How Do I Set or Change the Default Home Screen?

When the phone has two applications that do the same thing, Android wants to know which app should be used. For example, if two or more home screens are installed, pressing the Home button makes Android display a list of available home screens and prompts users to select one. Likewise, users who select the Email option from Contacts are prompted to choose between the stock email app and K-9 Mail, if the latter has been installed from the Market. Users can select the app they want to use this time, or they can select the one they want to use all the time.

This post describes how to tell the phone which of two or more applications to use for a particular task. The steps here describe how to set the default home screen, but the procedure is the same for setting the default email reader, web browser, Twitter client, and so on.

Setting the Default Home Screen from the Android System Screen

Once the Eyes-Free Shell is installed, pressing Home brings up the Android System screen, which allows users to select between the Stock Home screen and the Eyes-Free Shell. It also gives users the option to set the default setting.
1. If necessary, slide the physical keyboard out to access the arrow keys.
2. Briefly press the Home button. The phone may say, "Android system."
3. Navigate through the items on the screen: Eyes-Free, Home, and Use by Default for This Action.
4. Press the selector on Use by Default for This Action.
5. Set your default home screen.
a. If you want your default to be the Eyes-Free shell, arrow to Eyes-Free shell and press the selector.
b. If you want your default to be the stock Home screen, arrow to Home and press the selector
6. Briefly press the Home button to move to the home screen you have selected.

Clearing the Default Home Screen in Settings

If pressing the Home button opens a particular screen, then that home screen has already been set as the default. To set a different default, users must clear the current one. When they do, they can access the Android system screen and follow the steps described above to choose a new default home screen.

1. From the Home screen, go to Settings.
a. On the stock Launcher, press Menu, navigate to Settings, and press the selector.
b. On the Eyes-Free shell, down-stroke to Applications, type S, navigate to Settings if necessary, and press enter.
2. Navigate to Applications and press the selector.
3. Navigate to Manage Applications and press the selector.
4. Focus is on Downloads. At this point, you can arrow down through your installed applications or arrow right to All applications.
a. If your current default is the stock Home screen and you want to change it to Eyes-Free shell, arrow right to All; then arrow down to your Home screen, which may be called "Home" or "Launcher"; Press the selector.
b. If your current default is the Eyes-Free shell and you want to change it to the stock Launcher, Arrow down to Eyes-Free shell, and press the selector.
5. Navigate to Clear Defaults, and press the selector there. This screen is a nonuniform grid, so you may need to navigate in different directions.
6. Briefly press the Home button. Focus should move to the Android System screen, allowing you to use the previous instructions to set your preferred Home screen.

Clearing the Default Home Screen in the Eyes-Free Shell

The Eyes-Free Shell offers a convenient way to clear defaults for most apps on the phone. The stock home screen isn't one of them, so for that app specifically, users need to follow the steps described in the previous section. For most other cases (e.g., setting the default email reader or web browser), the following method is very handy.

1. Go to the Eyes-Free Shell.
a. If the Eyes-Free Shell is your default home screen, press the Home button.
b. If the stock Home screen is your default launcher, press the Home button, Navigate to and press the selector on All Applications, then on Eyes-Free Shell.
2. Down-stroke to the 8 position for Applications.
3. Navigate to the app that is currently the default. Do not press enter.
4. Press the Menu button.
5. Navigate to and press the selector on Details.
6. Navigate to Clear Defaults, and press the selector there. This screen is a nonuniform grid, so you may need to navigate in different directions.

TalkBack, Eyes-Free Shell Refreshed --- Now With End-User Settings

$

We are pushing out a series of updates via Android Market for TalkBack and the Eyes-Free Shell. Here is a brief overview of end-user visible changes.

Accessibility Preferences

Going by the principle of things should just work as expected , we have long resisted giving in to having a complex set of user preference settings for TalkBack and friends --- in my experience, if you introduce such a settings menu early on, we as software engineers tend to punt on all complex decisions by turning each question into a complex user-facing dialog. That said, it is now time to gradually introduce end-user settings for some aspects of the various accessibility tools.

Accessibility Preferences

Welcome new application AccessibilityPreferences to Android. What this application does:

• From an end-user perspective, it provides a single place where you will find preference settings corresponding to each accessibility tool you have installed on your phone.
• For developers of accessibility tools, it provides a simple means of registering a custom program for managing end-user preferences for that tool.

