybe you’ve experienced that transition before and have some sage words of wisdom for him or her, definitely give us a call, send us an email, or send us a tweet. Our caller line is 317-721-7124. Our email is tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Or you can send us the hashtag #ATFAQ.
Our next question was also via email. The question is, is there a better way to type equations? I have a client with limited arm function and a learning disability that make it difficult for her to hand write equations into Microsoft Word. Do you know of any software that would be helpful?
BELVA SMITH: To handwrite them into market word?
BRIAN NORTON: To type them. You might have a pretty hard time handwriting too.
BELVA SMITH: Everything I found when I was researching this point it back to using Microsoft word but with the equation editor that was supposed to be the fastest, easiest, best way. I don’t know if they are aware of that.
BRIAN NORTON: How do you find that? Do you know?
BELVA SMITH: I don’t. I think you know the answer to how to find it. I just googled it. The first four or five results were about using Microsoft Word.
BRIAN NORTON: There is a really useful equation editor found in Microsoft Word that it’s a fairly good job of allowing you to be able to type in equations into just a traditional word document. That works fairly well. There are good YouTube videos, a bunch of great resources to be able to know how to turn it on and use it as well. That may be your first option. Something I’ve used over a period of time with clients is one called MathType. MathType is an on-screen keyboard that’s essentially the same thing, but it’s an on-screen keyboard where you can simply type in very basic problems to scientific – it essentially gives you a scientific keyboard where you can type in very complex equations as well and be able to offer that.
JOSH ANDERSON: I’ve used MathType before with a screen reader, I think window eyes, and it did work. Isn’t there a plug-in you can put with Dragon?
BRIAN NORTON: There is.
JOSH ANDERSON: I don’t remember the name of it for the life of me.
BELVA SMITH: That’s Math Talk that I was talking about earlier today. You said MathType, and I was like, no, Math Talk.
JOSH ANDERSON: There is MathType too!
BELVA SMITH: Math talk is a plug-in or app that is used with Dragon NaturallySpeaking to be able to get your math equations.
BRIAN NORTON: Speaking from experience with math talk, that can be challenging to use because you have to know how to say – you need to know what those symbols are. You can to guests. You have to know exactly what it is. That can be a little bit challenging, or very challenging. The other thing I know with math talk is it’s hard to get installed because everything has to be installed very precisely, the one after the other, and there is a very specific way to get that stuff to work together. It can be challenging but it is good software. We’ve used it several times with clients who needed that type of support where they couldn’t access the keyboard and couldn’t interact with an on-screen keyboard. They had to use voice input to create those equations.
The other thing I don’t know folks know about is math way. Mathway.com is a good website. Although you are not typing it into Word, you are able to type equations on to the website. You can write equations, solve equations, all in one step. It provides the tools and keys to be able to type in an equation, and then you can ask it to stop it. It’s going to go ahead and solve it for you so it works a little bit like a calculator. The cool thing is it then lists all the steps of that are available that you would’ve gone through to solve the equation. Let’s say you have challenges with math, and math is one of your harder subject that you take, this can really help you better understand exactly what’s going on with the equation. Although it does solve it, it does break it down into steps, and it helps with that learning process because it kind of helps you step up the letter a little bit, one step at a time, to be able to know in chronological order how you got to that particular answer. I think it’s a great website. I think it’s $99 for a year subscription. You do pay for it, but it’s a great website. They have all levels of math. You can break it down from subject matter from algebra to geometry to calculus, all the way out. It’s a really useful website and tool.
BELVA SMITH: Another tool I found that might be worth looking at is Math-o-mir.
BRIAN NORTON: Which stands for Russian satellite?
JOSH ANDERSON: Space station.
BELVA SMITH: When you download it, you are going to be extracting MOM setup. It’s free. I’ve not used it, so I don’t really know how well it’s going to work, but I definitely would recommend looking into it to see if it might be something that would be helpful. The idea behind the software is to make it as easy to type the equation as it is to write it. It does say that it is compatible with Windows 2000, XP, Vista, 7, 7, 10. I would definitely take a look at that.
BRIAN NORTON: I have to look at the question again. Math is such a hard thing, and there is not a lot of assistive technology. There is more now today than there was several years ago, but it’s one of those things that it’s a late bloomer as far as resources and tools that you can use to get better access to it, not only being able to type stuff but also learn math for folks with some learning difficulties. It’s exciting to see something starting to develop in and around the particular subject matter
WADE WINGLER: The only thing I want to add on here, I think one of the big issues that happens with math and formulas and equations is finding a way to represent them on a computer. I don’t know if we talked about latex and this conversation. Latex is a mathematical computer-based language that allows you to represent complicated formulas online. It’s like markup language in some ways in that you use special characters like the dollar sign and colon in different ways to make complex math formulas on screen. I guess all I want to say is if your issue is not necessarily representing basic formulas or even intermediate formulas graphically on the computer, but you are dealing with very complicated math, Google the term latex which is the online standard for complex equations for folks who are dealing with very fancy math.
BRIAN NORTON: I think even with latex, although you’re doing it online, you can export an image of the particular equation that you created and paste it into a Word document. You’re not creating actual text but you are creating an image of a particular math equation. I believe gif’s, jpeg’s, and pdf’s are available.
Again, if you’ve run across folks that have had challenges in this area, being able to type equations into a document format, if you have had solutions that you have used yourself to be able to do this for yourself, let us know. We would love to hear from you. You can give us an email at tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Let us know if you have some resources. Or, if you have questions that are percolating in your mind about what you would like to be able to ask on our show, reach out to us. We love to hear from you.
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BRIAN NORTON: Our next question came in, also via email.
WADE WINGLER: I love email.
BRIAN NORTON: We do love email.
WADE WINGLER: You know what I like more?
BRIAN NORTON: Phone messages. That is true. If you guys are tempted to give us any kind of feedback, give us a call. We love to hear from you guys because that means we don’t have to talk as much on the show. We will play your voicemails if you want us to. You can leave a voicemail and tell us not to play it and we will read it, but definitely reach out to us. We would love to hear from you in person on our phone messages. That’s 317-721-7124.
Our next question came in via email. The question is, I want to know if the apps on my iPad that I have spent a significant time organizing into files will be preserved if I reset my iPad. I think we all have done that. On my iPhone, I have three or four screens full of apps. Wade, I looked at your phone. You are OCD about how you organize your apps.
WADE WINGLER: I’m not OCD, I’m ABC.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s true. You have them all organized into folders that are A through B and so on and so forth.
WADE WINGLER: My main screen is just the stuff I use the most. My second screen is everything else alphabetically by groups. I have an ABC group and a DEF group and so on.
JOSH ANDERSON: I don’t even have a second page. All of mine are in folders on the first page. There are pictures under them.
BRIAN NORTON: I don’t know what the apps are named. I just look for the pictures.
WADE WINGLER: I like pictures.
BELVA SMITH: How many screens do you have?
BRIAN NORTON: 3 1/2.
BELVA SMITH: I have 3 1/2.
BRIAN NORTON: Imagine, if you would, you spent all of that time organizing your apps. If you want to go ahead and reset and you back it up, would they be able to come back across?
