In the past blind people had no access to the advantages of mobile devices such as smartphones and pocket pcs. however, Full access to a windows computer is available for years now by using screenReading software. In a first step we had speech access to mobile phones running under the Symbian operating system. But now it is possible to use PDAs (personal digital assistant) and SmartPhones with speech and braille.
On this page i have collected the different software solutions for these mobile devices. Below is a list of all ScreenReaders and additional products, which will enable speech and braille on mobile phones and Pocket PCs.
Apple is the first manufacturer who has implemented screenreading capabilities in thair range of mainstream products. This includes the Mac OS operating system, several Ipod models, as well as the latest Iphone 3GS. Here is a link to the accessible Iphone pages.
It has similar features as the Symbian version of MobileSpeak but for Windows SmartPhones.
In the past there was only one accessible GPS solution for the blind, called Trekker. Trekker is developed by Humanware. It is a propritary hardware / software combination which is especially designed for blind people.
Now as accessible mobile phones are getting more and more popular, there are some new products available which are using the operating system of a Symbian or Windows Mobile Smartphone. These are less expensive and offer more flexibility because mainstream technology is used:
the KNFB reader is a new exciting software which can be installed on several Symbian smartphones. It enables the blind user to read printed text on the go by taking a picture using the phone's build in camera. The picture will be recognized and converted to spoken text.
TextScout is a similar software. The difference to KNFB Reader is, that the text recognition is done on a server. There is a trial version available for download.