TalkBack installs its user preferences under this tool. You can tweak a number of settings that affect TalkBack behavior including:

• Control whether TalkBack speaks when the screen is off --- useful to silence status messages when you have the phone turned off.
• Control whether TalkBack speaks when ringer volume is set to 0, i.e., phone is in silent mode.
• Control whether the proximity sensor is used to shut off speech.

Over time, we'll add more settings here as appropriate --- but expect us to be conservative with respect to how many settings show up.

Updates To The Eyes-Free Shell

Here is a summary of updates to the Eyes-Free Shell:

• Changes the proximity sensor logic so that it is only active when the shell is active; this should be more battery efficient
• Fixes a race condition bug that can trigger when the shell is being exited as an application is being installed/removed

TalkBack

Here is a summary of changes to TalkBack:

• TalkBack now includes application-specific speech strategies for some popular applications. This provides context-sensitive spoken feedback.
• Applications that have such speech strategies defined include Facebook, Stitcher and GoogleVoice amongst others.
• Implements a settings screen that can be used with Accessibility Preferences
• Available settings:
   
  1. Ringer Volume (Speak at all ringer volumes, No speech in Silent Mode, No speech in Vibrate and Silent Mode)
   
  2. Screen Status (Allow speech when screen is off, No speech when screen is off)
   
  3. Speak Caller ID (checked/not checked)
   
  4. Proximity Sensor (checked/not checked)

In addition, TalkBack introduces the ability to add application-specific plugins --- expect to see more advancement here in future releases.

AccessibilityPreferences Hints For Developers

If you're a developer of an AccessibilityService, you need to:

• Implement a preferences screen for your application.
• Implement this with intent filter:

              
  
              <intent-filter>            
  
                  <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />            
  
                  <category android:name="android.accessibilityservice.SERVICE_SETTINGS" />            
  
              </intent-filter>            
  
          
  

Share And Enjoy,

Eyes-Free Review: Droid2 From MOT

Here is a quick eyes-free access overview of the MOT Droid2.

Hardware

1. The device has a pull-out keyboard, and the buttons are much more tactile than the original Droid.
2. The device also has dropped the hard-to-use D-Pad from the original Droid in favor of PC-style arrow keys.
3. There is once again no dedicated number row at the top.
4. The capacitive buttons on the front of the device appear in a different order from the original Droid --- with the device in portrait mode, reading left to right you have: Menu, home, back, and search.
5. In addition, MOT ships a voice search application on the device that is triggered by pressing a special microphone button -- it's worth learning the position of this key, since voice-search can be useful --- and more importantly, if you're relying on spoken feedback, hitting this button leads to the phone falling inexplicably silent.

Software

If you look under accessibility, you'll find an application called Voice Readouts from MOT. This appears to be a screenreader analogous to TalkBack, though in my experience, it did not produce spoken feedback in many instances. That said, this application collaborates well with TalkBack --- and after installing TalkBack from the Android Market (note: the Droid2 does not come with TalkBack bundled) -- you can activate both TalkBack and VoiceReadout for an optimal experience.

VoiceReadout appears to have a preliminary version of touch-exploration. With VoiceReadout active, a single tap speaks the item under the finger; a double-tap activates that item. Note that moving the finger around on the display does not appear to trigger touch exploration; also, touch exploration appears to be available in only some contexts.

Instances where touch exploration appears to be active

1. Settings application.
2. Portions of Android Market.

In general, touch exploration appears to be available in ListView.

In addition, the Droid2 also includes a low-vision accessibility tool called Zoom Mode ( look for it under Settings -> Accessibility ) this tool provides a magnification lens.

Summary

All in all, the Droid2 appears to be one of the better choices for eyes-free use from among the presently available crop of Android phones. Touch exploration, though preliminary, is nice to see on the platform, and the bundled low-vision magnification aid is a nice touch. Voice Readouts is also a great example of an Android accessibility service done right in that it co-exists peacefully with other screenreaders like TalkBack to provide an optimal end-user experience. To users not familiar with adaptive technologies in general, this might not sound like a big deal --- but users of PC screenreders have long been familiar with the need to have only one screenreader turned on. As we transition to modern platforms like Android, it's useful to remind ourselves that screenreaders can in fact co-exist, with each tool providing something useful to create an overall experience that is greater than the sum of the parts.