JOSH ANDERSON: Mine usually stay. Every time I’ve upgraded phones, if I backed it up to iTunes, everything stays the same.
WADE WINGLER: Every time I have done it, I get my apps back but they are not in the same order.
JOSH ANDERSON: Mine stay in the same folders. I don’t put them completely alphabetically but mine looks the same as the iPhone I just got rid of.
BELVA SMITH: That was what I was about to say. I’ve only done it twice, but I have a couple of folders that have apps in them and I’ve never re-created them. They’ve just been there with my apps in them.
JOSH ANDERSON: I don’t back to iCloud. I back up to iTunes. Make sure if you ever check that box that asks to encrypt or backup, that you remember the password you put. I was down to my last chance last time so I almost lost it all.
BRIAN NORTON: So I understand that some people have had success in some people have it.
JOSH ANDERSON: We’ve had success. He [Wade] hasn’t.
BELVA SMITH: I don’t want to be responsible for telling this person yes and then them lose anything. What I would say is you had better get on Apple support page and see what people are telling you there. I’m using the 6S Plus, so it’s been over a year and a half since I’ve done it. I do only have three folders. Those three folders have several apps in them, and they came through from my 5 to this.
BRIAN NORTON: I went to one of the folks where I go for a lot of my Apple information, AppleVis.com. I googled this particular question. I got a mixed group of results. Sometimes it seemed to do it, sometimes it didn’t, some folks were saying all of my folders with the apps were set up on my new phone from an iCloud backup. Maybe it’s not iCloud or iTunes. Maybe it’s gotten better over time over the latest updates that cleaned up a bit. From what I’ve gathered from the website, I think the majority of folks felt that they have done things back in the order in which they were. Maybe that’s the way it is now.
BELVA SMITH: If you are willing to take that chance, it may be spring cleaning time. If for some reason all your folders don’t transfer, your apps are definitely going to be there. Maybe you just do some rearranging.
BRIAN NORTON: One person that I came across says, “they will carry over now. I remember when a used to do that, but all of your folders will now move from your backup and then be restored on your new phone.” Maybe if you’re using a new phone, it depends on what your iPad version is, what version of iTunes you are using, or if you are backing up to a iCloud. Maybe you’re going to be able to fine with that.
JOSH ANDERSON: I believe everything you back up and the new device both had to have the same operating system. They have to be the exact same or it won’t work.
WADE WINGLER: Maybe that’s been the issue when it’s not worked. Maybe the new system had the newer OS on it. It’s been a long time ago.
BRIAN NORTON: I say we do it with your phone and see you play with 400 apps which need to go back into the right folders.
WADE WINGLER: We just talked about how I need to have all my stuff neatly organized and you want to mess with that.
BRIAN NORTON: I have mine organized in rows my picture. All my green apps are in one row, all of my brown apps are in one row on my blue apps are in the other row.
SPEAKER: Where are your purple ones?
BRIAN NORTON: Purple matches my shirt today. It’s the day after Easter when we are recording.
WADE WINGLER: We went on and Easter egg hunt this weekend, and there was a little boy that would only pick up yellow eggs.
JOSH ANDERSON: Those are the best.
WADE WINGLER: He kept saying he got the golden eggs. It was pretty fun. It’s good to know that you had your iPhone organized like an Easter egg hunt.
BRIAN NORTON: It only takes me for five minutes to find the one I’m looking for.
WADE WINGLER: And then when they change the color of the icon. Chaos.
***
BRIAN NORTON: If you have any feedback on this past question, let us know. We would love to hear from you. You can give us a tweet at the hashtag ATFAQ and we would love to hear from you.
Our next question was through email as well. I would like to record lectures in my classroom and have them transcribed. I recently saw an interesting device called the Titan note. Currently it’s a crowdfunding project. Do you know of anything now that will do what it does. I’ve actually seen the Titan note come up with in my Facebook feed. It’s an interesting device. It looks like the Amazon dot –
BELVA SMITH: A little bit smaller.
BRIAN NORTON: It’s a round circle with depth to it. I believe you essentially stick it on the paper or table, and it will listen and transcribe everything that said. The thing I wanted to throw out, that’s been something of a pipe dream a little bit for a long time because a lot of times – I’ve been doing this for 20 years, and folks have wanted Dragon to do that same thing. Why can’t we just have Dragon listen and transcribe everything that it hears? Although Dragon can get close to it with a digital recorder and things like that, in a classroom environment I’ve always struggled to get it to work because you have multiple speakers, people all over the room who are talking and contributing. Dragon isn’t set up to be able to listen to multiple speakers at once. You are supposed to be able to do a little bit of training with it so we can learn your voice. I don’t know if you’ve been on a college campus recently. A lot of instructors have accents. Sometimes it’s just that accustomed to be able to listen and transcribe those with a high level of accuracy. I’m really interested in the Titan note and would love to get my hands on one when they become available to see how well it does in those different environments and to see what that accuracy is. If you are taking notes, accuracy, for me, is key in being able to transcribe and read and understand. If it’s not accurate, you are searching for what it meant by that once it is transcribed. It’s a really cool device. If you haven’t seen it, it’s on Indiegogo. It’s called Titan note. It certainly sounds really interesting. I know it’s been talked about for a long time and I know it has its challenges so I’m anxious to be up to get my hands on it.
JOSH ANDERSON: I know Craig uses is quite a bit and some colleges are using it, but Sonocent, which is an online notetaking application. It does transcription as well so it will actually do the audio transcription. You use your computer or phone to record, but you can also write your own notes. You can add notes to PowerPoint. You can mark up power points, PDFs, just about anything.
BRIAN NORTON: It will turn the recording into text?
JOSH ANDERSON: It will turn the recording in the text as well.
BRIAN NORTON: Interesting.
JOSH ANDERSON: I know some colleges here in the state of Indiana, Purdue is one. I think they offer it to students now. I think others are jumping onto it.
BRIAN NORTON: We’ve always had the traditional notetaking devices like the live scribe pen which is been around for a long time. There are three or four different versions of it. It’s a pen with a digital recorder that links your handwritten note to the audio recording.
BELVA SMITH: But it doesn’t do any transcription.
BRIAN NORTON: There is something called my script. With the live scribe three, it will do some transcription directly within the note itself, or you can get an add-on to the live scribe desktop to be able to turn notes into transcription. Again, it’s all about accuracy. The accuracy just isn’t 100 percent. The other is I ran into where Notability and Audio Note. Those are iPad and android apps. They will allow you to use a Bluetooth keyboard with a mobile device, also a stylus with a mobile device, allow you to walk up to the board and take pictures of whatever the teacher might have written during class and insert it into your notes. Again, all linking into the recording and you can move down through your notes, press anywhere, on a picture, on text, on type or written text, and it will jump to that point in the recording to be able to get it. Again it’s all about accuracy pure I’ve always struggled with that because whenever I see something like that, I just wait and see what that accuracy will be like. I think that’s the key to successful notetaking.
BELVA SMITH: What I read about it is it says it’s going to be able to record multiple voices and up to 70 feet away. I really have to see that.
