How to Tell a Driver You are Blind
Ridesharing companies like Lyft and Uber have a problem. Many times, a blind passenger needs to tell their driver that they cannot see, but the driver does n...
accessibility
OnePlus Phones get a OneMinus for Accessibility
The time has come to upgrade my Android phone. Two and a half years ago I got an Essential Phone. I enjoyed the stock Android experience, but the company wen...
Technical.ly Philly Profile
Technical.ly Philly published a wonderful profile about me as part of their series about accessibility. The article pretty much speaks for itself. My eyes hu...
A Thanksgiving Gift from Apple
It has taken over three years, but my first app Eyes-Free Fitness has gone live in the app store! I wrote it in RubyMotion. The project involves a team of pe...
BarCamp 10
It all begins at BarCamp! I gave my first speech at the unconference in 2012 and just gave another at the tenth anniversary of this defining event.
Back to my Open Source Roots
So much has happened, I hardly know where to begin. I haven’t written any articles in a while and have pretty much stayed off social media, except for an occ...
TechGirlz!
This week I volunteered to help teach a class about web accessibility for TechGirlz. This amazing nonprofit organization offers free workshops to help girls ...
The Accessible World and Beyond
I’ve had an amazing few weeks! At the end of April I gave the technology track keynote speech at the Accessible World, a conference about accessibility which...
The Apple Fancast
I just took part in an email interview with the Apple Fancast for their segment the Rounded Rectangle. They asked me a series of questions. They did the same...
I Love my Apple Watch
I finally got around to writing my review of the Apple Watch and its accessibility features. When I first got it, I deliberately held off, figuring that anyo...
EvoHaX and the Accessibility MacGuffin
A few weeks ago I participated in EvoHaX, an accessibility hackathon which happened as part of Philly Tech Week. Ather Sharif of EvoX Labs did a wonderful jo...
RubyMotion, the Apple Watch, and Accessibility
Check out this talk I gave at Philly Cocoa, a meetup for Mac and iOS programmers. It covers what we know about Apple Watch’s accessibility (not much) and sho...
On The Pulse for a Second Time
At the end of 2013 I appeared on a radio show called The Pulse, which airs on WHYY. I really enjoyed the experience of broadcasting, and hoped one day to do ...
CocoaLove
Last month I spoke at CocoaLove, a conference about people, not tech. After traveling so much it felt wonderful to speak at a local conference. It had the fe...
TEDx Philadelphia 2014
In late January I received an email inviting me to speak at TEDx Philadelphia, the local version of the famous TED talks. At first I mistook it for spam, but...
Proof that the Apple Watch has Accessibility
In October, Apple announced the Apple Watch. The blind all wondered if it would have some version of VoiceOver, the screen reader which they have on all thei...
EuruCamp 2014
This summer I spoke at EuruCamp. It took place in Potsdam, Germany. I spoke twice, participated on a panel, and made some new friends. Watch the video. I als...
#inspect 2014
I just spoke at #inspect2014, the second annual RubyMotion developer’s conference. The first one happened in Brussels. This year’s happened in San Francisco....
Philly Tech Week 2014
Every year Philadelphia has a week-long celebration of tech events called Philly Tech Week. Last year my friend Sonia and I had a braille street art table. T...
Motion-Accessibility
I just released my second RubyMotion gem. I call it motion-accessibility. It makes it much easier to make your applications accessible by providing Ruby-like...
Asbury Park Adventure
While speaking at the RubyMotion conference in Belgium I met Bret Morgan, who runs a coworking space in New Jersey called Cowerks. Since we live near each ot...
#inspect 2013
This article makes up the second part in a little trilogy about going to #inspect, the first RubyMotion conference. I expect a few updates as more content co...
RubyMotion and Accessibility
I just gave a great talk at the Philly Cocoaheads group. We met at the life-transforming Indy Hall. I covered basic iOS accessibility, RubyMotion, and how th...
Austin’s Accessibility Adventure
This weekend I attended BarCamp Philly. Everyone promised a life-changing time. They spoke the truth. I had a lot of fun, met some great people and even ende...
Why Twitter Still Needs to Care about Accessibility
In January I wrote an article detailing why Twitter needs to care about accessibility. Unlike other apps, the Twitter app has become tightly integrated into ...
Access Unlimited
I just appeared on the excellent show Access Unlimited, an award-winning show on KPFK in Las Angeles. I talked about my first experiences with computers, the...
The First Philadelphia VoiceOver Event
The Philadelphia regional chapter of thePennsylvania Council of the Blind partnered with Apple to put on the first VoiceOver event in this area. The event to...
What Apple TV Means to Me
I have recently gotten AirPlay working to prepare for a move. As I wrote, I got an Airport Express and an Apple TV. At the time of writing I had to wait t...
Why Twitter Needs to Care about Accessibility
Twitter has had an official app for a while. Now it has become less accessible, and it has also become integrated into iOS. Twitter must make the same com...
The Death of Steve Jobs
Steve Jobs has died at age 56. Family said he passed peacefully in his sleep. This has sent shockwaves around the net, and I thought I’d throw in my own litt...
What Today’s Apple Event Means to the Blind
Today, Apple had their “Let’s Talk iPhone” announcement. As usual no one knew what to expect. Many hoped for a redesigned iPhone with a curved surface, much ...
How to Make a Million Dollars with an iPhone
Sorry for the spammy title. I wanted to get your attention, plus I figure it will draw a bunch of traffic from search engines. This article actually discusse...
The Productive Macs Bundle with VoiceOver
Recently, LifeHacker featured the Productive Macs Bundle. This bundle promises eight great apps for a low price. I figured I’d test all eight for VoiceOver c...
A Trip to the Mac App Store
Today, Apple released Mac OS 10.6.6, which adds the Mac App Store. I wanted to give a sneak peak, especially from an accessibility point of view. I also want...
MobileMe or Die!
Firstly, let me say that I write this using an awesome program called Mac Journal. It lets me work directly with my blog. I hope this works. Now, onto busine...
Everything that happens will Happen Today
David Byrne of the Talking Heads has collaborated with Brian Eno on a new album! They worked together on some of Byrne’s solo projects, as well as several le...