Double Tap

Apple's HomeView, a new Apple TV 4K and HomePod mini 2 lead the news, then Vispero's Matt Ater and Ryan Jones explain how Vispero Companion in JAWS will change your settings and help you finish tasks when you get stuck.Steven Scott and Shaun Preece go through Apple's Welcome Home event. The new Apple TV 4K gets the A19 chip and built-in microphones, and the price goes up. HomePod mini 2 is sold on Siri AI, which will not arrive until a later update. The new Siri Remote has Find My built in. HomeView uses Face ID to recognise each person in the household, and the hosts ask what it offers blind users who already have a phone.Matt Ater and Ryan Jones of Vispero talk about the company's new CEO, Sid Gaitonde, Glen Gordon's return, and the push to bring more blind people into leadership and engineering roles.The main news is the new Vispero Companion in JAWS and Fusion. It brings PictureSmart, Page Explorer and other AI tools together in one place. You can describe a setting in plain language and Companion will change it for you. It can also pick a date or explain why a form won't submit. The tools run in the cloud and need an account. Businesses will be able to point Companion at their own AI models.ZoomText is getting performance modes and object detection in photos. Ryan stresses that AI is no excuse for companies to skip accessibility.Chapters0:00 – Intro1:22 – Apple TV 4K, HomePod mini 2 and the new Siri Remote6:25 – Apple HomeView smart home hub9:50 – Matt Ater and Ryan Jones on the Vispero name13:04 – New CEO and blind leadership at Vispero17:16 – Vispero Companion: AI settings and task help in JAWS41:51 – AI in the workplace and enterprise models46:55 – ZoomText updates50:42 – Why AI is no excuse for inaccessibility53:53 – Wrap-upIf you enjoyed this conversation, like, subscribe and share it with someone who uses JAWS or ZoomText. Tell us in the comments what you think of Vispero Companion and HomeView.Relevant LinksApple HomeView: https://www.apple.com/homeview/Apple TV 4K: https://www.apple.com/apple-tv-4k/HomePod mini: https://www.apple.com/homepod-mini/JAWS: https://vispero.com/jaws-screen-reader-software/ZoomText: https://vispero.com/zoomtext-screen-magnifier-software/Vispero Companion: https://companion.vispero.com/ ----Follow on:YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtubeX (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/xInstagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagramTikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktokThreads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threadsFacebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebookLinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedinSubscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/appleSpotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotifyRSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcastiHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheartAbout Double TapHosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited."Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Richard Harlow lost most of his sight to LHON while studying at Emily Carr University. Today he is a blind artist and accessibility advocate, and he's standing for Nanaimo City Council on Vancouver Island. He tells Steven Scott how he rebuilt his art, his career and his confidence, and why disabled people belong in local government.Leber's Hereditary Optic Neuropathy took Richard's central vision over six months when he was 20. A doctor told him he would never finish art school. He went on to finish a degree at Vancouver Island University, and he now paints large, high-contrast, tactile canvases that have been shown across Canada.Richard also racked up a string of firsts. He became the first blind cashier at Gap in Canada, working on an iPad till with VoiceOver, and the first blind technical support worker at Shopify. In six years on Nanaimo's accessibility committee he pushed for accessible city documents, talking crosswalks, accessible beaches and an easier LEAP recreation pass, which went from about 200 users to 3,300.His platform covers safer streets, a mental health crisis response team, valuing wetlands and tree canopy as infrastructure, and bus service for the Snuneymuxw First Nation. He talks about campaigning blind with help from the AI agent Muse, dealing with abuse from strangers, and mentoring families whose blind children have been pulled out of PE.Chapters0:00 – Introducing Richard Harlow1:36 – LHON, art school and a new way to paint7:18 – Firsts at Gap and Shopify10:40 – Bus stop announcements and why kindness isn't a system13:26 – Accessible documents and the right to run for office17:44 – Helping others up: campus access and the social model24:01 – The LEAP pass and accessibility as a lens for housing, parks and streets35:28 – Richard's platform for Nanaimo40:19 – Campaigning blind, AI tools and handling the haters47:12 – Election day, charity runs and mentoring othersRelevant LinksRichard Harlow for Nanaimo City Council: https://richardharlow.ca/CNIB Foundation: https://www.cnib.ca/Meta Muse: https://about.fb.com/news/2026/09/introducing-muse-personal-ai-agent/ ----Follow on:YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtubeX (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/xInstagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagramTikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktokThreads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threadsFacebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebookLinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedinSubscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/appleSpotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotifyRSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcastiHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheartAbout Double TapHosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited."Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In 2015, after twelve surgeries, Brett Halle lost his sight completely. The engineer who spent twenty years building the Mac had to learn to use it with VoiceOver. He explains Radar, why your bug report matters more than you think, and how he treated VoiceOver like a video game.This is part two of our tribute to Brett Halle, the former Apple engineer and friend of this show, who died on 1 October 2026. It was recorded with Steven Scott and Shaun Preece in July 2024.Yesterday Brett took us inside Apple. Today the story turns. His retinas began detaching, surgery followed surgery, and by 2015 he was totally blind. He was running engineering at Livescribe at the time and says he was simply too busy doing his job to deal with it. Retirement in 2017 was when he set about learning, as he puts it, how to be blind properly. Blindness became another problem to work around.He is thoughtful about accessibility inside Apple: where responsibility sits, why spreading it across every team can thin it out, and how far ahead the company plans. Then he opens up Radar, the bug system Apple engineers live out of. If it is not in Radar, it does not exist. His plea is direct: report the bug anyway. Never assume somebody else has already sent it, because the particular way you hit it might be the thing that unlocks the fix.On learning VoiceOver he is honest. For two weeks he wanted to throw his iPhone out of the nearest window. What changed was treating the software as a puzzle, giving himself time to play and explore, the way you would