hadley.edu file · Web viewToday’s seminar topic covers Twitter for Low Vision Users. Now let me welcome today’s presenter, Ian Shadrick. Ian is a full time instructor for Hadley

Transcript: The Hadley School for the Blind – Twitter for Low Vision Users

HadleyThe Hadley School for the Blind – Twitter for Low Vision UsersPresented by Ian ShadrickDate April 29th, 2015

Doug AnzlovarWelcome to Seminars at Hadley. My name is Doug Anzlovar and I am the dean of educational programs and instruction here at the Hadley School. Today’s seminar topic covers Twitter for Low Vision Users. Now let me welcome today’s presenter, Ian Shadrick. Ian is a full time instructor for Hadley and teaches several courses in the area of technology. He is a certified vision rehabilitation therapist and counselor. Welcome, Ian.

Ian Shadrick

Hadley.edu | 800.323.4238 Page 1 of 47

Thank you, Doug. Sorry about that, one second. Hello and welcome to today’s seminar, Twitter for Users with Low Vision. I want to begin by thanking you for joining today’s seminar, taking the time. I want to talk briefly about what it is that we’re going to be going over today outside of what you read in the overall description and kind of what brought you here. We’re going to begin by having a basic overview of what Twitter is and what the basic principles of Twitter are, how it can be used. We’re going to talk about some possible uses that are a little bit beyond what you sometimes hear about.

So we’re going to look at both some personal and professional uses, some of the different considerations for that. Additionally, we’re going to look at some of the basic principles behind signing up for the account. Maybe you’re someone that has not quite gotten to the point of signing up and it’s been of interest but you just weren’t sure where to begin. So we’ll talk about that. And then, additionally, we’re going to look at some of the basic concepts involved with Twitter.


If you want to think of them as almost definitions, we’ll get into some of those so that you really have an understanding of what it is that is really involved within Twitter, when you see or hear certain things or you hear people talk about things, these are the things that will give you a better understanding of what it is as a premise and how it helps you use Twitter and how it helps Twitter run for that matter.

We’re going to talk about some overall privacy considerations, and then we’ll take some questions about, you know, any of those basic principles, anything that we’ve talked about to that extreme, and then from there we’re going to start going into kind of hands on components of using Twitter. So how it is that we not only make some changes and change settings to best suit us as users with low vision, but also how it is that we can go through the sign-up process.

We’ll talk about the overall visual layout and what that looks like. We’ll talk about setup options and some considerations that you can make as a user with low vision specific to Twitter. We’ll then dive into how it is that we create tweets. We’ll talk


about things such as replying to tweets, using favorites, things of that nature. Then I’m going to talk to you about how we would navigate or do searching with Twitter. We’ll look at how we use links within Twitter, the possibility of using pictures and doing twit pics.

And then lastly we’re going to talk about some of the alternatives to Twitter, you know, as a user with low vision. Typically they’re thought about for those who may use a screenreader, but we’ll definitely talk about some possibilities or some alternatives, in addition to those main considerations from today.

Okay, so, as I said, today’s intention is really to look at how it is that we use Twitter as a user with low vision, what are some of the overall considerations, how can you use it more effectively using a screen magnifier. The overall premise for today, we’ll be talking about magnification in general. However, please note that today’s seminar will have a primary focus on the mobile use of Twitter, and within that, utilizing the IOS or Apple-based operating system. So we will be


primarily talking about zoom when we discuss screen magnifiers.

I’ll briefly give an overview of use of a desktop variation. So in this case, using zoom text for instance with the Twitter website. But overall primarily when we’re discussing kind of layout and the way to navigate, what we’re – we will be referring to by example will be the IOS system, so please keep that in mind.

So what is Twitter exactly? Twitter is what we would consider a micro blog in its true definition, and Twitter is really intended to be fast paced, quick message, fast response, in and out kind of interaction within social media. It is a form of social media, as you hopefully know, and the piece with Twitter that’s interesting and that can be challenging and keep things fresh all at the same time for some folks is that you do have limitations to how and what you post to some degree, and we’ll talk about those in just a moment in more specifics. But it does allow for some creativity at times.


Twitter is really intended as a form of social media to really get messages out very quickly, get responses back in a quick fashion. Sometimes that’s shooting someone to another link, maybe a picture, you know, shorthand messages, all of those kinds of things. It’s really intended to be a very quick response, quick messaging type of setup. So in many cases, waiting for longer emails or long responses that you might find on other forms of social media, even can be things that are past to some degree when you’re using Twitter.

Okay, so I want to briefly touch on some of the basic uses of Twitter, some of the possibilities, and within that some of the considerations as well. So I mentioned before that there are some considerations that can be a little bit challenging but also keep things somewhat interesting, and have a little bit of a frustration level for some people when you first get started, and one of those is primarily the character count for Twitter. And what I mean by that is you are limited to 140 characters when you are sending a message.

