ATMac

Posts in this category are especially for Windows users who are thinking about switching to a Mac computer and want to know how the Mac offerings compare to what they’re used to.

David Niemeijer of AssistiveWare has put together some videos demonstrating the “Spoken Menus” facility in the new iPod Nano 4G in both French and British English.

Speech-to-text software, sometimes known as dictation software, is something that lets you talk to the computer in some form and have the computer react appropriately to what you are saying. Here’s a rundown on the types of speech-to-text software that exist and what’s available for Mac OS X in these areas.

A round-up of bits and pieces we haven’t had time for, including Apple’s own accessibility website being updated, new guides for VoiceOver users mastering GarageBand, and some old Apple advertisements featuring American sign language.

Most of the software we review and recommend at ATMac is created by individuals or companies with just a few employees. This “indy” software, as it’s known, is usually available to be tested before you buy it and very reasonably priced but if you want a bunch of different pieces of software it can still add up quickly. How can you best save money when you’re buying software?

Firefox version 3 has been released for a while now, so a lot of users are exploring its possibilities. One of the great accessibility-related things new to Firefox 3 is full page zoom, where zooming in enlarges not just the text but also the images and the whole layout of the page - so it’s more like magnifying the page than just enlarging the text. I wanted to tweak it to my specific requirements though - here’s how.

All Mac users have been beginner Mac users at some point. Because the use of OS X is expanding so fast, there are a lot of new and inexperienced Mac users around at the moment. This is a wonderful thing for the Mac in general - it means there’s more users! Here’s some of the best resources I have to recommend to new Mac users.

A weekend round-up post for all those small bits and pieces that aren’t big enough to merit their own post, or don’t quite fit into ATMac but are still interesting.

The iPhone and iPod Touch feature the wonderful new multi-touch screens, but this can present some problems for people who need assistive technology to use them. Here are some solutions.

In the July - August ‘08 issue of MDA’s QUEST Magazine, there is an interesting article in the QuestTech section about Orlando Valle, a young man with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and the specialized digital photography equipment he uses for a middle school digital media course. Of particular interest is the motorized pan & tilt mount [...]

Long-time Mac OS X VoiceOver user and developer Greg Kearney of CUCAT has announced a 2 day residential camp to provide training in VoiceOver and use of the Macintosh.