1Vox --- Your Query Is Our Command

Video: 1Vox --- Your Query Is Our Command

1 Video: 1Vox --- Your Query Is Our Command!

Device Used: Motorola Droid on Verizon

Speech interface designers often express surprize at the the fact that the average blind user rarely if ever uses spoken input. But when you come down to it, this is not too surprizing --- given that the eyes-free user has speech output active, the overall system ends up talking to itself!

To show that these conflicts can be avoided by careful user-interface design, we demonstrate 1Vox --- our voice-search wizard for the Marvin Shell.

1. You activate 1Vox by stroke 9 on the Marvin screen.
2. You hear a spoekn prompt Search
3. You hear a little auditory icon when the system is ready for you.
4. You speak oft-used queries e.g., Weather Mountain View.
5. You hear a short spoken snippet in response.

We called this widget 1Vox --- in honor of the Google onebox found on the Google Results page.

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

YouTube And TalkBack --- Entertainment On The Go

Video: TalkBack And YouTube

1 Video: TalkBack And YouTube

Device: Motorola Droid on Verizon

This video demonstrates searching for and playing YouTube videos with TalkBack providing spoken feedback at each step in the interaction.

1. Launch YouTube from the Marvin Application launcher.
2. The trackball can be used here to move through the list of videos.
3. Pressing down on the trackball launches the selected video.
4. Press menu key to enter the YouTube application menu.
5. Click on Search with the trackball.
6. Type a query into the edit field. TalkBack speaks as you type.
7. Press Enter to perform the search.
8. Scroll the results list with the track-ball.
9. Click a desired result to start playing the video.

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

Using TalkBack With Google Maps

Video: TalkBack And Google Maps

1 Video: TalkBack And Google Maps

Device Used: Motorola Droid On Verizon

TalkBack provides spoken feedback as you use Google Maps. In this video, we will demonstrate typical maps tasks such as:

1. Launch Google Maps using the Marvin application launcher.
2. From within the Maps application, press the menu key.
3. Select Search and type a query into the search field.
4. Notice that I can type a partial query and have auto-completion based on previous searches.
5. Press Enter to perform the search.
6. Bring up the result list in ListView by touching the bottom left of the screen.
7. Scroll through this list using the D-Pad.
8. Click with the D-Pad (or enter) to select a business.
9. Scroll through available options, and click Get Directions.

10.Click the Go button to get directions.

1. Scroll with the trackball to hear the directions spoken.

In addition, you can also use Google Latitude to locate your friends.

Note that other Map tools such as Google Latitude are accessible from within the set of options that appear when you press the menu key.

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

TalkBack: An Open Source Android Screenreader

Video: Introducing TalkBack, An Open Source Screenreader

1 Video: Introducing TalkBack, An Open Source Screenreader

Device Used: Motorola Droid On Verizon

We briefly introduced TalkBack in the previous video while enabling Accessibility from the settings menu.Here, we show off some of this screenreader's features.

TalkBack is designed to be a simple, non-obtrusivescreenreader. What this means in practice is that you interactdirectly with your applications, and not withTalkBack. TalkBack's job is to remain in the background andprovide the spoken feedback that you need.

TalkBack works with all of Android's native user interfacecontrols. This means you can configure all aspects of the Androiduser interface with TalkBack providing appropriate spokenfeedback. What is more, you can use most native Androidapplications --- including those downloaded from the AndroidMarket with TalkBack providing spoken feedback.

Here are some examples of Android applications (both from Google as well as third-party applications available onmarket) that work with TalkBack:

• Google Maps: Perform searches, and listen to directions.
• YouTube: Search, browse categories and play.
• Simple Weather: Listen to local weather forecasts.
• Facebook: Moving around on the social Web.

But in this video, we'll demonstrate the use of a very simple butuseful Android application --- the Android Alarm clock.

• Launch: I launch the alarm clock from Marvin's eyes-free application launcher.
• TalkBack: TalkBack takes over and starts speaking.
• Navigate: Navigating with the trackball speaks the alarmunder focus.
• Activate: Activating with the trackball produces appropriate feedback.
• Navigate: Selected alarm displays its settings in a list-view which speaks as we navigate.

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

Introducing The Android Access Framework

Video: Introducing The Android Accessibility Framework

1 Video: Introducing The Android Accessibility Framework

Device Used: MotoRola Droid on Verizon

Starting with Android 1.6 --- fondly known as Donut --- the platform includes an Accessibility API that makes it easy to implement adaptive technology such as screenreaders. Android 1.6 comes with a built-in screenreader called TalkBack that provides spoken feedback when using Android applications written in Java.