WADE WINGLER: I’m really torn. I don’t want to be a skeptic but I have to be. As soon as it records, and without an Internet connection, it will translate on an app on your phone and translate the voice to text between different languages and it will summarize the notes at the end of the lecture. That seems like a whole lot of processing to happen on a phone. Is this going to be an app that fills the entire memory on your phone to be able to have that sort of database to do those things? On the other hand, they’ve raised almost $800,000 as of our recording on April 17. People are believing that they are going to do this. This could be a game changer.
BELVA SMITH: It says it doubles as a Bluetooth speaker.
BRIAN NORTON: I’m really excited about it. Did it say when they might start production?
BELVA SMITH: You can purchase it right now, from what I’m reading.
WADE WINGLER: Well, it’s on Indiegogo, so they are going to start rolling them out later in 2017. There is a timeline on their website that talks about it.
BELVA SMITH: Some are saying you can purchase it for $80 right now which is $70 off the retail.
WADE WINGLER: That’s preorder stuff. They are talking about mass production and shipping to backers in September 2017. So we are still six months off.
BRIAN NORTON: Super exciting to see how notetaking may change. If you’re listening and you have more information about Titan note or other types of no takers that do the transcript and peace – and I think that’s what is unique about this device, is that conception piece where it actually gives you a typed version of your notes once it’s done all of the listening that needs to do. May be you have some sort of software, some sort of device that you use that can do that for you that we didn’t mention. We would love to hear about those things. Any other information that specifically about Titan note that you know would be another thing to know about.
***
WADE WINGLER: And now it’s time for the wildcard question.
BRIAN NORTON: Our next question is the wildcard question. This is where I throw the mic at Wade and he asks as an off-the-wall question that we haven’t had any time to prepare for. What have you got for us today?
WADE WINGLER: This is one you had time to prepare for but you didn’t know you were preparing for it your whole life.
BRIAN NORTON: What if I don’t have a good answer? Does it mean I’ve totally screwed up?
WADE WINGLER: I wasn’t counting on you not having a good answer. Yes, all that. Several of us have been in the assistive technology industry for many years. Josh, you’ve been a little less than most and I’m counting on your perspective from that. Here’s a hypothetical question. If you had unlimited time, unlimited brains, and unlimited resources to someone major AT problem – not solve a disability or cure something, but unlike some sort of assistive technology roadblock with no holds barred. You had all the brains, money, time to do it. What would the one major AT problem be that you would fix?
BELVA SMITH: You asked me a very similar question to this one you did my interview. My answer then is going to be my answer today.
JOSH ANDERSON: Cheater.
BELVA SMITH: I want 911 access to death/blind individuals all over. I know it’s barely there in some areas, but after working the last three or four years with many individuals that are both visually and hearing impaired, most of them living alone, having absolutely no way to call for medical, fire, or any of that is really a big scary thing. If I could figure that out, I would do it.
WADE WINGLER: That’s a good one.
BRIAN NORTON: My fix or what you are looking for in this question would be, I would want one place where people could go to get answers to all of their questions.
BELVA SMITH: Wait, we’ve got that. ATFAQ.
JOSH ANDERSON: Like a podcast?
BRIAN NORTON: That’s exactly right. Here’s the deal. State agencies, federal agencies, we have foundations, different types of funding sources. There is so much out there, yet what I struggle with is it so fragmented. People just don’t know who to call or ask. If people call me, I’m going to get the information I know of. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know half the stuff that is out there that they should be tapping into. I know there are information phonelines here in Indiana, we have 211 where you can call and get information. I’m not even sure they know everything.
WADE WINGLER: They don’t.
BRIAN NORTON: I just wish there were one place where people could come and get answers to everything. I know that’s probably a pipe dream that will never happen.
WADE WINGLER: It’s a pipe dream question.
BRIAN NORTON: That would be revolutionary for folks. You don’t know what you don’t know. Even though you’re trying to bark up the right tree, those folks don’t know everything either. That would be my thing, if people could go and get the one-stop shop type of information. I think that could be hugely helpful for folks.
JOSH ANDERSON: What was the question again? I listened to both of theirs and forgot.
WADE WINGLER: If you had unlimited time, brains, and resources, what would be the one major AT problem that you would solve?
JOSH ANDERSON: Could businesses understanding AT be one? I worked with so many businesses, first in employment and now in AT. You get the look from the person hiring, well how are you possibly going to be able to do this job? It requires this or that. Then what you actually put something in place, some sort of assistive technology and they are successful, sometimes more so than the person who doesn’t have a disability sitting next to them, once they see that, then they’re like oh, that opens a whole new area of people I could hire. Or, hey, this might help everyone that works here to be more productive. Just being able to get that worked out a little bit that these things are out there and can help people. It wouldn’t just help people with disabilities find employment. They could help companies hire a much bigger pool of applicants. I know hiring can be a royal pain sometimes. Being able to have more applicants and folks to pull in would definitely be a big thing. But way too big and probably take to time.
BRIAN NORTON: But you have unlimited resources.
JOSH ANDERSON: And on the brains. So I guess I might be able to pull that off.
WADE WINGLER: I’m impressed because you had these far-reaching goals. Mine was much more technical. I want universal OCR that can read handwriting and printed writing and script and everything. If you could have any sort of written language, no matter if I dreaded it down on a postcard or a fancy wedding invitation or regular typeface, if you could have universal OCR, I think that would solve a lot of problems for folks with disabilities.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s a great answer.
BELVA SMITH: If only we could do all that, it would be a perfect world.
BRIAN NORTON: Thank you for taking time out of your day to listen to our show. Please take some time to send us questions. You can do that by calling our listener line at 317-721-7124. You can also send us an email at tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Or Tweet us with the hashtag ATFAQ. We would love to hear from you. Also if you have additional resources or information regarding any of the question that we talked about on the show today, please send us that as well. We would love to hear from you. One of the best ways to do that is through our listener line. The number again is 317-721-7124. The reason we ask folks to call our listener line is that’s a great way to engage with you and hear from you, because we also think it to play your voicemails on the air. That’s a great way for folks to not only get the resources, get the questions, but also it helps folks understand who is listening to us. Thanks for taking the time to listen to our show and thanks for being part of it. Have a great week and we will talk to you guys later.
WADE WINGLER: Information provided on Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions does not constitute a product endorsement. Our comments are not intended as recommendations, nor is our show evaluative in nature. Assistive Technology FAQ is hosted by Brian Norton; gets editorial support from Mark Stewart and Belva Smith; is produced by me, Wade Wingler; and receives support from Easter Seals Crossroads and the INDATA project. ATFAQ is a proud member of the Accessibility Channel. Find more of our shows at www.accessibilitychannel.com.
***Transcript provided by TJ Cortopassi. For requests and inquiries, contact tjcortopassi@gmail.com***
BRIAN NORTON: Not yet, just maybe. Vision team leader here at Easter Seals crossroads. We also have Josh Anderson.
JOSH ANDERSON: Hi everybody. I’m super happy to be here.
BRIAN NORTON: Josh is the manager of our clinical AT program. And Wade Wingler.
WADE WINGLER: Hello everybody. I suppose I’m supposed to be happy to be here since everybody else is super happy.
BRIAN NORTON: Wade is the popular host of AT update podcast that we do here at Easter Seals crossroads, but he is also our audio engineer and contributor.