So by doing that, any of your punctuation, your spaces, all of those kinds of things count within


your character count. So punctuation is a big one, as well as ways to potentially shorten words. Other times you’ll see words combined or find ways to shorten words as a way to get around that character count. So again, just something to keep in mind as you’re moving through the process, and something to consider.

As far as overall uses of Twitter, typically what we’re often seeing is what we would consider a personal use, and that could be anything from the individuals who might be what we might consider a power user of Twitter, and by that I mean using it constantly. You know, anything from tweeting out what it is that they’re having at a new restaurant to their opinion of the day, to a story that they’ve read, any of those kinds of things. It could be, you know, if it’s a personal account, it’s really anything that you want to put out there on Twitter, for the most part you’re able to do, within the realm of the character count and maybe having to get a little creative as to how you post something. But the material as to what you post is really up to your personal opinion and personal usage.


So what we are starting to see more and more increase of is the professional use of Twitter. You’re seeing on most websites on your – if it’s a business or an organization that there’s going to be a link of there that says follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, those kinds of things. And in the case of Twitter, when you click on that what it will do is it will draw you directly to their Twitter account for that business. You’re going to see the information that they post, and it’s a good way to keep up with – especially if it’s a local or regional business, or someone that you particularly are a fan of as a consumer.

Additionally, it’s a really good way for businesses to get information out. So it might be today we’re running this sale, or click here for this coupon, or it directs you back to their website if it’s just their link. Could be any number of ways to actually utilize it. But there are some really good ways for businesses to be able to do that. Additionally, one of the ways that hopefully we start to see a little increase in, and maybe a new way of thinking of this in terms of professionally, or from a business perspective, becomes if you are an individual who runs your own small business or you are someone


who maybe runs a BUP operation, it’s a good potentially to get information out.

So let’s say you run a cafeteria, you could post on Twitter as an example and say, you know, today’s special, and you could list that out in as many characters as possible within the character limit. You could post a link to today’s new menu item. You could post a picture. Any of those kind of things as ways to kind of draw business in. So there are some really good ways to kind of think about it, not only from a personal perspective but also professional. In my case, just as kind of a caveat to kind of how I use Twitter, personally I do have a Twitter account, I use it fairly regularly, but many times what I’m doing is I’m using it as a way to follow things that are of professional interest to me in addition to my personal interests.

So with my particular account, so I have local and regional things that I follow in terms of items of interest particularly in the news, things like that. You know, sports teams that I’m interested in, things of that nature. But I’m also using it largely as a way to keep up with professional situations. So things within the disability realm, whether that be


national policy, whether that be access technology, you know, blindness specific issues. Whatever the case may be it’s a way for me to follow and like those tweets and those account holders in particular, in order to keep up with things that I might otherwise have difficulty being able to do.

So for me I use it really two-fold. You know, I do post some personal things, although honestly, it’s somewhat limited. Most of what I’m doing is that I’m keeping up with things that are of professional interest to me, even though it’s my personal account. Additionally, I actually manage a current Twitter account for a professional organization that I run. So it’s another way to use it professionally, and we’ll talk about some of the parameters behind having multiple accounts. But it is possible to do that. So as I said, I use it in kind of a variance of ways, but really a mixed bag between personal and professional, and sometimes overlapping of the two.

So one of the things that’s important with this is it’s nice to be able to look at information for those that have put out something that is of interest to you. Whether that’s one particular story, whether


that’s a number of things. So it could be that maybe you are following someone and you choose to unfollow them, and that’s perfectly fine, you can do that. You know, maybe it’s only a few things that are of interest to you that they’ve posted, or you think they’re going to be more interesting than what they end up posting, things of that nature. You know, it’s perfectly fine to follow and then choose to unfollow, that’s your choice.

But as a way to really be up on what it is that someone, whether it’s personal or an organization or a business is doing, you would want to follow them. Okay, the other overall consideration when you’re going through the sign-up process, and we’ll get into after we take a few questions, we’ll get into some of the specifics about what it is that the sign-up page looks like. But the primary consideration in doing so is going to be what your handle choice is, and it may be easier for some of you to think of your handle as your user ID, or the ID that everyone sees you as, your account name.

In either case, Twitter considers it a handle. However, it could be any number of ways that you’re representing that. So in my case it’s @ I


Shadrick, so it’s my first initial and my first name, and then my last name as my Twitter handle. Okay, so it all – you know, it’s up for personal preference to a large degree on what that choice is. So long as it’s something that hasn’t been taken, okay? So you know, if you’re typing in something and let’s say you have a more common last name, it may be that you have to get a little creative as to what that choice is going to be or what that’s going to look like for you.

