Next Thursday (5/17), for the sixth year, the World Accessibility Awareness Day (Global Accessibility Awareness Day or GAAD), which aims to provoke reflection on access, digital accessibility (web, software, mobile devices and others) and even for people with disabilities. Last year, Apple produced commercials that illustrate the reality of people with special needs who use their products.
This year, Apple highlighted the work it has been doing in recent years to benefit people like Austin Pruitt, an American paralympic athlete who has cerebral palsy (a condition that restricts his movements from the knee down). To the CNET, the athlete told how the Apple Watch has contributed to improve the performance of his training regarding the resource implemented in the watch that accompanies the activities performed in a wheelchair.
Before the facilities provided by the Apple Watch, Pruitt usually adjusted different wheelchair trackers to record his workouts, which made the process much longer. In addition to training, Ma's watch follows other daily activities of the athlete and has become an "all in one" device.
This (Apple Watch) has it all. Have my exercises in wheelchair and walks, all in one.
With each new operating system, Apple adds new features that aim to improve not only the lives of some groups of people, but also a larger group of users (mainly iPhones).
An example: iOS allows a visually impaired person to use their iPhone to find specific spices using a camera app to read bar codes. Although essential for visually impaired users, the tool is also a facility for users in general.
For Sarah Herrlinger, Apple's global director of accessibility policies and initiatives, every year the company tries to implement new features. “We think about how we can improve year after year,” added the director.
Among other features implemented by Ma, are the color filter functions (in Settings General Accessibility Screen Adaptations Color Filters) for color blind users and the speech option (which allows the visually impaired to hear the content of the screen by going Settings General Accessibility Speech), whether for emails or even for a shopping list.
For people with hearing impairment, the compatibility of hearing aids has been improved and the subtitle options now have their own menu (in General Settings Accessibility Subtitles and Optional Subtitles).
We will wait for the new features that will be implemented by Apple in its next operating systems (iOS 12, macOS 10.14, watchOS 5 and tvOS 12), especially those that include accessibility and help even more the lives of people with special needs.
via 9to5Mac
