All Cool Blind Tech Shows

Join Jessica for an exclusive Spotlight interview with Chad Udell, Managing Director, and Steve Richey, lead director at Float, makers of Cydalion. Cydalion is a revolutionary new app based on the Tango platform for Android which allows blind and visually impaired users to navigate indoor spaces using augmented audio technology. You won't want to miss this exciting episode. To find out more, follow @gowithfloat on twitter or check out their website

Spend a day with a member of the CBT Team as we review our first GPS app from APH. Hugo takes Nearby Explorer to work, a coffee shop, a restaurant and then back home for a walk around his neighborhood.

From the App Store:

Nearby Explorer by American Printing House for the Blind is a full featured GPS app designed for use by people who are blind. Instead of just providing directions, it describes the environment in ways comparable to reading signage or observing road characteristics.

It uses onboard maps, so a data connection is not required, but if you have one, Nearby Explorer supplements the on board map data with crowd collected locations from Foursquare or Google Places. It includes complete maps for the United States and Canada which contain millions of points of interest. The onboard maps are over 4GB in size, so be sure the device you plan to use has enough available space before purchasing.

Nearby Explorer works with any device running iOS version 9 or later, but if the device does not contain its own GPS receiver, like most iPads and iPods, you must use an external GPS receiver. All iPhones contain GPS receivers.

Nearby Explorer works by letting you select from several different location related options about what to announce as you move. These include both typical items like street name and address, and specialized options like approaching streets, intersection configurations, and nearby places and the distance and direction to them. (All announcements are optional.) All of this information is shown on the home screen and is available at any time, but typical use is to adjust the level of announcements, then lock the screen and put the device away. This keeps both hands free and let's your preferred voice speak the characteristics of the environment as you move.

You may also use the devices position and orientation to obtain additional targeted details such as pointing the end of the device to scan for businesses, even in a moving vehicle, or tilting it vertically to function as a compass, including a listing of streets in the indicated direction. This all works with the device locked, so one need not fuss with the touch screen while moving. You may even mark a point, then use the position of the device to get haptic feedback about that point's location.

Nearby Explorer includes a transit feature that provides detailed mass transit schedules for over 60 metropolitan areas in the U. S. and Canada. It treats transit stops just like favorites and points of interest by announcing their name and relative position as you move, but in addition, transit stops add next vehicle stop time, direction of travel, and route name to the announcements. You can use the transit schedules to look up times or even follow a route.

You may virtually move to any area in the U.S. or Canada and explore the road network, search, or use the transit maps for that area.

For complete details about Nearby Explorer, see American Printing House for the Blind

We're always excited to see good quality audio games, particularly ones with high bars in sound and game play hit the market. One fault many games suffer from is replay-ability - can I still do cool post-game action and have things feel more random in the story after I'm done? Or have I just wasted $39 of my money for a week's worth of distractions, anticipation, and nervous fits over not being able to complete my game?

When playing Manamon, these were some of the factors that lead us to consider it a great choice for an Audio game. It's at least a year's worth of development effort which culminates in an action-packed adventure featuring a Pokemon-style environment with similar concepts. For example, trainers are tamers, but just like Pokemon, you have starter characters and types. You complete quests on a journey to uncover the hidden operations of the Shadow Kingdom, and battle to become more and more powerful through levelling up your Manamon and turn-based fighting opponents.

We recommend two resources for your journey, friend.

The main Manamon game page for downloading and ordering,

and The Audiogames.net forum topic where you can find a turn-by-turn walkthrough of the game, if you get a little stuck in a puzzle. I wouldn't completely spoil the fun with it, though - but in-game clues are sometimes less obvious. Good luck on your travels, and may Ziognioss be with you.

In this episode of the REAPER series, Alex shows you how to switch and combine takes in an audio track to make one cohesive track. We listen to some seriously underwhelming takes, and some really cool and intricate ones.

Takes are sections of audio that are recorded, most likely multiple times and are able to be combined to make a "perfect" section of music.

Next, he discusses automation. Automation is a way to alter plugin or track parameters by creating an envelope that automatically gets triggered when the project is played. For example, increase a track's volume for a guitar solo or vocal line.

In the example Alex increases and decreases the volume of his solo/lead guitar track to emphasize various parts where needed.

Alex then shows us track templates and their conveniences.

In this episode, James Oates reviews the new Amazon Echo Dot (2nd Generation). He describes the configuration, and tells the lay-out of the physical buttons, and what they do. If you need help setting up your new Echo device, listen to this podcast from Leonid Prazdnik of Cool Blind Tech. James then talks about Amazon’s new unlimited music subscription which rivals the other major music subscription services already available. He demonstrates how well the Echo works with Amazon’s music subscription.

In this brief episode, James Oates shows us the new voicemail transcription feature in iOS 10. He explains how to find and read the transcription and how to submit feedback to Apple so that the service can improve over time.

In this episode, James Oates demonstrates new third party application integration with Siri in iOS 10. He shows us how to find out which applications are available for Siri integration, and how to activate them. He selects three applications to take on a test run. See how well Uber, Skype, and Roger work with Siri.

In this episode, James Oates introduces us to the built in Windows Mail client, which is a part of Windows 10 Anniversary Update. He shows us how to configure multiple accounts, create a signature line for our outgoing mail, how to create and send a message, how to reply to a message, how to activate a link within a message, how to quickly navigate a webpage using Microsoft Edge, how to search for a message, how to find all of your mail folders, how to use mail filters, how to format text in a message, and how to create and send a message using Cortana. Throughout this podcast, James uses Narrator, the built-in screen reader from Microsoft. He also shows us most of the handy keyboard shortcuts for Windows Mail.

Join Jessica with Tamas, Leo and Joel for another exciting VIP! This week, Google held their Google Event on October 4th, where they announced several new products. You won't want to miss this exciting update as our team brings you the latest news and insights about these exciting new products, including the new Pixel phones, the all new Google Assistant, the Chromecast and the all new Google Home and Google Router. Google has stepped up their game in the world of virtual reality with their new Google Daydream VR Headset (Pictures) Daydream Product Info

Cool Picks:

Jessica recommends handmade iPhone cases for their price, aesthetics and tactile appeal. Check your local vendors for hand crafted cases that fit your needs.

Leo: Google Allo

Joel: Fire HD 10 Tablet

Tamas: Sleep++, for tracking your sleep using an Apple Watch on the device itself.

Please let us know how you like the new format. we'd love to hear your feedback via comments, questions or email.

Join Jessica with Tamas, Leo and Joel for another exciting Cool Picks:

Jessica recommends handmade iPhone cases for their price, aesthetics and tactile appeal. Check your local vendors for hand crafted cases that fit your needs.

Leo: Google Allo

Joel: Fire HD 10 Tablet

Tamas: Sleep++, for tracking your sleep using an Apple Watch on the device itself.

Please let us know how you like the new format. we'd love to hear your feedback via comments, questions or email.