As an example for Hadley, our Twitter account for the school is @TheHadleySchool, all one word. So again, there’s a number of ways you can get creative as to what that handle is going to look like. You do have currently a 15 character limit, so keep that in mind. But the thing to keep in mind with that is as Twitter evolves that may change over time too, it’s just something to keep in mind as applications change. But currently the handle that you choose is going to be the thing that when you send out a tweet that’s going to be what people see. So they’re going to see @ and then whatever your handle is, and then the proceeding message, okay?


So as you’re signing up, keep that in mind as you think about what it is that want your handle to be and how you get creative with using that. Okay, I wanted to briefly get into some of the overall concepts, or as I said before, almost definitions, if you want to think of them that way, to what Twitter is and how Twitter works. The first of those, I did mention before, the character count. So just keep that in mind as you’re getting into Twitter. Maybe you’re new to Twitter, you’ve signed up for an account before but you’re not sure about how to best go about using it.

So the character count does come into play for sure. For almost all of this, you know, I’ve had several messages where I go to post something and I realize that I can’t post because I’ve got too many characters. Twitter will tell you both visually or if you were using identification and speech, it will tell you that you have too many characters, and it won’t send your message. So keep that in mind. Okay, the @ sign gets used in a couple perspectives. So the @ sign is what you’re going to use before the handle.


So as an example, if you were going to send a message directly to someone, and that’s the intention behind the @, is that so if I were sending a message to our Hadley account I would say @TheHadleySchool, and then I can type message. Okay, if I were sending a message that is not directly intended to someone, or it’s just a personal message or my own opinion, things of that nature, I may not use any direct handle or any @ sign. The intention there being that you’re sending that directly to someone, and in the case of this typically you’re going to want to know their handle. It makes things easier so you don’t have to do too much searching as to who it is that you’re sending that message to. So you’ll see the @ sign used in that perspective.

Okay, sometimes you will see it as a form of short form. So you know, you could slip in a message by itself, it might be used in that regard. But typically within Twitter it’s intended to then be followed by a handle, and then you’re sending that message directly to someone. Okay, the hash tag, or what you might consider the pound sign visually, as though you were on a phone for instance, that is going to be your identifier for some type of


message or phrase or word. It could be a name. Any of those things, and it’s really intended to be the thing that’s going to be the attention grabber.

So as an example, an item that you’re going to hear a lot over the next 18 months are elections. So your hash tag might be hash tag elections, or hash tag and whatever party member that you’re discussing. Or hash tag vote. Any of those kinds of things are going to be hash tags that you’re going to see probably over the next 18 months or so. So the idea with the hash tag is that you’re really trying to draw someone’s attention to a particular topic or idea. You’re carrying forward something that you want attention to.

Along those same lines, another thing that you’re going to see both on the page but you’re also hearing a lot about and you will continue to hear about is the word trending, and what we mean by trending is a couple of things. Trending is essentially whatever it is that’s hot, what’s being talked about most, where is most of the attention going. So there’s a couple of ways that that can happen. That can happen simply based on the number of hash tags that a particular topic gets. It


can happen based on the number of times a particular individual or hash tag is mentioned, as in a direct tweet, or a repost or a retweet, okay? All of those kind of elements lead to an item then trending, and becoming a popular topic essentially.

Okay, one note again with hash tags, many times you will see them as combined words. So again, a number of words together kind of creating one long phrase. You could see it as a simple one word. So just keep that in mind, hash tags can present in a number of ways. There’s no real parameter there, but typically they are run together, if it’s multiple words, typically lowercase.

Okay, before we get into any questions about some of the overall concepts that we talked about here, I did want to briefly mention as far as privacy is considered. Typically you do want to make note that your tweets are considered public by default. There are settings that you can change to delineate how someone sees your tweets and what it is that they see. But without doing that, typically those things are going to be public, okay? So they can see the tweets that you would put out, again, unless you make those setting changes. Within


settings there are ways to set it up for instance so that someone has to follow you in order to be able to see your tweets and/or you have to approve the follower. So there’s ways to do that, but just keep in mind that if you don’t, those are public, okay?

I’d like to take a moment now to answer any questions that anyone may have about any of the overall concepts that we’ve talked about thus far.

Doug AnzlovarThanks, Ian. This is your moderator, Doug. There’s a question in the text chat. Do you have to have separate email accounts for each Twitter handle?

Ian ShadrickYeah, that’s actually a good question and I’ve not signed up for multiple accounts under the same email. I have done multiple accounts, both personal and professional, but they’ve been under separate emails. I would think so long as your handle is separate it might be possible, but that wouldn’t be something to quote me on.


Doug AnzlovarAre there any other questions for Ian from the participants before we press forward?

