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Introduction.

Readers to my very occasional series of blog posts will note that, some time ago, I purchased a notetaker principally for reading documents I had prepared on the PC which I wanted to read in a portable way, sometimes to undertake audio production tasks. I also needed a product to use when out on the road so as to take notes of assessments I conduct for clients. Notetakers do much more than give you the ability to take notes these days as we will soon discover.

Introduction.

In late February of this year, RNIB, (one of the prominent organisations for blind people in the UK), reached a significant milestone. They began offering a service of making available their vast collection of DAISY books for download.

Up to this point, books were provided either online using the Overdrive platform (in lower quality MP3 format), or in DAISY format on CD, the latter service being in place for many years. DAISY not only offers a higher standard of audio reproduction but in addition allows a user to navigate through the book more easily.

I love these cosy late Autumn days when it's cold outside and toasty warm inside. Just after Halloween and before the Christmas rush really starts, my mood is reflective and nostalgic. I seem to have time to think about all kinds of things and remember lots of silly little things I never remember the rest of the year.

I count myself very blessed these days in my friends. I have a tight little circle of close ones, and a wide, looser web of people I know from social media who put up with my stream of ramblings, reactionary rantings, witlessness and what passes for pink bear wisdom with varying digrees of equanimity. There are three things I think have to go into any kind of real friendship. Loyalty, that's a given. Any digree of two facedness or back biting, not standing up when the chips are down and there are no second chances.

Introduction.

Thank you for reading my previous post on the use of my Pixel 4 phone on the Android platform. I am now just entering day seven of use.

Last time, I made the point that as soon as resources are written about this kind of technology, they are very soon out of date, and so it proved with the last blog post. Within a matter of hours after I published it, I began to receive suggestions as to how some of the difficulties I wrote about could be solved.

Introduction.

It's no secret that the latest release of the I O S operating system contains quite a number of problems. These are by no means limited to the accessibility arena, but also affect mainstream customers as well. This is further evidenced by a number of updates being released within a short time-frame.

This blog post was updated on 10 July 2019.

One of the aspects of Microsoft Outlook I've benefited from for many years is the calendar. As a busy professional, it allows me to keep track of a hectic diary every week, and I know all my meetings are beautifully organised.

Moreover, as many people will know, I train people how to use the JAWS screen-reader in conjunction with computing applications. Most of that training is conducted in the workplace throughout the UK.

There are times when I get the urge to forsake adult books and jump back into the literature I loved as a child. It's like climbing up the magic Faraway tree into another land, a land where there are no murders, no love triangles that go on infuriatingly for three hundred pages, no distopias, no zombie apocalypses, no dark, bleak fantasies, no novels about glamorous, powerful women or unhappy, unfulfilled ones that get their revenge or go missing or watch someone from a train.