Hi Scott and Others.
On Sep 19, 2008, at 7:00 AM, Scott Bresnahan wrote:
Hi,
I thought I'd describe what I know about the accessibility feature
of the iPod nano in the hope that it helps listers understand the
limits of the technology.
First and most important, there is no text to speech engine on the
nano. This is why it doesn't work out of the box. When you enable
the feature in iTunes, iTunes builds audio files of your system
voice speaking all the strings in the iPod menus as if it were
converting a text file to mp3 or aac file. Then, iTunes will synch
and associate that small file with the menu items. Thus, when you
navigate the iPod menu, it plays back the associated file
corresponding to menu name.
Right, there's no dynamic interaction supported on the 4G, In a few
other cases, where supplying a long episode description of each
podcast, or address book contact information and notes, would have
been possible, but inefficient both in space usage and sync, these
features are not there. You have access to equalizer presets, but not
an interactive equalizer. The battery charge level is one of the
dynamic quantities that you can't get information on, but you do get
this as status announcements -- "Charging", "Charged", or "Low
Battery". I suggested that they at least add some intermediate status
messages between "Charged" and "Low Battery", and possibly let us
check the battery charge level when we the nano is connected to the
computer.
This is very clever in that it doesn't penalize people who don't
want text to speech by clogging up their iPod with Alex and the
engine application. The bad part is it doesn't help with dynamic
content like the current time or applications. I personally expect
this technology to migrate to the classic, but don't expect it to
move to the iPod touch. In essence, Apple built in an audio
interface to the menu interface if associated files exist.
This adopted solution of recorded audio voices speaking track titles
is like the tack that Rockbox takes to add voiced menus to a variety
of MP3 players, including the older iPods. However, it gives you the
advantages of better power usage than Rockbox, the ability to play
audio content with DRM (from the iTunes Store and Audible.com), and
full support of smart playlists. It also gives you access to a much
wider range of the iPod menus than devices like the i-Tell.
I personally expect this technology to migrate to the classic, but
don't expect it to move to the iPod touch. In essence, Apple built
in an audio interface to the menu interface if associated files exist.
Ironically, I mentioned this exact approach to a colleague who is
now at Apple a few years ago.
Maybe the shuffle will support jumping by audio book chapter next. :)
Cheers,
Esther