WADE WINGLER: I’m the nerd.
BRIAN NORTON: He spends all day here. For folks who are new listeners to the show, to give you information about how the show works, we receive feedback and come across various assistive technology related questions throughout the week. We take all those and that’s how we create our show. We’re looking for content all the time. If you guys have questions, you can give us a call on our listener line at 317-721-7124. You can email us at tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Or send us a tweet with the hashtag ATFAQ. You can send us your questions through any of those channels. We are monitoring those and really do want to hear from you guys. We want to know what you have on your mind, if you have questions. Let us know. It’s a great way to provide that.
The other thing I asked that you do is as we go through question we have in the show today, we are also looking for feedback. We are going to talk about what we think about these particular questions, give answers that we think we have, but we are looking for your feedback. If you guys have run across some of the situation we are going to talk about today, let us know, provide us feedback. You can get a hold of us in the same three ways: the listener line, email address, or Twitter, hashtag #ATFAQ. We will monitor for feedback and include those things in the show as well.
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The first thing that we are going to do is jump into feedback from last week’s show, or several of our shows. You can comment on either the last show we released or previous shows as well. Belva, you mentioned that you some feedback about a question we had a few weeks back about office 365 and JAWS. Can you refresh us about what that was?
BELVA SMITH: I don’t remember the question. I was hoping you were going to refresh me on the question. What I was going to add to that is – the question was related to using JAWS with Outlook 365 and how different was it going to be. The person that I spoke to said, “I’m not noticing much of a difference.” The reason was because when you purchase 365, you have two options: one is to install and run it from the cloud; the other is to install it like an application on your computer. Most of the folks that I know that are using it with a screen reader that even the folks at Freedom Scientific, are installing the application version. They’re not using the cloud version. It’s 365, it’s out there, and can be used in access to the cloud, but it’s also installed directly on your computer. When you do that, it functions pretty much the same as other versions of office.
BRIAN NORTON: I went back and it was in episode 48. The question was how does Outlook in 365 work differently than Outlook 2010, there be any JAWS issues. So you are saying if you install the application, there will be less issue.
BELVA SMITH: Yes. You can use it either way. You can use as a web-based, but then you’re going to be using it, as Wade mentioned during that episode, you’re going to be using more Internet strokes than regular keystrokes.
***
BRIAN NORTON: Great. The second bit of feedback that we got this past week was, I think in our last show we had mentioned about JAWS and Zoom text, we had a question talking about those things and were mentioning pricing as we were trying to answer the question from our last episode. At one time there was some special pricing at the NFB and ACB conferences. The person mentioned that there was some incorrect info come to be about the cost with that. Again, we are not really sure what the cost is –
BELVA SMITH: Under $100.
BRIAN NORTON: I would say if you’re interested in the cost, you can call Freedom Scientific, or VFO now since they are all under one umbrella, and talk about the cost. I do believe there are some discounts if you have previous licensed versions, there is an upgrade which will give you a discounted cost but maybe not to the degree that you had at those previous conferences.
BELVA SMITH: I think I misspoke during the episode as I was listening to the playback on it. I said at all the conferences they have those discounts. That is not true, for example ATIA bitter offer those discounts. The NFB and ACB conference that they offer it at that I am most aware of. It’s under $100, $79.
BRIAN NORTON: We will probably have to wait and see if they are offered at future conferences. I would probably say that was one where it was at that particular conference because it was right here and now and that’s when all of those changes are coming along.
BELVA SMITH: They were really pushing to get people on board with the newer version.
BRIAN NORTON: I think we recently had some friends from VFO come over and talk to us about software, just to our clinical team. On our clinical team here at Easter Seals crossroads, we are doing assessments for folks where we are in the weeds and trenches with folks trying to figure out what their needs are and helping them accommodate those needs. We just had a representative come out and talk to us about those changes and new software. You are right. The push is to get people on the most current version of their software because there’s been a lot of changes, it sounds like, with their software as they have updated it. They are streamlining it and hopefully coming out with a product line that is a little bit more –
BELVA SMITH: Compatible.
BRIAN NORTON: You’re not going to have as many issues as maybe you had in the past. Getting things to play nicely in the sandbox together. That’ll be interesting to see.
BELVA SMITH: Compatible.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s a more concise way to say it.
BELVA SMITH: It might be a good time to throw out that while those folks were here with us, they did mention that if you happen to be using Fusion and you don’t have an SMA, it would be a good idea to get the SMA before the beginning of May.
BRIAN NORTON: Because they are going to release a new version.
BELVA SMITH: Correct.
BRIAN NORTON: Excellent. Feedback can’t be listening to the questions we have. If you’re interested in our show, go back and listen to previous shows. If you have feedback regarding those, we will put those on the show as well.
***
The next thing we will do is jump into our first question. Our first question is, I’m looking for a custom key guard that is adaptable over time for a student that needs to start small and have more and more keys available to them as they get better and better at using the keyboard itself. I think there was a question as to this was a computer keyboard. At least from our perspective, was it a computer keyboard that they are talking about or was it and augmentative communication device keyboard that they were needing. I think we landed on an augmentative communication device.
WADE WINGLER: I think it go either way. I think you might have situations where a computer keyboard you might want to restrict certain keys, like if you’re just using arrow keys or number keys for math programs or whatever and you want to keep folks off the function keys. They could be AugCom too. I think it could go either way.
BELVA SMITH: If it is a computer keyboard, and the first thing I thought of was – and I can think of the name of it – the blue keyboard that has the —
BRIAN NORTON: You’re talking about the Intellikeys USB keyboard.
BELVA SMITH: Is that still available and compatible with Windows 10?
BRIAN NORTON: I believe you can still get the USB version. I’m pretty sure the software works.
BELVA SMITH: If so, that’s a great option. It doesn’t have a guard but it does have the different –
BRIAN NORTON: It does come with guards. You to buy them separately. It did have guards, should have guards that you can buy in a five pack that goes with the five standard keyboard that it typically has.
BELVA SMITH: I thought of that one and also found a website, www.fentek/in.com. I guess they will customize a keyboard guard and even sell the keyboards with the guards. They have a list of keyboards that they have available and can customize.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s cool.
JOSH ANDERSON: Nice.
BRIAN NORTON: It sounds like your website I found which is turning point technology. Turning point technology allows you – they are to have some keyboards that are readily available or you can even search for keyboards through their site as well. Whether it is a computer or AugCom device, they have a variety of different ones available, either Apple or Windows, even calculators, things for iPads and kisses and stuff like that. They seem to have quite a few options available for you. It seems to be laid out well for you to search for those things.
WADE WINGLER: Back in the day, we used to make them. They’re not that terribly hard to make. You take a piece of plexiglass, cut it to the size of the device or a little bit bigger, and you can take a magic marker and draw circles or squares around the different keys, get a drill press and drove them smaller than the key itself that you are trying to hit, and take a blowtorch and flame them out. That’ll smooth off the edges. We’ve made the before and you can use Velcro or dual lock to attach them to the device. It’s not a super easy thing to do but it’s not that hard either to make your own, and you can create custom key guards for anything you want.