Audience Member #1I have a question. In concept I would then – from understanding, the hash tag and the @ sign could be commonly used for the same purpose, like if you have a company you want to identify. Is that a true understanding?

Ian ShadrickIt could be. Typically the @ sign in that instance would be used if you’re directing the tweet both to that company and then maybe a hash tag about the company. In the instance of just drawing attention to a company, you might typically use a hash tag in place of the @ sign. But again, if you’re wanting to include that company, or organization, you might use the @ in place of it. So it could kind of go either way.

Doug Anzlovar


Ian, this is Doug again, your moderator. So if I’m new to Twitter myself, so I’m going to ask this question, say you were sending a tweet to me, you would do @DAnzlovar. That’s – I think that’s my Twitter handle, and then you would type in your message, is that correct? And then that tweet would come directly to me?

Ian ShadrickCorrect. So it will post on my timeline for instance as though I’ve put it out there. But the message itself goes directly to you with that @ sign being attached to it.

Doug AnzlovarAnd just a follow up question, with that message coming to me then, anyone following me, will they also see that message? Or is that where I would need to go into my settings and do some – set some privacy restrictions?

Ian ShadrickThey would see it on your timeline but they wouldn’t necessarily get it as a direct message.


Whereas in your case it would show up in your feed directly and shoot you a notification. I will talk briefly about direct messaging here in a few moments as well, which is really a personal messaging, almost like an instant messenger concept as well. So that’s another option if you choose to leave things more public but yet want to send personal messages, you know, between one person and another.

Doug AnzlovarThanks, Ian. Any other questions from our audience before Ian moves forward? Okay, Ian, why don’t you go ahead and continue.

Ian ShadrickOkay. I’d like to begin now by discussing just a brief overview or review of what we consider the zoom functions, or use of zoom within IOS. And please keep in mind we are using the very latest version of IOS, so IOS 8.3 for today’s example. And also we are using the latest version of the Twitter app. So again, I’m not going to go into great detail, but I do want to give you a basic review or overview if you’re not familiar with the zoom


features and how to do that. You know, it does take some practice, so please keep that in mind. But again, just a basic overview.

If you were to go into general on your IOS device, and then go into accessibility, the first item that you’re going to notice under accessibility is going to be voiceover, the second will then be zoom. You can use both at the same time, but typically you’re going to use one or the other. So we’ll focus today on zoom as I said, and zoom, the big thing to keep in mind is it does magnify the entire screen, so keep that in mind.

So as far as basic navigation goes with zoom, you’re going to double tap with three fingers so you actually zoom in. You would then drag with three fingers to move around the screen. So you’re going to do that with a three finger motion. Okay, if you double tap with those three fingers you can then drag to change the zoom. So if you double tap and hold or drag, you can change your zoom magnification level. So keep that in mind.


A couple of other options that you have under zoom, you can follow the focus. So for instance, if you’re typing it’s going to follow your cursor. You can zoom the keyboard. Again, these are personal preferences but please keep that in mind. A couple of other things, you can show the controller. The controller is simply like if you were using the zoom text for example, the user interface box would make all of your settings changes. This is essentially the same idea. But you can either show that or hide that, and then the zoom region, you can actually choose whether you want that to be a window or full screen.

Typically a lot of people are using that as full screen, but again, that’s something for you to play around with and decide what you like. And lastly at the bottom of that page, you get into maximum zoom level, and that does go up to a possibility of zooming up to 15X. Now, again, that’s completely personal preference on where you want that to zoom in at. It is a slider you can change all of those settings. So just keep that in mind.

In terms of low vision, a couple of other things that you might find helpful, and again, this is up for


your own personal looking into, but you can invert your colors, you can also do grayscale, so kind of the reverse of that. Or you can do larger text, okay? There’s also bold text options. We won’t get into all of those but suffice it to say, it is something that you do want to look into as far as your own IOS use and determine what it is that’s going to work best for you. We’re focusing today primarily on as I said, the magnification itself. So be sure to look into that and check into what’s going to work best for you.

Okay, the one thing to keep in mind with any app that you are using is you really want to keep in mind that things can change over time. So as the IOS updates in this instance, or in the case of Twitter, you know, if there’s a specific app change or an app update, you know, many times that’s for the better, occasionally it’s not. Okay, so just keep that in mind, so what we’re reviewing today is as of today’s version. So just keep that in mind as we go, you know, it’s something that could change over time. Typically that’s more for non-visual use, but sometimes even for visual use, there are some changes that make it difficult for a low vision standpoint, so just keep that in mind.


Okay, I wanted to move now to the overall setup and sign-up of your Twitter account. So as I said, you could be someone who maybe you’re overall, you’re a little bit familiar with Twitter, but you haven’t quite signed up and you’re just unsure as to exactly the best way to go about that. You do have a couple of ways to do that, and we’ll talk today about one in particular, I’ll briefly run through the other options. But what we’re using today is actually going to be an example of the mobile version of the Twitter website, and I’m doing that for a couple of reasons.

