S1: Hello everyone. Welcome to Talking Tech. This edition available from
S1: October the 15th, 2024. I'm Stephen Jolly. Great to have
S1: you with us listening maybe through Vision Australia Radio, associated
S1: stations of the Radio Reading Network or the Community Radio Network.
S1: There is also the podcast to catch that. What you
S1: need to do is search for the two words talking
S1: tech and Danica Noel. Come usually on a Tuesday afternoon
S1: just after it's been produced. Another option is to ask
S1: your Siri device or smart speaker to play. Vision Australia
S1: radio talking tech podcast. Vision Australia radio talking tech podcast
S1: with me. Vision Australia's national access technology manager. Damo McMorrow. Hey, Damo.
S2: Hi, Stephen.
S1: Let's start by talking about a device known as the Braillesense.
S2: Some people would already be familiar with the Braillesense six.
S2: It's been out for a little while and was a
S2: replacement for the Braillesense Polaris. These products are from Silvis. Blv.
S2: Who some people would know as hymns and the Braillesense
S2: six is their Braille note taker type device. It comes
S2: in two variants a 32 cell and a 20 cell variant.
S2: They run the Android operating system and they have a
S2: number of inbuilt apps. So they have things like a
S2: word processor, a notepad, an email client, a web browser,
S2: a web radio, a daisy player, a media player for
S2: playing your MP3 music files, and that type of thing. Uh,
S2: there's a number of other extras like a dictionary, an
S2: Excel viewer, a range of other sort of utilities, a
S2: scientific calculator. And they have speech and Braille. And you
S2: can also do things like produce maths equations and those
S2: sorts of things in the word processor. Obviously being an
S2: Android type device, it has all of the usual sort
S2: of wireless and Bluetooth connectivity as well. The 32 cell
S2: version is probably about the size of an iPad mini,
S2: I would say, and the 20 cell. The mini version
S2: is a little bit smaller, so it's probably a similar
S2: width to a brilliant 20, but a little bit deeper
S2: from front to back because of the stereo speakers and
S2: the headphone jack and the two USB-C ports and so on.
S1: Some listening might be wondering how does this relate to
S1: the selfless, blv sense player that has been around now
S1: for almost two years?
S2: The Braillesense six came out ahead of the sense player
S2: by probably a year or so. So some of the
S2: apps are shared. So things like the the podcast downloader,
S2: the daisy player, the media player, those sorts of things
S2: are shared between the two devices or are very similar
S2: in functionality, but obviously because this has a Perkins style
S2: Braille keyboard, you know, you have things like the word processor,
S2: the email client, the calculator and a whole range of
S2: other things. So whereas the sense player is very much
S2: a media player type device, I tend to think of
S2: the Braille sense family of products more as a note
S2: taker type device. So I use mine in a similar
S2: way to the way my sighted colleagues tend to use
S2: their iPad.
S1: And with the Braille, it's a lot more expensive, isn't it?
S1: Up around 7500? Something like that. They are for.
S2: The 32 cell version. Yes. And for the 20 cell
S2: it's about 6500, I believe. Yeah.
S1: Whereas the sense player is down around about 1,100 AUD.
S1: That's right. Great devices, both of them. And the Braille
S1: sense has had a significant firmware upgrade recently.
S2: Yes it has. So what they're calling version 2.5 of
S2: their of the software for the Braille sense six came
S2: out this week. and it introduces a couple of cool
S2: new features, including a ChatGPT client and a new YouTube
S2: search facility where you can search YouTube and bookmark your
S2: favorites and those kinds of things. There's also about three
S2: pages of notes in terms of fixes, so there's quite
S2: a long list of things that have been updated, reworked, fixed,
S2: that type of thing. So anyone who's running a Braillesense
S2: six or a Braillesense six mini, I would definitely recommend upgrading.
S2: It's definitely a worthwhile upgrade.
S1: So we're talking about the Braillesense six or the Braillesense
S1: six mini. They're available from Silvis, Blv and the new
S1: firmware that's available. You're saying it's good to go for it?
S2: Yeah, definitely.