JOSH ANDERSON: Depending on what they need it for. If it’s for someone with a cognitive impairment that just needed to learn the keyboard piece by piece, you could take a piece of paper over the keys you don’t want them to touch.
BELVA SMITH: I was thinking cardboard.
JOSH ANDERSON: Something like that. Something you just have laying around. It would cost money or anything like that. If you need something to make sure they are not accidentally hitting those keys, and mobility challenge, it’s something totally different. If you’re just trying to have them learn the keyboard piece by piece and keep out some of the other information, paper, cardboard, anything you can cover it up with.
WADE WINGLER: I don’t know about apps but if you look at traditional augmentative communication systems, like the Prentke Romich website right now for the accent 1000. They have a bunch of different key guards available for a 1628 all the way to a 144 location key guard that you can get. They range from $145-$225 apiece, but they have a lot of different options. Based on the question, I wonder if they’re asking about a key guard that grows and shrinks and expands and changes. I don’t know about anything that would be a successful key guard that would change in size.
BRIAN NORTON: You would almost have to swap them out.
WADE WINGLER: I think you would.
BRIAN NORTON: I was also taking 3-D printing. With 3-D printers, you can print just about anything. I don’t know how you would design it. I guess you would have to get good at the designer software that needs to be able to trade those images to send to the computer. I assume that could be done at very low cost.
BELVA SMITH: It sounds like it would be pretty easy.
BRIAN NORTON: Just a wrap that question up, I think there are places where you can get some premade, either through the manufacturer or some of these others where you can go out and get some manufactured key guards that are specific for different types of keyboards and devices. You might be able to create your own. Wade mentioned – we’ve done that in the past are our fabrication lab where you just take your piece of plexiglass and mark it up with marker and drill out the holes yourself, create your own. That’s a fairly inexpensive way to go about doing it. 3-D printing might be an option. I think there are lots of options for you to be able to create your own key guard and, over time, expanded. The only thing I would say might be not possible is to find one that is changeable. I think you would have to create one that would work for now, and when things need to change you would have to create a different one or a new keyboard made by yourself or find a different one made by the manufacturer. Hopefully that answers your question.
As our listeners are listening, if you have feedback, maybe have a different resource that we didn’t mention, give us a shout out. You can send us a voicemail at our listener line at 317-721-7124. We would love to hear from you. Let us know if you have other resources that would help this person address their key guard needs.
***
Our next question came in via email. The question is, I’m headed to college next fall and wanted to know what I should be asking the disability services office about accessibility and assistive technology. I use a solo literacy sweet software and high school right now and want to make sure I have something comparable available in college. What you think, as far as accessibility and assistance of knowledge available on your campus?
BELVA SMITH: I think they just ask that question. You sit down with the folks in disability services and say to them exactly what they just said. During high school, I used this particular software and I used it to help me with ABC, so I knew something comparable. What it is it you’re going to offer that is comparable, or is there not anything that you offer? So then they can look at what the options are that the school does have to offer. If they don’t have anything that’s going to accommodate them the way that they are used to being accommodated, and they are going to need to reach out to another source to get it.
Aren’t almost all of the college is now offering the Read and Write Gold?
BRIAN NORTON: To me, it depends on the size of the school. Some of the bigger state institutions – we are Indiana, so you think about IU, Purdue, Ball State, IEPY, a lot of these bigger institutions, Indiana State. There are several large colleges here in Indiana. I think you’re going to find some assistance technology available on campus. I think depending on the size of your university, it might be a standalone office that you can get all the questions answered, either the disability office, adaptive education office. If you are at a smaller private school car you might be talking to your admission counselors because they should know. I know I went to a school, Anderson University, which is in Anderson Indiana, a small private school. They had a learning center where I would be able to ask those types of questions. I know the admissions office would have directed me over there if I have question.
I think you’re right. The first thing is you need to be willing to ask those questions. I think the biggest thing for folks is they don’t know what they’re getting into when they leave high school and go to college. It’s a completely different process and there are supports you do get in K-12 that you don’t get when you go to college.
BELVA SMITH: In K-12, you don’t have to ask for things like you do when you get into college. You then have to speak up because no one is going to come tap on your shoulder. I think it’s really important. Also, the sooner the better. As soon as you know which college you’re going to go to, start asking right then.
BRIAN NORTON: In that K-12 environment, I think you still ask, but there is a process and a system around you in the IEP, or individualized education plan, to help folks have a forum to be able to ask the question they need to ask. When you get to college, if you don’t ask and don’t know where to go, you just don’t get any accommodations.
BRIAN NORTON: I agree. I’m guessing don’t ask. But it’s typically your parents or someone doing the speaking for you. In college, you’re going to have to be the one that does that speaking.
JOSH ANDERSON: Make sure you ask how the software is delivered, because sometimes it would be something you can download from their technology services. Sometimes it’s loaded on a computer in a lab. Sometimes so many computers will have it. Just make sure you know how to be able to access that to make it a whole lot easier. Also, really important when talking to – very important, make sure you do talk to disability services. If you have accommodations in the classroom, the professors have to know about that or they can pretty much say no.
WADE WINGLER: Absolutely. I think it’s important to not only speak up for yourself but to be informed about your products and assistance to what he needs. When you look at the solo suite from Don Johnson, it includes a text reader, a word production system, a talking word processor, and a graphic organizer. If you go to a college admissions office or disability services office and say I want the solo literacy software, they may not know what you’re talking about, but if you say I really use word prediction and I need a graphic organizer, you may not use the text reader or the talking word processor in that particular package. Know the generic terms for the technology you’re using and be able to describe how you use it. They may say, well, we don’t have that but we do have these other programs to offer you the same kind of thing.
If you are in Indiana – we have a lot of listeners in Indiana – and you want a list of the disability services offices, we have one of those we keep on our website. If you go to www.eastersealstech.com/college, it’ll have a listing of all of the disability services offices at all universities and the state of Indiana appeared I don’t know if other AT act project to that, but I’m pretty sure that if you called your local assistance technology act project, they can direct you to the disability services office in any of the colleges in the United States. You can get that list, if you’re looking for your local AT act project, at our website www.eastersealstech.com/states. That’ll take you to a listing of all of the AT acts in the country and territories.
BRIAN NORTON: I think that’s really important. At most universities, when you were saying about using solo suite and the different things that it can do for somebody, I college a lot of times they are offering some free things to you. I know if you go to IU, you can download a version of read and write gold which is similar to solo suite. It has some of the same things but is not exactly the same thing. The tools don’t necessarily work exactly the same way that you might be used to with solos we just because you are more familiar with the software. There will probably be a learning curve to that. Knowing that you can not only get that but having them know that you’re going to need that, and then who’s going to train you on how to use it and get you comfortable with the software, would be a good thing to know.
BELVA SMITH: I think your study habits are going to be different as a college student. You are probably going to have longer study periods – and maybe I’m wrong – then you did when you were K-12, so you may want to reach out to your local VR office, vocational rehabilitation, to see if they can provide you with any additional technology that you might need for longer reading periods and stuff like that.