Typically when someone is using Twitter they’re doing so from a mobile platform. So it may not be an IOS device, it may be a Windows phone, it may be an Android phone, it may be an iPad or some other tablet. But typically they’re going to use it from a mobile version. We will talk briefly about desktop use towards the end, but they may be signing up for an account for instance, but maybe they haven’t downloaded the app just yet, okay?


So what you find when you go to a mobile site of Twitter, so mobile.Twitter.com is what we’re using today, and that is exactly the same information that you would find whether you were on Twitter.com from a web-based machine, or a PC, you know, Mac, whatever you’re using, or if you were to go and download the app and sign up directly from there. The information that you’re actually inputting is going to be the same. So again, that’s why I’m choosing the mobile site as an example, to walk you through.

So in setting up your device, what you’re going – and your account – what you’re first going to encounter when you go to the mobile.Twitter.com is going to be, ‘Hello, welcome to Twitter.’ And what you get is a picture on the screen, and there’s a couple of images that change over time. There’s two buttons at the very bottom of your screen. So if you’re zoomed in you’re going to probably want to scroll down to the bottom of that screen depending on how far you’re zoomed in, and the two buttons, one on the left, one on the right, and the one on the left is actually going to be your sign-up button. The one on the right would be your log-in.


So if for some reason you were using this site later, rather than using the app you would go with the button on the right after you’ve signed up, okay? But now we’re going to go with the sign-up button. So if we tap on that we’re going to get a screen that says – has the Twitter logo and then says sign-up, and directly below that are going to be some form fields that you can fill in. So again, if you’re using voiceover hand zoom, voiceover will read you these. If you’re just using zoom, they’re very straight forward, very nice, clean layout. The first is going to be your full name, and the thing to keep in mind with your full name, you can enter that however you like.

However, the thing to keep in mind is when someone goes to your page and let’s say they click on your handle, they’re then taken to your account page, and what they see on that account page is going to be your full name. So however you enter it here is going to be what shows up on the page. So just keep that in mind. Some people may not use their legal full name and use some variation. They may use something altogether different. So again, that’s up to you on how you want to do that.


Okay, the next item that you’re going to find is going to be your phone number or email. Again, personal preference on which one you choose to use. It really impacts more specifically how it is that you could share information. Typically for me I use email, simply because when I get alerts that are outside of Twitter, so if I get for instance let’s say someone followed me, you know, if I don’t have Twitter turned on, it will send it to my email rather than texting me, okay? So again, that’s really the biggest different there.

Okay, the third field down is going to be your handle or username. Okay, so it’ll say apps and then username in the background. So that’s where you’re going to be selecting your username. Again, keep in mind you do have currently a 15 character limit, so as you do that you may have to get a little creative. Additionally, it is going to tell you if it’s something that’s been selected already. Now, if you’re using voiceover and zoom, again, you may not notice that until you move to the next field. If you’re using just the zoom, you’re going to see that in red and it will tell you that that name has been selected. So it’s going to either give you


suggestions or give you – make you go back essentially and change that.

Okay, the last item is going to be your password. Again, preference obviously varies, but just keep in mind you want it to be something that’s secure. Okay, the last thing that you see before you hit the sign-up box is actually going to be a check box that says tailor Twitter based on my recent web visits, and then they do a little link there to learn more. Essentially the idea there being that if you click on that it’s going to use kind of some market research to give you an idea of who to follow, or what it is that may interest you based on your web visits. So again, preference on whether you choose to use that feature or not.

And then lastly you’re going to find your sign-up button. So when you hit that button, and let’s assume that everything previous to that has been accepted, so your username’s okay, your password’s good, all of that. You’re going to be presented with two screens that follow. One is going to be a screen that asks you on this next page who is it that you would like to follow, based on your contacts, or based on the things you know.


It is pulling that information typically from email or other social media things that you may have posted, things like that.

So again, you could go through that page, it’s just a list of individuals that you would most likely know, choose whether or not you want to follow them. If so, you would click on their name, it’ll put a check mark next to them. Or you could skip that page altogether. Okay, when you proceed past that page, whether you’ve used the features or whether you’ve skipped them, your next option is going to be essentially the same type of list, but it’s going to be more about your interests. So things that interest you, it’s going to give you a rundown list of variations on what may interest you in terms of what to follow or who to follow, in terms of organizations, businesses, you know, sports, news, all of those kinds of things.

Again, you could skip that page if you chose not to utilize it, or you could go through that page. Once you go through that page you’re then going to brought to your main Twitter account, okay? So just as though you had signed up from a typical site, okay?


