The simple fact of being able to customize certain display elements to make a digital tablet more visually appealing could change the everyday life of many iPad owners. And you don’t have to have your FADOQ card in your pocket to benefit from it.
For people who find it difficult to distinguish icons that are too small, type long texts on the screen or simply select the right function, there are simple solutions that are already integrated into the device.
Here are five.
1. Use the “Zoom” magnifying glass.
Although they have been around for almost fifteen years, digital tablets do not yet appear to be fully mastered by application and website creators. Result: On the tablet’s touchscreen we often find symbols that are too small and are intended to be clicked on with the mouse cursor. Since the digital tablet is operated with the fingers, the symbols on the touchscreen must be wider and further apart than on a computer screen.
The same applies to text designed for a website: on the screen of an 8.3-inch iPad mini, the text is suddenly too small to read comfortably.
In both cases, the iPad offers a simple solution: a magnifying glass! This is a content magnification feature that appears in a small rectangular area of the screen that you determine by swiping three fingers across the device.
Where can this function be activated? Go to the Settings menu (the icon of a small wheel) and then the Accessibility menu (a sky blue pictogram with a little white man in a circle). After rendering, activate the “Zoom” function. Then all you have to do is quickly double-tap with three fingers at the same time to activate it. You can move it to where you want it and then turn it off by double-tapping it with three fingers again.
Remember that you can zoom in on a text element simply by spreading two fingers on the screen. And with the “Magnifier” feature, also included in Accessibility, you can turn the iPad camera into a real magnifying glass for external text, such as a newspaper article on paper written in letters that are too small.
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2. Read the text out loud
Not everyone enjoys reading long texts on the screen of a digital tablet. Staring at an iPad’s backlit screen for hours on end isn’t particularly good for your eyes. Due to the brightness, there may also be flickering around the displayed characters, which makes reading difficult over time.
There is another very useful tool for this: reading on the screen, also called “speaking content” or “speaking content” depending on the iPad version (a black symbol with a small comic bubble in the middle, a phylactery).
It is possible that the tablet only reads out manually selected excerpts of the content displayed on the screen, or even the entire content. iPad offers a choice of voices in the language of your choice, allowing you to adjust the speed and even the pronunciation of certain words that the device is not yet familiar with.
There are several third-party apps for reading text on the screen, but most require payment, either after a few paragraphs or after a few minutes of reading. However, the tool included in iPad Settings is free and intended for everyone.
It helps in different situations. For example, if you need to view a multi-page PDF document, this system can read it to you in whole or in part, which is convenient when traveling on public transport.
3. Touch Help
After sight, touch is undoubtedly the second most common sense used by an iPad. Apple has therefore expanded its accessibility features to include numerous settings, which can still be adjusted in the Accessibility menu under the small icon of a white hand in a blue square.
Some people who suffer from hand tremors sometimes have difficulty pressing the right icon quickly and accurately on their tablet screen. If you have to write text using the virtual keyboard, it can be quite a headache.
To make interaction safer, even if the hand shakes, simply adjust the touch adjustment function. This makes it possible, in particular, to set the required contact time with the finger on the screen so that the device recognizes this as a touch command. You can also prevent repeated taps from being interpreted by the device as multiple consecutive commands.
There is also the option to activate the “AssistiveTouch” function. This allows you to use the tablet even if you have difficulty touching the screen or need to use an adaptive accessory. AssistiveTouch lets you activate a menu that appears on the screen when tapped and offers a range of quick actions depending on the context.
4. Megaphone on request
Apple has recently added several accessibility features to its mobile devices, two of which are specifically designed for people who have difficulty expressing themselves orally. For example, a first feature called “Live Speech” allows you to tap text on the tablet screen or virtual keyboard and the system reads that text out loud in the language of your choice.
The second function is called “Personal Voice” and is an addition to “Live Speech”. You must first configure this feature (this takes some time) by reading out 150 sentences generated by the iPad. Once the exercise is complete, the tablet reads the text in the user-created voice.
However, a personalized voice created on an iPad is automatically available for use on another Apple device: it can also be shared with applications that then generate words using that voice.
5. Link to accessibility
You don’t always need to enable these or other features included in the Accessibility menu, such as: B. Tools for describing a video or managing hearing aids.
To make it easier to use, you can tell your iPad to turn it on or off each time you quickly press the power button three times.
For example, you can create accessibility shortcuts for display colors and contrast, for voice reading of on-screen text, or for display tools that enlarge text or other elements on the screen.
A digital tablet is more practical to use than a computer, simply because it is very mobile and light. Customizing the way you interact with it makes it even more versatile, regardless of your age.
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