WADE WINGLER: I think another interesting factor is, if you have been using it, in this example solo literacy suite in high school, and the college goes back and says we use read and write gold or Kurzweil, I think there are benefits to using the same tool that you used in high school because you will have a quick a learning curve. But on the other hand, maybe it’s time to learn new tools. It’s a growth experience to say now I can use two different tools to do that. I think you’re going to experience something similar when you move into the workplace. You may have an employer that wants to use something different yet. I can see argument on both sides of using the tool I’m best with because I’m going to perform the best, and I can also see argument for it’s also good to learn new things.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s a great point.
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BRIAN NORTON: Don’t forget, if you have some feedback, some additional information for our college student about accessibility and assistive technology that’s available on campuses, maybe you’ve experienced that transition before and have some sage words of wisdom for him or her, definitely give us a call, send us an email, or send us a tweet. Our caller line is 317-721-7124. Our email is tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Or you can send us the hashtag #ATFAQ.
Our next question was also via email. The question is, is there a better way to type equations? I have a client with limited arm function and a learning disability that make it difficult for her to hand write equations into Microsoft Word. Do you know of any software that would be helpful?
BELVA SMITH: To handwrite them into market word?
BRIAN NORTON: To type them. You might have a pretty hard time handwriting too.
BELVA SMITH: Everything I found when I was researching this point it back to using Microsoft word but with the equation editor that was supposed to be the fastest, easiest, best way. I don’t know if they are aware of that.
BRIAN NORTON: How do you find that? Do you know?
BELVA SMITH: I don’t. I think you know the answer to how to find it. I just googled it. The first four or five results were about using Microsoft Word.
BRIAN NORTON: There is a really useful equation editor found in Microsoft Word that it’s a fairly good job of allowing you to be able to type in equations into just a traditional word document. That works fairly well. There are good YouTube videos, a bunch of great resources to be able to know how to turn it on and use it as well. That may be your first option. Something I’ve used over a period of time with clients is one called MathType. MathType is an on-screen keyboard that’s essentially the same thing, but it’s an on-screen keyboard where you can simply type in very basic problems to scientific – it essentially gives you a scientific keyboard where you can type in very complex equations as well and be able to offer that.
JOSH ANDERSON: I’ve used MathType before with a screen reader, I think window eyes, and it did work. Isn’t there a plug-in you can put with Dragon?
BRIAN NORTON: There is.
JOSH ANDERSON: I don’t remember the name of it for the life of me.
BELVA SMITH: That’s Math Talk that I was talking about earlier today. You said MathType, and I was like, no, Math Talk.
JOSH ANDERSON: There is MathType too!
BELVA SMITH: Math talk is a plug-in or app that is used with Dragon NaturallySpeaking to be able to get your math equations.
BRIAN NORTON: Speaking from experience with math talk, that can be challenging to use because you have to know how to say – you need to know what those symbols are. You can to guests. You have to know exactly what it is. That can be a little bit challenging, or very challenging. The other thing I know with math talk is it’s hard to get installed because everything has to be installed very precisely, the one after the other, and there is a very specific way to get that stuff to work together. It can be challenging but it is good software. We’ve used it several times with clients who needed that type of support where they couldn’t access the keyboard and couldn’t interact with an on-screen keyboard. They had to use voice input to create those equations.
The other thing I don’t know folks know about is math way. Mathway.com is a good website. Although you are not typing it into Word, you are able to type equations on to the website. You can write equations, solve equations, all in one step. It provides the tools and keys to be able to type in an equation, and then you can ask it to stop it. It’s going to go ahead and solve it for you so it works a little bit like a calculator. The cool thing is it then lists all the steps of that are available that you would’ve gone through to solve the equation. Let’s say you have challenges with math, and math is one of your harder subject that you take, this can really help you better understand exactly what’s going on with the equation. Although it does solve it, it does break it down into steps, and it helps with that learning process because it kind of helps you step up the letter a little bit, one step at a time, to be able to know in chronological order how you got to that particular answer. I think it’s a great website. I think it’s $99 for a year subscription. You do pay for it, but it’s a great website. They have all levels of math. You can break it down from subject matter from algebra to geometry to calculus, all the way out. It’s a really useful website and tool.
BELVA SMITH: Another tool I found that might be worth looking at is Math-o-mir.
BRIAN NORTON: Which stands for Russian satellite?
JOSH ANDERSON: Space station.
BELVA SMITH: When you download it, you are going to be extracting MOM setup. It’s free. I’ve not used it, so I don’t really know how well it’s going to work, but I definitely would recommend looking into it to see if it might be something that would be helpful. The idea behind the software is to make it as easy to type the equation as it is to write it. It does say that it is compatible with Windows 2000, XP, Vista, 7, 7, 10. I would definitely take a look at that.
BRIAN NORTON: I have to look at the question again. Math is such a hard thing, and there is not a lot of assistive technology. There is more now today than there was several years ago, but it’s one of those things that it’s a late bloomer as far as resources and tools that you can use to get better access to it, not only being able to type stuff but also learn math for folks with some learning difficulties. It’s exciting to see something starting to develop in and around the particular subject matter
WADE WINGLER: The only thing I want to add on here, I think one of the big issues that happens with math and formulas and equations is finding a way to represent them on a computer. I don’t know if we talked about latex and this conversation. Latex is a mathematical computer-based language that allows you to represent complicated formulas online. It’s like markup language in some ways in that you use special characters like the dollar sign and colon in different ways to make complex math formulas on screen. I guess all I want to say is if your issue is not necessarily representing basic formulas or even intermediate formulas graphically on the computer, but you are dealing with very complicated math, Google the term latex which is the online standard for complex equations for folks who are dealing with very fancy math.
BRIAN NORTON: I think even with latex, although you’re doing it online, you can export an image of the particular equation that you created and paste it into a Word document. You’re not creating actual text but you are creating an image of a particular math equation. I believe gif’s, jpeg’s, and pdf’s are available.
Again, if you’ve run across folks that have had challenges in this area, being able to type equations into a document format, if you have had solutions that you have used yourself to be able to do this for yourself, let us know. We would love to hear from you. You can give us an email at tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Let us know if you have some resources. Or, if you have questions that are percolating in your mind about what you would like to be able to ask on our show, reach out to us. We love to hear from you.
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BRIAN NORTON: Our next question came in, also via email.
WADE WINGLER: I love email.
BRIAN NORTON: We do love email.
WADE WINGLER: You know what I like more?
BRIAN NORTON: Phone messages. That is true. If you guys are tempted to give us any kind of feedback, give us a call. We love to hear from you guys because that means we don’t have to talk as much on the show. We will play your voicemails if you want us to. You can leave a voicemail and tell us not to play it and we will read it, but definitely reach out to us. We would love to hear from you in person on our phone messages. That’s 317-721-7124.
Our next question came in via email. The question is, I want to know if the apps on my iPad that I have spent a significant time organizing into files will be preserved if I reset my iPad. I think we all have done that. On my iPhone, I have three or four screens full of apps. Wade, I looked at your phone. You are OCD about how you organize your apps.
WADE WINGLER: I’m not OCD, I’m ABC.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s true. You have them all organized into folders that are A through B and so on and so forth.
WADE WINGLER: My main screen is just the stuff I use the most. My second screen is everything else alphabetically by groups. I have an ABC group and a DEF group and so on.
JOSH ANDERSON: I don’t even have a second page. All of mine are in folders on the first page. There are pictures under them.