So I want to talk briefly about what the visual layout looks like. Again, we’re doing this example from the mobile version, however, I will give you kind of a visual layout for the desktop version as well. Okay, when you first land on your Twitter account once you’ve signed in, the first thing that you’re going to notice at the top of the page in the very center you’re going to see the word home. From there you’re going to see to the left of that a little box with a person, and that’s your find people button. Okay, that button is kind of two-fold, visually. If we were to click on that button your heading will change to find people.

To the right of that you’ve got your search and your create tweet. Those two options typically stay right there, your search and your find tweet. So just keep that in mind as we move forward. Just below that you’ve got tailored and then popular, so two different tabs that you could hit on. Okay, if we go to tailored, that’s going to be essentially following businesses, people, organizations, etc, based on what you may have already signed up for, or may already follow. When you first sign up


that may be pretty limited, so keep that in mind, okay?

In my case I get a lot of things about employment, I get a lot of things about blindness, you know, disability – all different individual or organizations based on the types of activity that I’m already doing. Okay, if I go to popular on the other hand, that’s going to be different categories of items. So as an example, sports, music, photography, Twitter, entertainment, news, etc, okay? You get a list of finding people based on a category, okay, under popular.

So that’s the find people button. There is also a search option, so if you were to go to the find people, and you go just to the right of the word follow people, you’re going to have a search bar that comes up, and if you click in that, that’s the same as using any other search bar. Your keyboard is going to pop up and it’s going to give you the option to type in a name or a phrase, and it will do a search for you.


Okay, if we go back to the homepage and any time that you’re on a page, just keep in mind visually what you’re going to find to the left side of your screen at the top will be a back arrow. So that will be a way that you can jump back to whatever previous page that you are on, okay. Again, if we look at the top of the home screen, just to the right of home you’re going to find a search bar again. That search bar, again, is going to be there throughout. To the very right is going to be your create tweet, okay?

Just below all of that is going to be what’s called your feed or your timeline, and in the case of this, essentially what that is is a running list of all of the tweets from individuals who you follow or are of interest to you. So again, when you first start out, that can be a little bit limited. It’ll be things that are more popular or maybe things that are trending, rather than things you may follow. Okay, below this and below – directly below your timeline at the very bottom of your page, so again, you may want to zoom in and scroll down to the bottom of the page, you’re going to be presented with four different options.


So if we go from left to right, the first is going to be your home. So that’s where we are now. The next will be notifications. We’ll talk briefly about those in just a moment. The third or next one over will be your messages, and lastly is the me button. So if we go to the me button or the far right button, I’d like to briefly discuss this. This is your actual account page. So previously when I mentioned someone clicking on your username, that’s going to be what they see. So in the case of my account, you can see a photo of me, my name and my username below that.

To the right of that information you’re going to find a couple of options. The first is going to be a gear, and that little visual gear that is there is going to be an option that pulls up some settings. Okay, you get a list that will pull up and that list [Inaudible: 37:43] settings, then lists, then help, sign up and cancel. And again, that order will remain the same. For the purposes of this, we want to click on settings, and within settings this is going to be where you get information about a couple of the accessibility things that you can tweak directly within Twitter.


So the first thing that you’re going to see on this list under settings is accounts. So if you only have one account, you would just see the one. Again, if you have multiple, it’s going to show all of them. The next thing you’re going to see is general. Most of that is going to be pretty straight forward, so badge app, sound effects, whether you want those on or off, image previews on or off.

The next thing that’s there is text size. So it does open up, if you click on that it gives you an option to have a slider, and it gives you a visual display of a sample text. And then as you slide to the right it will change the size of that text. Now, keep in mind two things. First of all, if you’re using that without any type of magnification, for most of us with low vision, typically that’s not going to be quite large enough to really use it real functionally. You know, you may be someone who that works for you, and that’s great. If however you’re using some type of zoom, it may be that you need to back that off. Okay, so keep that in mind, depending on where your zoom is set is going to play a role in how that looks for you.


So from a low vision standpoint, under accessibility, that’s going to be your main thing that’s listed there for settings. You do have options below that, specific to accessibility, but they’re primarily if you’re getting into using it with voiceover. So I would suggest taking a look at those if that’s something of interest to you.

Okay, if we go back to the me page where we first got to settings, that’s also going to be where you can edit your profile. Okay, so you do see an option to the far right, edit profile. Below that you’re going to see how many followers that you have. So those are going to be listed to the right, and then to the left of that will be how many people you are following. So as those numbers grow or change, you’ll see those reflected there. Okay, directly below that is going to be a couple of tabs. The first will be tweets. Those are tweets that you send out directly. Then media. So if you’ve posted any images or video, typically those are going to be pictures. And then lastly, favorites. Okay, so if you’ve favorited anything, those are going to show up there.