The next few videos will progressively introduce TalkBack, SoundBack and KickBack, a suite of programs that augment the Android user interface with alternative output.

All of these special utilities are available through option Accessibility in the Android Settings menu. Once activated, the accessibility settings are persistent across reboots, i.e., you need enable these tools only once.

Notice that because I have accessibility enabled on my phone, all user actions produce relevant auditory feedback. Thus, each item is spoken as I move through the various options in the settings menu. The spoken feedback also indicates the state of an item as appropriate.

Activating SoundBack produces non-spoken auditory feedback; KickBack produces haptic feedback.

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

Connecting The Dots: Marvin And Android Access

Video: Connecting The Dots: Marvin And Android Access

1 Video: Connecting The Dots: Marvin And Android Access

When we first launched project eyes-free in early spring 2009, we promised to post frequent video updates to the eyes-free channel. Well, sadly, we have been remiss in keeping that promise --- but all in a good cause --- we were busy building out the needed accessibility APIs in the core Android framework.

We're now returning with a fresh set of video updates that demonstrate the new accessibility framework in Android, and how these access related tools mesh with the Eyes-Free shell shown earlier.

To summarize:

1. All of the eyes-free utilities from project Marvin continue to be developed in order to provide fluent eyes-free interaction.
2. The Marvin shell that we demonstrated last time continues to be my default home screen.
3. We have added an application launcher on the Marvin screen that can be launched by stroking 8.
4. This launcher uses stroke dialing to quickly navigate and launch applications.
5. With the launch of the Accessibility API in Android 1.6, and the accompanying Open Source TalkBack screenreader, I can now launch any Android application, e.g., Google Maps or YouTube.
6. TalkBack provides spoken feedback for native Android applications, including the settings menu.
7. You can use Android Market to install third-party applications, many of these work outof the box with TalkBack.

We'll demonstrate these, and a variety of other new cool enhancements in these forthcoming videos, stay tuned!

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

Date: 2009-03-30 Mon

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Eyes-Free Home: The Marvin Shell

Video: Eyes-Free Home: The Marvin Shell

1 Video: Eyes-Free Home: The Marvin Shell

Device Used: T-Mobile G1 from HTC

The Marvin shell pulls together available eyes-free applications to provide an integrated user experience. Note that talking applications can come from many sources, with project Eyes-Free being but one such source. For other exciting talking applications that use our open Text To Speech (TTS) APIs, see the Android Marketplace, where you will find many useful tools that integrate seamlessly with Marvin.

when you install the Eyes-Free Shell, you can choose to make Marvin your default home screen --- this means that pressing the home button always brings up the Marvin shell. To return to the default Android home screen, hold down the back button for 3 seconds or more. Here is a brief description of the Marvin user interface.

1.1 Single Touch Access To Useful Tools

The Marvin shell uses the Stroke Dialer to provide single touch access to useful tools right from the home screen. You can explore this interface by moving your finger around the screen --- as you move over the buttons, Marvin speaks the associated action. Lifting up the finger executes the current action. As an example, the top row of the keypad, i.e., 1, 2, and 3 provide status information. Stroking to 4 brings up your favorite short-cuts, and 6 speaks your current location using geo-location information obtained from Google Maps. Pressing 7 connects to your voice-mailbox, and pressing 9 invokes Voice Search to obtain quick spoken answers from Google e.g., current weather for your location. Finally, the applications that appear on the shortcuts screen can be customized by editing XML file

/sdcard/eyesfree/shortcuts.xml

on your SD-Card --- as is apparent, this is a power-user feature:-)!

2 Talking Mini-Applications For Single Touch Access

Here, we demonstrate some of the talking mini-applications that can be accessed from the Marvin screen. All of these mini-applications speak useful information without the need for the user to do some form of context switch.

2.1 Device State

Available from 1 on the Marvin screen, this mini-application announces useful information such as signal strength, and availability of WiFi networks.

2.2 Date And Time

Available on 2 on the Marvin screen, this mini-application provides single-touch access to current date and time.

2.3 Battery State And Power

Pressing 3 on the Marvin screen speaks the current battery level and announces if the phone is presently being charged.

2.4 Knowing Your Location

Available as 6 from the Marvin home screen, this mini-application announces your present location based on information acquired via GPS and the cell network. It speaks your current heading using the built-in magnetic compass, looks up the current location on Google Maps, and announces the location in terms of a nearby address and street intersection.

Author: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>

Date: 2009-03-30 Mon

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