S1: Tell me about notebook LM, and when I say LM,
S1: that makes me think I.
S2: Yes, absolutely. And this is one that I've been playing
S2: around with this week, and I'm really quite intrigued by it.
S2: So notebook LM, it's a Google service and it is
S2: free at this point. I don't know whether they'll change
S2: that in the future, but at the moment it's free.
S2: And Google describes it as an AI powered research assistant.
S2: So what that means is that you can give it
S2: a number of different sources. So they might be documents
S2: from your computer, you know, word documents or PDFs. They
S2: might be, uh, websites. Um, there's a whole range of
S2: different formats that it supports. So you can give it
S2: a list of sources, and then you can have it
S2: generate a number of different things from those sources. It'll
S2: give you a list of things like, um, a table
S2: of contents, a summary, a study guide, an FAQ, or
S2: frequently asked questions. But the one that really surprised me
S2: is a thing called a deep dive conversation. So you
S2: can give it a, you know, a number of documents
S2: or a course outline or a manual or whatever you've got.
S2: Tell it to generate a deep dive conversation and it
S2: will generate some audio in the format of a podcast.
S2: So it will sound like two people having a discussion
S2: about your content in a very conversational sort of style.
S2: So almost like what you and I are doing here, Steven.
S2: But it's, uh, their AI generated voices.
S1: And we're not.
S2: That's right. Not yet anyway. Um, but they. You really
S2: wouldn't know in that they sound very natural. They breathe, they, um. And, ah,
S2: they laugh, you know, they it is a very conversational style.
S2: And I was really quite shocked at, uh, at the results.
S2: And it generates it quite quickly. And it might be
S2: a sort of a 10 to 30 minute, um, you know, audio, uh,
S2: you know, like a podcast episode, almost depending on how
S2: much content you give it.
S1: Notebook LLM language model. How do you get to it?
S2: Really, the easiest way is just to do a Google
S2: search for notebook LM, and it'll be the first thing
S2: that comes up and you do it through a web browser.
S2: I was using Google Chrome when I've been using it
S2: this week. Uh, it'll ask you to sign in to
S2: your Google account. So if you've got a Gmail account,
S2: you're already set up with one. Otherwise you you will
S2: need to create a Google account first. And then there's
S2: a button that says try notebook LM. And you can
S2: set up different notebooks too. So if you're looking at
S2: different products, you know, or different things, you know, so
S2: you could, for example, have a notebook where you give
S2: it a bunch of, uh, holiday, you know, destination websites
S2: and you could say, give me a list of all
S2: of the holiday accommodation in Byron Bay together with their
S2: prices or something like that. And then you might have
S2: another one for your your overseas trip to Italy and
S2: another one on, uh, the rules of test cricket, you know,
S2: so you can have a bunch of different notebooks that
S2: you can select from so that it organizes all of your, uh,
S2: information and your sources and the things that it generates
S2: quite nicely for you and to.
S1: Be clear, it's web based. It's not an app.
S2: That's right. Yes, it's it's accessed through a web browser.
S1: That one called notebook LM now Windows 11 and the
S1: major update for 2024.
S2: Yes that's right. Microsoft, in their sort of typical fairly
S2: cryptic fashion, are calling it version 24 H2. And yes,
S2: it is the major Windows 11 update for 2024 for
S2: people who already have one of the new, uh, co-pilot PCs.
S2: So the new ARM Snapdragon based PCs, they'll already be
S2: running it because they've been shipping it with those devices
S2: since June, mid-June. But for everybody else, uh, it's starting
S2: to come down the line from the beginning of October.
S2: So you may already have it. You may not. And
S2: it'll come down through the normal sort of Windows Update process.
S2: Microsoft tend to do these things as a staggered rollout,
S2: so they kind of deploy it in waves based on
S2: I'm not quite sure what either geographic location or PC manufacturer.
