Deteriorating Braille Experience with Latest iOS and iPadOS. Thanks Apple!

By Maldalain, 2 October, 2019

Forum
Braille on Apple Products

I have the latest iOS on my iPhone 7 and iPad. I can not use any of the keys on my braille notetaker to navigate and to type. They work fine for very short time once my braille display is connected. The only thing that gets them back to work is either turning off VoiceOver then switching it back on, or locking then unlocking my device.
I encounter the same issue on both my iPhone and iPad.

Thank you

Options

Comments

By Brian Tew on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

I would reboot all three devices as a first step toward diagnosis.
I am going to update my ipad now to see what happens.
If you never hear from me again you know the grimlins got me.
Farewell, cruel apple.

By Brian Tew on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

Updated ipad. used it about an hour. seems ok.
except I can't find the status bar.
Maybe it's all in control center now.
Anyway maybe it's just a braillenote or humanware problem.

By Maldalain on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

I unpaired and re-paired, rebooted all devices, did lots of other things to diagnose the problem, however nothing worked for me. It is a HIMS BrailleSense U2. It only works when I lock and then unlock the device. And yes, the status bar shortcut is gone, even on my bluetooth Logitech keyboard I can not get status bar items, this is really bad because I can not check the time, connectivity status or battery percentage.

By Brian Tew on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

I only used it about an hour, but did not notice any problems.
Hims u2 and ipad os 13.1.2.
Make sure you have version 13.1.2.
And your ipad and u2 are physically near each other.
And there is no other display or device using bluetooth.
I have two braille displays, and if both are turned on with bluetooth they interfere with each other.

By Maldalain on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

Yeah this is what I am doing. I noticed braille controls stop working when I receive notification on the iPad, like Messenger message or any other notification from my News apps. Also I use my iPad with Logitech Create smart keyboard, can that be relevant?

Sometimes resetting network settings will fix these kinds of issues. Yes you will need to re-enter your wifi network passwords, but if it solves the braille display problem it might be worth it.

Well I didn't get any notifications while testing, so I will try that later today.
If you are using a bluetooth keyboard, do you really lose the braille functions or is it the logitech functions?
In other words do the braille keys on the u2 still work, and do the logitech keys still work, or are they both messed up?
try using the u2 without the logitech if you can.

By Brian Tew on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

I notice that space-234 on the home screen does nothing at all,
But within an app it brings us a partial status bar showing time and date.
I haven't got any notifications yet so we'll see how that goes.

By Maldalain on Tuesday, October 22, 2019 - 14:11

FOr the status bar, yeah, it is gone, even with keyboard shortcuts it is no longer there, you only get that clicking sound. I use a smart keyboard, it connects to the iPad with the smart connector on the bottom of the iPad. The keybboard does not stop working. And yeah, I reset network settings. Bryan, try to activate the control center with space dots 2/5 and then try to activate any button on the, let’s say, settings, nothing will work, you can not activate any button, you will have to lock and unlock the iPad. This is a new bug I discovered now. I wanted to turn on my bluetooth via the control center, I used my keyboard shortcut, then I found that all my attempts to activate any button failed. Good job Apple, this is very creative!

I do not get that result with control panel.
I activate it with space-2-5 and all buttons still work.
I may not be understanding what you mean.

I do not have any short cuts; they are turned off.