BRIAN NORTON: I don’t know what the apps are named. I just look for the pictures.
WADE WINGLER: I like pictures.
BELVA SMITH: How many screens do you have?
BRIAN NORTON: 3 1/2.
BELVA SMITH: I have 3 1/2.
BRIAN NORTON: Imagine, if you would, you spent all of that time organizing your apps. If you want to go ahead and reset and you back it up, would they be able to come back across?
JOSH ANDERSON: Mine usually stay. Every time I’ve upgraded phones, if I backed it up to iTunes, everything stays the same.
WADE WINGLER: Every time I have done it, I get my apps back but they are not in the same order.
JOSH ANDERSON: Mine stay in the same folders. I don’t put them completely alphabetically but mine looks the same as the iPhone I just got rid of.
BELVA SMITH: That was what I was about to say. I’ve only done it twice, but I have a couple of folders that have apps in them and I’ve never re-created them. They’ve just been there with my apps in them.
JOSH ANDERSON: I don’t back to iCloud. I back up to iTunes. Make sure if you ever check that box that asks to encrypt or backup, that you remember the password you put. I was down to my last chance last time so I almost lost it all.
BRIAN NORTON: So I understand that some people have had success in some people have it.
JOSH ANDERSON: We’ve had success. He [Wade] hasn’t.
BELVA SMITH: I don’t want to be responsible for telling this person yes and then them lose anything. What I would say is you had better get on Apple support page and see what people are telling you there. I’m using the 6S Plus, so it’s been over a year and a half since I’ve done it. I do only have three folders. Those three folders have several apps in them, and they came through from my 5 to this.
BRIAN NORTON: I went to one of the folks where I go for a lot of my Apple information, AppleVis.com. I googled this particular question. I got a mixed group of results. Sometimes it seemed to do it, sometimes it didn’t, some folks were saying all of my folders with the apps were set up on my new phone from an iCloud backup. Maybe it’s not iCloud or iTunes. Maybe it’s gotten better over time over the latest updates that cleaned up a bit. From what I’ve gathered from the website, I think the majority of folks felt that they have done things back in the order in which they were. Maybe that’s the way it is now.
BELVA SMITH: If you are willing to take that chance, it may be spring cleaning time. If for some reason all your folders don’t transfer, your apps are definitely going to be there. Maybe you just do some rearranging.
BRIAN NORTON: One person that I came across says, “they will carry over now. I remember when a used to do that, but all of your folders will now move from your backup and then be restored on your new phone.” Maybe if you’re using a new phone, it depends on what your iPad version is, what version of iTunes you are using, or if you are backing up to a iCloud. Maybe you’re going to be able to fine with that.
JOSH ANDERSON: I believe everything you back up and the new device both had to have the same operating system. They have to be the exact same or it won’t work.
WADE WINGLER: Maybe that’s been the issue when it’s not worked. Maybe the new system had the newer OS on it. It’s been a long time ago.
BRIAN NORTON: I say we do it with your phone and see you play with 400 apps which need to go back into the right folders.
WADE WINGLER: We just talked about how I need to have all my stuff neatly organized and you want to mess with that.
BRIAN NORTON: I have mine organized in rows my picture. All my green apps are in one row, all of my brown apps are in one row on my blue apps are in the other row.
SPEAKER: Where are your purple ones?
BRIAN NORTON: Purple matches my shirt today. It’s the day after Easter when we are recording.
WADE WINGLER: We went on and Easter egg hunt this weekend, and there was a little boy that would only pick up yellow eggs.
JOSH ANDERSON: Those are the best.
WADE WINGLER: He kept saying he got the golden eggs. It was pretty fun. It’s good to know that you had your iPhone organized like an Easter egg hunt.
BRIAN NORTON: It only takes me for five minutes to find the one I’m looking for.
WADE WINGLER: And then when they change the color of the icon. Chaos.
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BRIAN NORTON: If you have any feedback on this past question, let us know. We would love to hear from you. You can give us a tweet at the hashtag ATFAQ and we would love to hear from you.
Our next question was through email as well. I would like to record lectures in my classroom and have them transcribed. I recently saw an interesting device called the Titan note. Currently it’s a crowdfunding project. Do you know of anything now that will do what it does. I’ve actually seen the Titan note come up with in my Facebook feed. It’s an interesting device. It looks like the Amazon dot –
BELVA SMITH: A little bit smaller.
BRIAN NORTON: It’s a round circle with depth to it. I believe you essentially stick it on the paper or table, and it will listen and transcribe everything that said. The thing I wanted to throw out, that’s been something of a pipe dream a little bit for a long time because a lot of times – I’ve been doing this for 20 years, and folks have wanted Dragon to do that same thing. Why can’t we just have Dragon listen and transcribe everything that it hears? Although Dragon can get close to it with a digital recorder and things like that, in a classroom environment I’ve always struggled to get it to work because you have multiple speakers, people all over the room who are talking and contributing. Dragon isn’t set up to be able to listen to multiple speakers at once. You are supposed to be able to do a little bit of training with it so we can learn your voice. I don’t know if you’ve been on a college campus recently. A lot of instructors have accents. Sometimes it’s just that accustomed to be able to listen and transcribe those with a high level of accuracy. I’m really interested in the Titan note and would love to get my hands on one when they become available to see how well it does in those different environments and to see what that accuracy is. If you are taking notes, accuracy, for me, is key in being able to transcribe and read and understand. If it’s not accurate, you are searching for what it meant by that once it is transcribed. It’s a really cool device. If you haven’t seen it, it’s on Indiegogo. It’s called Titan note. It certainly sounds really interesting. I know it’s been talked about for a long time and I know it has its challenges so I’m anxious to be up to get my hands on it.
JOSH ANDERSON: I know Craig uses is quite a bit and some colleges are using it, but Sonocent, which is an online notetaking application. It does transcription as well so it will actually do the audio transcription. You use your computer or phone to record, but you can also write your own notes. You can add notes to PowerPoint. You can mark up power points, PDFs, just about anything.
BRIAN NORTON: It will turn the recording into text?
JOSH ANDERSON: It will turn the recording in the text as well.
BRIAN NORTON: Interesting.
JOSH ANDERSON: I know some colleges here in the state of Indiana, Purdue is one. I think they offer it to students now. I think others are jumping onto it.
BRIAN NORTON: We’ve always had the traditional notetaking devices like the live scribe pen which is been around for a long time. There are three or four different versions of it. It’s a pen with a digital recorder that links your handwritten note to the audio recording.
BELVA SMITH: But it doesn’t do any transcription.
BRIAN NORTON: There is something called my script. With the live scribe three, it will do some transcription directly within the note itself, or you can get an add-on to the live scribe desktop to be able to turn notes into transcription. Again, it’s all about accuracy. The accuracy just isn’t 100 percent. The other is I ran into where Notability and Audio Note. Those are iPad and android apps. They will allow you to use a Bluetooth keyboard with a mobile device, also a stylus with a mobile device, allow you to walk up to the board and take pictures of whatever the teacher might have written during class and insert it into your notes. Again, all linking into the recording and you can move down through your notes, press anywhere, on a picture, on text, on type or written text, and it will jump to that point in the recording to be able to get it. Again it’s all about accuracy pure I’ve always struggled with that because whenever I see something like that, I just wait and see what that accuracy will be like. I think that’s the key to successful notetaking.
