Sao Mai AccessTech Issue 48

Opening Message

Dear Readers,

As announced in the last issue, Sao Mai has moved to a new location and we were quite busy to settle everything. As usual, summer time is considered as the busiest period in a year of our colleagues at Sao Mai. We will update you more about Sao Mai last month activities in the news section below. So now, what we bring to you in this issue?

Seeing AI app for iOS, global ICT contest for youth with disabilities and new interesting features of upcoming NVDA 2017.3 are among exciting news. In the article and tips sections, we have writings: using OneDrive with screen readers part 2, quoted the article about how to fix “cannot open app on Windows 10”, speaking password with NVDA, quickly turning on/off Talkback + Voiceover and the tip how to get more control with Windows automatic updates feature.

We welcome a new writer, Mr. Le Van Mai who has contributed his article for this issue! We thank him a lot for this and look forward to receiving more from him for next issues. In addition, we also would like to have more writers join us in order to bring more useful information to the blind community.

With regards,

Sao Mai AccessTech Editorial Team

News Section

From Sao Mai

We have worked with a partner manufacturer in Hongkong to produce Braille and talking watches. And in the last month, we imported four different models for both male and female. There is Vietnamese-spoken option for talking watches. This is one of our business activities with the goal to generate income to support Sao Mai activities for the Vietnamese blind community. For more information, please contact Sao Mai products and services team; or call us at: +84-28-7302-4488.

After moving to the new location, we already finished building one recording studio which is used for materials production and music related activities. Besides, we also installed a new VoIP phone system in order to better serve more visually impaired people on the phone at the same time as well as increasing the effective collaboration between staff.

From 1-2/July, we organized a training for 10 blind young people knowledge and skills on how to use Facebook as a tool to promote and sell services/products. This is one of our vocational activities. Read more information about this training at https://saomaicenter.org/en/news/training/training-course-using-facebook-online-business-and-marketing-24-25062017

From 07/17 – 08/21, Sao Mai will open a training on Microsoft Office and browsing internet for blind students. This summer course is targeted for students who are following high school and university programs. Main goal of the training is to equip trainee essential knowledge and skills to effectively apply into their studies.

From 07/17 – 08/04, Sao Mai collaborates with the Hanoi Vocational and Rehab Training Center for the blind to open a soft-skill + customer service training for 15 trainees living in Hanoi area. Through this training, we expect to provide visually impaired young people job related skills which they can explore more employment opportunities. We also invite potential employers to meet with the trainees at the end of the training.

Korean Society for Rehabilitation of Persons with Disabilities (KSRPD) will organize a global ICT challenge contest for youth with disabilities in Hanoi from Sep 18 – 22, 2017. We are in collaboration with them to process the application form submission from our network of students. Vietnamese youth with disabilities who are interested in the contest can visit this page to download the form and email back to us.

International Conference on Special Education (ICSE)

Providing access and engagement for children with Special Educational Needs must be given priority and emphasis by addressing opportunities and barriers such as diverse leaners’ needs, designing and implementing accommodative curriculum suited to the needs of children and responsive curriculum strategies in teaching and learning. The SEAMEO 7 Priority Areas; 1) Early Childhood Care and Education, 2) Addressing Barriers to Inclusion, 3) Resiliency in the Face of Emergencies, 4) Promoting Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET), 5) Revitalizing Teacher Education, 6) Promoting Harmonization and Higher Education and Research and 7) Adopting the 21st Century Curriculum form the basis for this conference.

Microsoft's new iPhone app narrates the world for blind people

Microsoft has released Seeing AI — a smartphone app that uses computer vision to describe the world for the visually impaired. With the app downloaded, the users can point their phone’s camera at a person and it’ll say who they are and how they’re feeling. They can also point it at a product and it’ll tell them what it is. All of this is done using artificial intelligence that runs locally on their phone. Read this full article at: https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/12/15958174/microsoft-ai-seeing-app-blind-ios And watch an introduction clip about Seeing AI at: https://youtu.be/Yzu9cfPYOzY?list=PLD7HFcN7LXRdXafTJ1MnbFtdeDFl_AvMv

Microsoft Garage: Presentation Translator

Presentation Translator is an Office add-in for PowerPoint that enables presenters to display live, translated subtitles. As you speak, the add-in allows you to display subtitles directly on your PowerPoint presentation in any one of more than 60 supported text languages. Additionally, up to 500 audience members in the room can follow along with the presentation in their own language, and on their own phone, tablet, or computer. Read full article at: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/garage/profiles/presentation-translator/

New Price Policy for Duxbury Braille Translator Software

According to recent announcement from Duxbury Systems, their popular Braille translation software will be increased to more 50USD for upgradation and 100USD for new purchase from August 1st, 2017. Users are encouraged to upgrade or purchase before this time. See Duxbury website at: http://www.duxburysystems.com/

Web Accessibility Evaluation Tools

W3c has a page listed many web accessibility tools from different venders, which is a very useful resource for web developers. The page can be viewed at https://www.w3.org/WAI/ER/tools/

Microsoft Excel with NVDA

NV Access just published the Excel training module with NVDA on their store. Users can purchase at: https://www.nvaccess.org/shop/ NV Access has been working with Sao Mai to translate their training modules into Vietnamese. This Excel module will be finished at the end of this month; and will be given free to blind individuals in need.

New Interesting Features Coming in with NVDA 2017.3

Based on NV Access post on the 26th of June and what we read the most recent revision changes, it seems upcoming release of NVDA would be the star of this year. Some new highlight features include: report flagged message and support date picker control in Microsoft Outlook, improve for Skype business version, support MathML in Google Chrome, report values of aria-placeholder on web, speak with Windows OneCore voice, input with both uncontracted and contracted Braille, support Unicode Braille code and many more. We will have a detailed article about new features and improvements of NVDA 2017.3 when it comes to its final release phase.

Article Section

Get started using a screen reader with the OneDrive app for Windows 10 Part II

By Dang Manh Cuong

Continue with part 1, this part 2 will show you how to share a link of an item and set permission level.

Fixing Issue: Windows 10 apps won’t open

By Le Van Mai

This full article is divided into three posts for each issue. Apps are important part of Windows 10, and some users have reported that Windows 10 apps won’t open on their computer, so today we’ll show you how to fix this problem.

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