approach a video game. His method is the one a blind person uses in a new hotel room: walk the perimeter, find the edges, build the map.He had warm words for this community, calling us creative and smart and worth building for. The last word is his.Chapters0:00 - Remembering Brett Halle, part two0:57 - Losing his sight in 20152:05 - Too busy to be blind3:58 - Accessibility at Apple and where responsibility sits5:42 - Why Apple switched on to accessibility10:20 - Radar, the heart of Apple engineering13:18 - Why your bug report matters16:23 - Learning VoiceOver19:47 - Walking the perimeter22:31 - A creative community and building the best product ----Follow on:YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtubeX (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/xInstagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagramTikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktokThreads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threadsFacebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebookLinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedinSubscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/appleSpotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotifyRSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcastiHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheartAbout Double TapHosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited."Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Brett Halle sold the Apple II as a student, joined Apple in 1991, and was the first engineer through the door after Apple bought NeXT. He led the Core OS team behind Mac OS X, ran Final Cut, and quietly moved the Mac from PowerPC to Intel. This is part one of a two part tribute, in his own words.Brett died on 1 October 2026. He was a friend of this show and a daily listener, and the best way we know to remember him is to let you hear him tell his own story. This conversation with Steven Scott and Shaun Preece was first broadcast in July 2024.He starts at the beginning: a hardware engineer at the Byte Shop of Long Beach, selling the Apple II when it was brand new. By 1991 he was inside Apple, writing memos asking why the company kept reinventing the wheel. When Apple went looking for a new operating system he sat on the team that weighed NeXT against BeOS, Microsoft, IBM and Sun, and he explains clearly why NeXT won.Then comes the meeting where Steve Jobs stood up, said he was willing to bet the company, looked at the engineers and told them not to mess it up. Brett was in the room. He describes Apple weeks from bankruptcy, the layoffs, the arrival of the iMac, and a secret building down the road where his team moved the entire Mac platform to Intel while almost nobody at Apple knew.He is candid about Steve. Intense, demanding, frequently right, and the surest way to get fired was to tell him what you thought he wanted to hear. A year at Apple, Brett says, was worth seven anywhere else, and he would not have traded it. He closes on Final Cut Pro, built to push the hardware and to put a half million dollar edit suite within reach of anyone.Part two follows tomorrow.Chapters0:00 - Remembering Brett Halle1:04 - Long Beach, the Byte Shop and the Apple II4:02 - Joining Apple and choosing NeXT6:46 - Bringing up the microkernel on PowerPC9:53 - Steve Jobs bets the company11:29 - Bankruptcy, the layoffs and the iMac13:59 - The secret building and the move to Intel16:37 - Working for Steve Jobs22:22 - Final Cut, FireWire and high definition ----Follow on:YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtubeX (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/xInstagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagramTikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktokThreads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threadsFacebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebookLinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedinSubscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/appleSpotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotifyRSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcastiHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheartAbout Double TapHosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited."Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

NASA ran an Artemis webinar built for blind and low vision people, and two of the panelists are blind NASA engineers. Steven Scott talks to Dr. Robert Shelton, Dr. Craig Moore and Christine Malec about the RS-25 rocket engine, how they built careers at NASA, and what would make space missions accessible to blind fans.Bob Shelton has worked at NASA for almost 40 years and is now lead simulation engineer for the Commercial Crew Program. He describes joining Johnson Space Center as a blind mathematician in 1971. His first boss told him to figure out where he could make the biggest impact. Craig Moore, a chemist turned materials engineer at Marshall, explains what changed in the RS-25 between the Space Shuttle and Artemis, including 3D printed parts.The panel also covers how AI tools like Gemini make maths PDFs readable, with equations converted to LaTeX. Christine explains why science descriptions should include the science as well as what's on screen, and how sonification turns telescope data into sound. She also wants NASA to release the astronauts' own conversations about what they saw from the far side of the Moon.The webinar drew 800 sign-ups and over 220 live attendees, with questions ranging from digital twins to how blind people could live in space. In the feedback, Eleanor's request to Gemini goes amusingly wrong, Leander asks about alert and ringer volume in iOS 27, and Glendon James shares his thoughts on modernising braille and on the inaccessible websites blind people still have to fight with.Chapters0:00 – Intro2:52 – Meet the panel and why NASA made the webinar8:09 – Bob Shelton's path into NASA as a blind mathematician13:22 – Inside the RS-25 rocket engine18:47 – AI, LaTeX and accessible maths21:43 – Audio description and sonification27:01 – Careers at NASA and advice for blind students33:12 – Following Artemis missions without sight37:05 – Webinar questions and turnout43:35 – Listener feedback: Gemini, iPhone volume and brailleRelevant LinksNASA Artemis webinar for the blind and low vision community: https://www.nasa.gov/general/nasa-hosts-virtual-artemis-webinar-for-blind-low-vision-community/NASA Artemis program: https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/artemis/Chandra X-ray Observatory: https://chandra.harvard.edu/Google Gemini: https://gemini.google.com/Smooth Scotland: https://www.smoothradio.com/scotland/ ----Follow on:YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtubeX (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/xInstagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagramTikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktokThreads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threadsFacebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebookLinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedinSubscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/appleSpotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotifyRSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcastiHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheartAbout Double TapHosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited."Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.