BELVA SMITH: What I read about it is it says it’s going to be able to record multiple voices and up to 70 feet away. I really have to see that.
WADE WINGLER: I’m really torn. I don’t want to be a skeptic but I have to be. As soon as it records, and without an Internet connection, it will translate on an app on your phone and translate the voice to text between different languages and it will summarize the notes at the end of the lecture. That seems like a whole lot of processing to happen on a phone. Is this going to be an app that fills the entire memory on your phone to be able to have that sort of database to do those things? On the other hand, they’ve raised almost $800,000 as of our recording on April 17. People are believing that they are going to do this. This could be a game changer.
BELVA SMITH: It says it doubles as a Bluetooth speaker.
BRIAN NORTON: I’m really excited about it. Did it say when they might start production?
BELVA SMITH: You can purchase it right now, from what I’m reading.
WADE WINGLER: Well, it’s on Indiegogo, so they are going to start rolling them out later in 2017. There is a timeline on their website that talks about it.
BELVA SMITH: Some are saying you can purchase it for $80 right now which is $70 off the retail.
WADE WINGLER: That’s preorder stuff. They are talking about mass production and shipping to backers in September 2017. So we are still six months off.
BRIAN NORTON: Super exciting to see how notetaking may change. If you’re listening and you have more information about Titan note or other types of no takers that do the transcript and peace – and I think that’s what is unique about this device, is that conception piece where it actually gives you a typed version of your notes once it’s done all of the listening that needs to do. May be you have some sort of software, some sort of device that you use that can do that for you that we didn’t mention. We would love to hear about those things. Any other information that specifically about Titan note that you know would be another thing to know about.
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WADE WINGLER: And now it’s time for the wildcard question.
BRIAN NORTON: Our next question is the wildcard question. This is where I throw the mic at Wade and he asks as an off-the-wall question that we haven’t had any time to prepare for. What have you got for us today?
WADE WINGLER: This is one you had time to prepare for but you didn’t know you were preparing for it your whole life.
BRIAN NORTON: What if I don’t have a good answer? Does it mean I’ve totally screwed up?
WADE WINGLER: I wasn’t counting on you not having a good answer. Yes, all that. Several of us have been in the assistive technology industry for many years. Josh, you’ve been a little less than most and I’m counting on your perspective from that. Here’s a hypothetical question. If you had unlimited time, unlimited brains, and unlimited resources to someone major AT problem – not solve a disability or cure something, but unlike some sort of assistive technology roadblock with no holds barred. You had all the brains, money, time to do it. What would the one major AT problem be that you would fix?
BELVA SMITH: You asked me a very similar question to this one you did my interview. My answer then is going to be my answer today.
JOSH ANDERSON: Cheater.
BELVA SMITH: I want 911 access to death/blind individuals all over. I know it’s barely there in some areas, but after working the last three or four years with many individuals that are both visually and hearing impaired, most of them living alone, having absolutely no way to call for medical, fire, or any of that is really a big scary thing. If I could figure that out, I would do it.
WADE WINGLER: That’s a good one.
BRIAN NORTON: My fix or what you are looking for in this question would be, I would want one place where people could go to get answers to all of their questions.
BELVA SMITH: Wait, we’ve got that. ATFAQ.
JOSH ANDERSON: Like a podcast?
BRIAN NORTON: That’s exactly right. Here’s the deal. State agencies, federal agencies, we have foundations, different types of funding sources. There is so much out there, yet what I struggle with is it so fragmented. People just don’t know who to call or ask. If people call me, I’m going to get the information I know of. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know half the stuff that is out there that they should be tapping into. I know there are information phonelines here in Indiana, we have 211 where you can call and get information. I’m not even sure they know everything.
WADE WINGLER: They don’t.
BRIAN NORTON: I just wish there were one place where people could come and get answers to everything. I know that’s probably a pipe dream that will never happen.
WADE WINGLER: It’s a pipe dream question.
BRIAN NORTON: That would be revolutionary for folks. You don’t know what you don’t know. Even though you’re trying to bark up the right tree, those folks don’t know everything either. That would be my thing, if people could go and get the one-stop shop type of information. I think that could be hugely helpful for folks.
JOSH ANDERSON: What was the question again? I listened to both of theirs and forgot.
WADE WINGLER: If you had unlimited time, brains, and resources, what would be the one major AT problem that you would solve?
JOSH ANDERSON: Could businesses understanding AT be one? I worked with so many businesses, first in employment and now in AT. You get the look from the person hiring, well how are you possibly going to be able to do this job? It requires this or that. Then what you actually put something in place, some sort of assistive technology and they are successful, sometimes more so than the person who doesn’t have a disability sitting next to them, once they see that, then they’re like oh, that opens a whole new area of people I could hire. Or, hey, this might help everyone that works here to be more productive. Just being able to get that worked out a little bit that these things are out there and can help people. It wouldn’t just help people with disabilities find employment. They could help companies hire a much bigger pool of applicants. I know hiring can be a royal pain sometimes. Being able to have more applicants and folks to pull in would definitely be a big thing. But way too big and probably take to time.
BRIAN NORTON: But you have unlimited resources.
JOSH ANDERSON: And on the brains. So I guess I might be able to pull that off.
WADE WINGLER: I’m impressed because you had these far-reaching goals. Mine was much more technical. I want universal OCR that can read handwriting and printed writing and script and everything. If you could have any sort of written language, no matter if I dreaded it down on a postcard or a fancy wedding invitation or regular typeface, if you could have universal OCR, I think that would solve a lot of problems for folks with disabilities.
BRIAN NORTON: That’s a great answer.
BELVA SMITH: If only we could do all that, it would be a perfect world.
BRIAN NORTON: Thank you for taking time out of your day to listen to our show. Please take some time to send us questions. You can do that by calling our listener line at 317-721-7124. You can also send us an email at tech@EasterSealsCrossroads.org. Or Tweet us with the hashtag ATFAQ. We would love to hear from you. Also if you have additional resources or information regarding any of the question that we talked about on the show today, please send us that as well. We would love to hear from you. One of the best ways to do that is through our listener line. The number again is 317-721-7124. The reason we ask folks to call our listener line is that’s a great way to engage with you and hear from you, because we also think it to play your voicemails on the air. That’s a great way for folks to not only get the resources, get the questions, but also it helps folks understand who is listening to us. Thanks for taking the time to listen to our show and thanks for being part of it. Have a great week and we will talk to you guys later.
WADE WINGLER: Information provided on Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions does not constitute a product endorsement. Our comments are not intended as recommendations, nor is our show evaluative in nature. Assistive Technology FAQ is hosted by Brian Norton; gets editorial support from Mark Stewart and Belva Smith; is produced by me, Wade Wingler; and receives support from Easter Seals Crossroads and the INDATA project. ATFAQ is a proud member of the Accessibility Channel. Find more of our shows at www.accessibilitychannel.com.
***Transcript provided by TJ Cortopassi. For requests and inquiries, contact tjcortopassi@gmail.com***