Okay, we’re going to jump now to the couple of tabs at the very bottom of the page. The first is notifications. And notifications is very simplistic. It’s simply information that you are directly included in. So if someone tweets you directly or they mention you in a tweet, that’s going to show up in your notifications, okay? That’s essentially all that that information is.

The next option, or the third tab over the bottom is going to be your messages. And messages are a way to send messages directly to an individual, or an organization. I’ve used it particularly – pretty well for things like customer service, if I’m having an issue with certain things that are going on. The thing to know about messages is the individual that you’re wanting to message has to be following you as well. So sometimes you’ll see information about follow us so we can DM, or direct message. That’s what they’re referring to when they say that.

Okay, so what we want to do now is jump into how it is that we create a tweet, how do we reply, and how do we favorite a tweet. The next way to do that, as we get into that, keep in mind that again, that create tweet option is going to always be in


the upper right hand corner. So if you scroll up to that part of the page. If you click on that what you’re going to get is a picture of yourself, if you’ve put that in, if not it’s going to be a picture of an egg. So that’s the tweet standard image. Your name and your username, below that what you’re going to see is what’s happened, okay? And it’s in a little watermark.

If I click on that, that will pull up my keyboard. From there I can type my message, say what I want to say. A couple of things to remember, just to the right of your spacebar, if you’re using an IOS device, you’re going to find the @ sign. So it’s a quick way to insert an @, and just to the right of that will be your hash tag, okay? Keep in mind if you’re using a typical qwerty keyboard, the layout will be different, but those are two keys that you want to keep in mind.

Above your keyboard you’re going to find a couple of options. One will be your location. So it allows Twitter to input your location, okay? Again, personal preference if you want to do that. The middle option at the top of your keyboard will be your pictures. So that’s a way to actually tweet


pictures or do what we call twit pics. Basically it will pull up your camera roll if you’re using an IOS device, where you could insert an image. Which does not play against your character count, keep that in mind. Okay, and then the last is going to be any drafts that you have. So if you click on that last tab above your keyboard it’ll show you drafts that you may have.

Okay, as you’re typing your Twitter message – your tweet, I’m sorry, what you’re going to find is as you’re typing the message at the very top of your page, the far left is going to be an X so you can cancel out. To the right, just to the left of the word tweet, which is on the far right, you’re going to find your character count. As you go into getting close to your 140 characters, it’s going to, you know, as you type a character in will show that. If you go over it’ll show those characters in red, and show a negative, or not. So if you keep that in mind.

And then lastly, your option to tweet, and to actually just send the message is going to be again, in that upper right hand corner. So in the same location that your create tweet is if you’re not actually in the message. So if I were to want to


send a message, I would hit tweet in the upper right hand corner. Okay, so now we’re going to cancel out. We’re going to briefly discuss how to favorite and how to reply. So as an example, if I go to notifications that’s going to be an easy way to reply to a tweet if it’s directly to me. So at that point if I pull up a tweet that has my name in it, so I just tap on it, I get a couple of options.

At the very bottom of the message that someone sends me, I get – the first option is going to be reply. The second will be – what visually looks like arrows going up and down, that’s going to be retweet. So you’re basically – when you retweet something, if you click on it you get a couple of options. You get the option to retweet or to quote the tweet. You can do either. Or lastly, there’s a cancel option. The third tab over’s going to be your favorite. So when you click on something it simply adds it to your favorites, if it’s something of interest to you.

And then you get an option for more. Within more you can share it through a direct message, you can send it via mail, you can copy a link. You can mute someone, block them or record an issue. If I want


to simply reply to a tweet however, that first tab when I tap on that will be reply, and what that does is anyone who’s included in that message directly, so in this case it’s a message that the Hadley account included me in, and then directly back to someone. So as a result, when I hit reply I’m actually going to have their message – their usernames included, and then I can type in my message. Now, the thing to keep in mind is when you reply and you have usernames included, they do go against your character count. So again, keep that in mind.

We talked briefly about how to include pictures. Again, you’re going to have an option directly on the sensor above your keyboard. It will pull up your camera roll and show you how – excuse me, it will pull up the camera roll and you can then click on that picture that you want to include, and it will include it inside your tweet, okay?

If we’re wanting to do links, there’s a couple of options. You can – if it’s a link directly from Twitter, you can hold and wait for your copy and paste to come up, you know, so you have list to do that. You could then paste it directly into your tweet. Now,


again, keep in mind, that’s going to go against your character count. The other option is if you’re tweeting a link directly from something else, two options there, one, you sometimes see a list that will say tweet and it’ll pull it up directly in a tweet for you. Alternatively, you could simply copy and paste that link into a Twitter message.