S2: I'm not quite sure how they determine who gets what
S2: and when, but you can get it, you know, if
S2: you want to force the update. And there is a
S2: URL which we can put in the show notes, um,
S2: where you can download the installation assistant and force the
S2: update to happen. I would suggest perhaps a little bit
S2: of caution though, in that if you use Windows Mail
S2: or Calendar or Contacts, so the sort of standard windows
S2: apps for those things, they will disappear with this update
S2: and you'll end up with the new look, um, Microsoft Outlook.
S2: And it's not like the outlook that most of us
S2: who use sort of office 365 would be used to.
S2: It is a web based app. It's the look and
S2: feel is quite different, and it's been getting some fairly
S2: mixed reviews, both in the mainstream press and in, uh,
S2: the sort of assistive tech space in terms of whether
S2: people like it and what they think of it from
S2: an accessibility standpoint. So if you're really happy with Windows Mail,
S2: you may want to consider not not installing this update.
S2: If you use Microsoft Outlook through a sort of an
S2: office 365 subscription or an earlier version of office, that
S2: won't change. You won't lose that. But if you use
S2: Windows Mail, Contacts and Calendar, then there is a big change.
S2: So it's just worth worth being aware of that.
S1: Yeah, so no real reason to go chasing after it.
S2: I don't think so. If you're running a machine with
S2: an ARM processor, you will notice some performance improvements and
S2: you will find that your sort of older legacy windows
S2: apps will run better. Um, but most of the other
S2: things are, again, sort of cosmetic under the hood updates.
S2: There's some changes to Windows Explorer, some changes to the
S2: kind of the visual look of things like the system
S2: tray and Cortana has been replaced with, uh, The copilot.
S2: Probably none of those things. Certainly from my point of view,
S2: I don't feel compelled to rush out and spend my
S2: Friday evening updating to Windows 11 24 H2.
S1: It'll just come in time.
S2: That's right.
S1: Yes. Now, for people using iOS 18, particularly on the
S1: iPhone 15 Pro and above. In other words, all the
S1: iPhone 16 models. A bit of a tip about preserving
S1: your battery. People may not be aware that there is
S1: now a feature in settings in the battery part. So
S1: you go into settings, then battery, and it's called charging.
S1: And within there you can set the level that you
S1: want it to stop charging at. It said isn't it Damo,
S1: that it's better for the battery not to go to
S1: the 100%? Every time, though, there's a bit of conjecture
S1: about how important that is. But you can stop it,
S1: say at 80, which is the lowest that you can
S1: stop it at 80, 85, 90, etc. and it will
S1: only charge to that level and maybe that will preserve
S1: the life of your battery. There's a funny thing happened though,
S1: with iOS 18 .0.1, which came out just a week
S1: or so ago for some people. What happened was that
S1: this no longer was happening, the stopping at the 80%
S1: and it was going on beyond that. And what we
S1: found is that if you go back into settings, move
S1: that pointer back up above the 80 or whatever you
S1: had it set at, and then back down again, it
S1: seems to take effect again. So you can get it
S1: back to behaving the way you expect it to, but
S1: a bit of a bit of a strange one. These
S1: quirks do come up in iOS. You've been using iOS
S1: 18 for some time now. You're finding it okay.
S2: Yeah, I do like it, particularly the Braille screen input
S2: changes that we talked about, and I have been experimenting
S2: with the battery life. I did set mine up to
S2: only charge to 85% just to see Whether I could
S2: get through, you know, a day of sort of normal
S2: usage with it set like that. And I mean, the
S2: modern phones, the battery life is so good that really
S2: I haven't noticed much difference at the end of the day.
S1: Now, before we go, a reminder that you can find
S1: details of what we've been talking about in this and
S1: previous editions of the program by going to VA radio.org/talking tech.
S1: VA radio.org/talking tech to write to the program Damon McMorrow.
S2: That's Damo dot m c m o r o w
S2: at Vision australia.org, and I have had a couple of
S2: emails from listeners each week and I really appreciate receiving those.
S2: So thank you.
S1: Very good. Damo Dot McMorrow at Vision australia.org. This has
S1: been talking tech with me has been Vision Australia's national
S1: access technology manager Damien McMorrow I'm Stephen Jolly. Take care.
S1: We'll talk more tech next week. See you.