Unmute Presents Digital Bytes – EP7 – Scanning SPotlight Travel Hardware

00:06.650 –> 01:45.680
I want to tell you about a brand new scanner app that came out for iOS. It’s called Simple Scan. It’s made by the same developer that makes drafts. They’re called agile tortoise. They make some really cool apps, so I would suggest checking that out. Simple scan is really easy to use and straightforward. It does work with voiceover really well. When you open the app, you’re presented with some options at the very beginning. First you choose a document which would be saved as a PDF or you can choose image. Then you choose how you want to save the scanned file and it gives you some really great options. You can save it directly to an email. If you’re going to email it to someone, you can save it to any file folder on your computer or on your phone. And then the last option is saving it to the share option which then allows you to do any of the things that you have available to you in the share sheet, such as email message. Maybe you want to save it to photos or any of the other options that you may have in your share sheet. Then you choose the file size which would be original. Then you would have medium, small, large. After that, you hit the scan button and watch it do its magic. It’s a pretty cool app, so check it out. Enjoy.

01:46.130 –> 03:24.494
On iOS 17, Apple released a new feature that helps you quickly find items in your phone if you weren’t aware of it when you find the page switcher. So while flicking to the left once from your leftmost dock item, you’ll hear page one of X. Double tap on this and you’ll then hear spotlight. When spotlight is open, you can use the keyboard located at the bottom of your phone to begin typing the app or location, or even a calendar event that allows you to add that to your phone. Marty showed us how to add a calendar event to our phone in a previous recording. But one cool thing about the search feature is if you just want to find an application, tap the first two letters of that application and then across the top of your screen you’ll find a list of those apps. Also, if you need to access spotlight from your phone and you don’t want to find that page switcher, just three finger flick down from the middle of your screen anywhere and the keyboard for Spotlight will open up at the bottom. The last tip, this one’s for you, Chris, is if you’re a braille screen input user, turning your rotor to the braille input method on your home screen. In the beginning to type in braille, the first couple of letters of an application’s name will give you that application right away. If you’re a braille display user, tap the spacebar on the home screen and begin typing the name of the application that you’re seeking out.

03:24.612 –> 08:45.140
Hi, everyone. I’m really excited to share with you a couple of accessories that were very helpful to me on my recent travels. I had the privilege of going to the CSUN Assistive technology conference, and that was an amazing experience. It was so great. I loved every minute of it. But I wanted to share with you a couple of things that made my life easier. These are really inexpensive options for accessories, and so the first thing that I took with me are several cable ties. They are cool silicone magnetic cable ties, and they’re really awesome because they’re so easy to work with and they don’t get tangled up. Sometimes they get stuck to each other. If you have a couple of cords that are living in the same little case or a little area, but what they are, they are a tie that is about four inches long, and it’s made of silicon, little cord, and then you’ve got two little dime sized magnetic pieces on either end. And so you can easily wrap your cables, cords, little headphones, whatever you’ve got, you can easily wrap them around. And then the little magnetic pieces at the end click together, and your cord is all securely wrapped up. And so they come 20 in a package, and they’re multicolored. There are no white cords, but there are every other kind of color. So you have black, pink, purple, red, a couple of different kinds of blue. There’s a turquoise and such. And so there’s probably two colors of each one. And they’re just really great. I love them. You can even use them for bookmarks, because when you want to mark a page that you’re reading in a print or braille book, you can take and snap the two little pieces together, and then you have a little loop of cord hanging from the side of your book. So it’s really a cool way to mark things in a book. So these silicone, cool silicone magnetic cable ties are about $16. I got them on Amazon, and like I say, there’s 20 of them in a package, and they are really super great to have around. So that kept all my cords nice and tidy. The other thing that I took with me is a little charging station. It’s made by Kosus, and it is a charging station that has six ports that you can plug in the station, and then you can plug in six different kinds of cords. So it looks like a flat piece that’s about four x six and it’s probably an inch and a half thick. And it has a place for the electric cord to plug in. And then there are slots on top of the device where you fit these little plastic dividers so that you end up with six places where you can place your phone or iPad or tablet, anything like that, even a little rechargeable battery. Everything can have its own slot and then these little dividers come out. So if you want to pack it into a ziploc bag with the little dividers and the cord and everything, it’s really handy to be able to take. The reason I like this option is because there are six slots and it makes it really handy. Plugging it in is great. And then I’m not plugging things into the hotel lamp that has the USBA ports. Not so sure. I’m a little bit wary of maybe some possible data being transferred back and forth or something. And so having something completely independent of any apparatus that might be in the hotel room is great. And then I can just plug everything in and I take all the different kinds of little short cables that I want. It does usually come with a set of six cables and you can order extra little cables. I would say these cables are probably six inches long, and you can order extras of the kinds that you might use. The USBC lightning or micro. I don’t know that they have any mini USB cables. They’re older and so I’m not sure if they have those, but I think I paid about $35 for the charging station and it’s really been invaluable. I have several of them. I have one at work, I have a few here at home. So that whatever I’ve got nearby, I can just plug it in and have a number of cables plugged into the station already. And so that charging station and those magnetic cables were really awesome companions to me at the CSUn assistive tech conference and I would take these things anywhere with me. So we can always provide links if you need them. But they were easily found on Amazon and I hope you found this accessory tip or two. Help. Morning.