Eyes Free Typing App Fleksy Now Free

The eyes free typing app for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch called Fleksy is now free on the App Store. The app is able to predict what word you are trying to type even if you did not hit any of the right virtual keys. As long as you are close to the right keys Flesky is able to predict the word. Fleksy is so accurate you do not even have to look at your phone to type. Just like other keyboard apps on iOS Fleksy does not replace the default keyboard. Click here to read the full review.

Click read more below to learn more.

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Learning Ally Adds Text To Select Audiobooks

Learning Ally has started to add text  to a handfull of audiobooks in its collection. Learning Ally is an audio book library for people with print disabilities. The audio books with intergrated text download and opparate just like any other Learning Ally audiobook. If you prefer to just listen to the book and not read along you can do so. The book is read aloud with human narration and each paragraph is highlighted as it is being read. The text and highlighting help users follow the words as the text is being read which can help with comprehension. Some people might find it easier to follow the text if it highlighted word by-word or line- by-line instead of  paragraph-by-paragraph, but including text is a great new feature.

The app on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch still does not allow for background download or reading which means that when you close the app the audiobook will stop. Even with these shortcomings it is exciting to see  human audio and text in one easy to use app.

One title I found with the new feature is "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." Learning Ally will begin offering more titles with text and audio in the future. To download the free Learing Ally app click here.

Click read more below to view screenshots of the app in action.

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Slow Down iOS Home-Click Speed

The iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch home button does more than just take you do the home screen. With a quick double tap it can bring up the multitasking pane or music controls. With a quick tripple click it can be used to start an accessibility feature such as VoiceOver, Zoom, Assistive Touch, or Guided Access. If you find it difficult or impossible to double or tripple click the home button quickly you can slow down the speed in settings. To slow down the home-click speed go to settings > general > accessibility > home-click speed.  This setting is only available in iOS 6. To learn how to upgrade to iOS 6 click here. This setting will allow you to press the home button much slower in order to activate the double or tripple click actions. Watch the above video to learn more.

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PDF Expert Review

PDF Expert is an elegant PDF manager, viewer and annotator. The app is available for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch but the iPhone version and iPad version must be purchased separately. You can easily add PDF to the app by using the "open in" feature. Once you have PDFs in the app you can organize them into folders and sub-folders. The highlight of PDF Expert is its annotation features. PDF Expert allows you to quickly and easily add note, text, signatures, watermark stamps, images from the camera roll or audio notes to any PDF. You can search for a PDF by title or by the contents. PDF Expert also includes a passkey lock feature that allows you to protect your sensitive PDFs. 

Unfortunately, PDF Expert does not include text-to-speech for PDFs. Even PDFs created on the computer cannot be read allowed. Also there is no optical character recognition feature for scanned PDFs. If these features are not important to you than PDF Expert is a great choice because of all the other great features. If text-to-speech is important to you than you may need to look elsewhere.

PDF Expert sells for $9.99 in the App Store. Click here for the iPad version and here for the iPhone and iPod Touch version. Click read more to view screenshots of PDF Expert.

App was provided free to reviewer for purpose of review

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Ariadne GPS App Review

Ariadne GPS is an app for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch that allows people with visual impairments to navigate their surroundings. Ariadne GPS app is best suited for the iPad and cellular iPad because those devices have the most accurate location information. The app is fully compatible with VoiceOver allowing visually impaired users to use all features of the app. Ariadne GPS helps the user explore their surroundings by using the GPS of your iOS device to convey information about location, direction of travel and nearest favorite locations. The app can enable blind users to navigate streets, transit systems and even large buildings. When traveling on a train or a bus a blind user could set Ariadne GPS to alert them when they were getting close to their stop. A blind user could also program there classroom locations into the app in order to help navigate a large school building. As a user walks with the app can read street names and numbers. iAriadne GPS also has a map mode which allows a visually impaired user to access maps with VoiceOver.

Ariadne GPS is made to integrate perfectly with VoiceOver. It is a really well thought out app that solves a complex problem. United States users may find some of the labeling odd because the app is was designed over seas. For example street addresses are spoken with the street name and then the number and city.

Overall the $5.99 Aridane GPS is defiantly worth checking out. Click here to view it in the app store. Click read more below to view screenshots and videos of Ariadne GPS.

App was provided complimentary to reviewer 

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Typ-O App Review

Typo-O is a word prediction, spelling and text-to-speech app for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. The app costs $14.99 and requires iOS 6. Click here to view the app in the App Store. Typ-O is simple and easy to use. To get started just start typing, Typ-O then predicts the which word you are trying to type. You can touch the word to accept the predicted word or you can press on a speaker button to have the word spoken  using a text-to-speech voice. The word prediction is very good and can help improve spelling. Hearing the sentence read back to you using text-to-speech can also help improve grammar. Once you have finished writing you can send your text via email or text message. Typ-O includes a number of customizable setting to help improve word prediction accuracy. One negative of the app is that it uses text-to-speech voices from the internet which means if you are not connected to the internet you must use low quality text-to-speech voices.

Watch the video above to see Typ-O in action. Click here to download a lite version of Typ-O to try before you buy. Click read more below to view screenshots of Typ-O.

App was provided complimentry to reviewer

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Create iOS Keyboard Shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are a tool for improving typing speed on your iOS device. To create a keyboard shortcut go to Setting > General > Keyboard > Shortcuts. To add a new short cut click the plus button in the top right. You can create a short cut to write "see you" when you type the letters "cu." You could also create a short cut for your email so you can enter your email quickly with just a few key strokes. Watch the above video to learn more.

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