A Quick Way To Switch Between Bluetooth Braille Displays, Possibly With a Shortcut?

By Teresa, 30 April, 2021

Forum
Braille on Apple Products

Hi, all. I'm trying to find a way to switch between my Or-20 and Or-40 using a quicker method than drilling through the settings to Voiceover and Braille, etc. I've done some searching in Shortcuts but haven't found anything besides turning VO on and off. Does anyone know if there might be a quicker way to switch displays?

Thanks in advance!,

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By Piotr Machacz on Saturday, May 22, 2021 - 05:57

Initially I wasn't aware of any quick way, but as luck would have it someone on the r/shortcuts subreddit just posted a really useful site containing a list of URI's (basically a fancy link that causes apps to do specific things like open to particular screens). The settings app has a ton of these, including one to open into the VoiceOver braille settings. I made a shortcut to try this, which you can find here:
https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/b98c6b8941974abbb377d36ccf4117b3

It won't put you directly on the choose a display heading so you'll still have to find that yourself, but it'll get you most of the way there.

For future reference, that list can be found here:
https://ios.gadgethacks.com/how-to/always-updated-list-ios-app-url-scheme-names-paths-for-shortcuts-0184033/

This is a really useful shortcut, thank you for sharing it. I have a shortcut I made for switching my Bluetooth off and back on again, which you can get here: https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/802445fe164f4b46b9e5793cd381e176
I called it Braille, because my main use for that shortcut was to get my Braille Displays to reconnect so it would work properly after I unlocked my phone.
Now I have a Chameleon and a Mantis, so I don’t need the shortcut anymore. They have an option built into the operating system on them called “reconnect devices’ which is really cool!
I hope the shortcut helps other braille users with older - more finicky - Braille displays.

By Piotr Machacz on Saturday, May 22, 2021 - 05:57

In your settings app>Shortcuts, you should see a switch to allow untrusted shortcuts, which is probably off by default (it's been a while since I had to look in there). Once you turn it on, you'll still get a warning the first time you run it, giving you a chance to review everything the shortcut does, but after that it should just work without prompting. The first time you run it I would suggest you do so from the shortcuts app itself to make sure it works. When you get it to open the braille settings for you you can go ahead and assign it to a VoiceOver gesture or braille display command to really speed up the process.