So both of those are good ways to really get your tweet involved there, and make sure that that link is – how you want it to be is just, as I said, you want to make sure that you’re watching that character count. So you might have to get a little creative about the rest of your message or maybe something like check this out, or whatever the case may be.

Okay, lastly I wanted to briefly touch on a couple of alternatives to Twitter. And also briefly go over what it is that the PC or computer-based site for Twitter is going to look like. A slight variation there, if we were to go to Twitter.com on a computer, your overall layout is going to be very similar. You know, start off by seeing the image of your account on the left side of the page. You’re going to then


see how many tweets you have, how many people are following you and how many followers.

Okay, directly below that you’re actually going to find your trending information, and then if we move slightly to the right, so taking up the majority of this side of the screen is going to be your actual Twitter feed of information. And then on the far right is going to be information about who to follow. So in other words, suggestions on who to follow, okay?

If we go to the very top of the page, that’s where you’re going to be finding your tabs. So your home tab is going to be at the top left, followed by notifications, then messages. So rather than those being at the very bottom of the page, they get moved up to the top. Okay, and then on the far right you’re going to find an option for search Twitter, and if we go just further to the right, that’s going to be again, where your tweet option is. So that piece again kind of remains the same. Again, overall usage is very similar to the mobile version, it’s just that the layout is slightly different because it can be expanded a little bit.


Okay, so that’s the biggest difference in layout between mobile and web-based of some variety, is that it’s going to be more expanded. Okay, so as far as alternatives go, I’ll briefly touch on a couple of those, and please keep in mind that we know that there are a plethora of options out there, or alternatives to Twitter, or what we might consider Twitter clients. But we’re mainly wanting to just touch on a couple of options for those.

And for someone who is going to use a computer-based account, or intend to use it that way, Chicken Nugget is one alternative to that. So it’s a piece of software you can download and does allow for some more accessible use. It’s a cleaner image, it’s also very good for screen reading. Okay, so if you’re someone who again is using both magnification and screenreader, it might be a consideration for you.

Okay, as I said, there are a number of apps as well that are what we call Twitter clients, and in other words, in these instances what you’re doing is you’re using your Twitter account, but you’re using


it through an alternative pathway to get your information. Okay, one of those that is intended primarily as a voiceover consideration but is very low vision friendly, is what we call Twitterific (sic). All one word. It is nice because what it does is it really cleans up the overall image so that what you see at the top of the page is going to be your primary information, so your home button, your notifications again, your direct messages, and then your create tweet option.

However, the difference being the information that’s additionally displayed, because directly below all of this is going to be your feed. If you click on the image for your account however, you get a side bar to the left, and that side bar is not only visually clear but works well with a screenreader if you’re using both, as I said. So that’s where you’re going to get [Inaudible: 49:19] information, like your mentions, your favorites, being able to do searches, things of that nature, some of the advanced features of the app.

But essentially what that does is it takes out some of the extemporaneous visual layout. You can still see images on the screen, so it’s still low vision


clearly by having pictures, but it does take out some of the extra images for the layout.

So at this point I’d like to open it up to any questions that anyone has about anything discussed to this point.

Doug AnzlovarWell, actually I know that we’ve moved through things pretty quickly today, but I did want to point out that we do have a course that’s coming up on using social media, and it does go into Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. So be watching for that over the summer and we can follow up with additional details. So again, I’d like to open things up to any questions.

Does anyone have questions for Ian before we bring today’s seminar to a close? Okay, well, thanks to all of you for participating in today’s seminar, and Ian thanks to you for presenting. This seminar like all seminars at Hadley will be archived on our website and available 24-7. We will – and again, our website is www.Hadley.edu, and you can find this archive seminar under the past seminars


http://www.Hadley.edu/

link. Information on podcasts and how to set up podcast notifications is also available by going to the past seminars page.

Okay, and the social media course that Ian mentioned, we’re hoping to have it out by the end of June or early July this summer. Thank you again for participating today, we do value your feedback. Please let us know what your thoughts of the seminar were and you are also welcome to suggest future seminar topics by sending an email to [email protected]. I’m going to hand the microphone back over to Ian for some closing comments and then I will work to launch the seminar survey. So if everyone could just standby for just a few more minutes.

Ian Shadrick I would just like to thank everyone for participating in today’s seminar, and to encourage you to look into the social media course if that’s something that interests you and in learning more about any of the three areas. And then also just to encourage you to get out there and try using Twitter. You know, there’s not too many things that can go


mailto:[email protected]

wrong with it as long as you have a basic understanding, and hopefully that’s what we provided you with today. So again, thank you for joining us.


Documents

hadley.edu file · Web viewToday’s seminar topic covers Twitter for Low Vision Users. Now let me welcome today’s presenter, Ian Shadrick. Ian is a full time instructor for Hadley