Fleksy- GIF, Web & Yelp Search

I have no doubts on your inventions and advances. You offered a totally new way of typing and introduced a different keyboard on the closed system that is iOS. That is true, and no one should argue that. The problem is that it seems you (as a team) left the accessibility behind and focused on expanding to other apps and reaching the "other" people. And that is the logic way of acting, but the difference is quite big. Some time ago when we proudly supported this project by paying for the app it had a clear message, a message of unity between sighted and blind or visually impaired people. As the price went down more and more people got the keyboard and told their relatives. Finally it went free and even more people joined the "happy typing" group. But one day some technical problems appeared and the magic keyboard split in two, and something changed. Maybe my life has been too turbulent and that is the reason I'm seeing this in a pessimistic way. Of course I will always admit all the good things you gave to us. Also I'm not part of that people that claims that they will no longer use this app and all that stuff. It is really good, but I feel things could have been done a little bit different. I don't want to sound offensive, even if your true goals were totally opposite to accessibility as other companies'. Every person has its own opinion and it has to be taken with respect. Now, after this long paragraph, I just want to thank you for what you have done, and I hope my words will loose their value after some time and see a new Fleksy united.

Hi Raul, have you actually listened to the podcast interview that Ioannis did with Jonathan Mosen recently? I provided a link to it in the comments above. This interview explains very clearly the problems that fleksy were experiencing and the reason for why the app was temporarily split in two. I think its clear fleksy is committed to accessibility but they have to think of the needs of all of there users, as a result they had to refine the fleksy experience because blind and sighted people use it differently. I would suggest listen to the interview and that will help you understand the problems, I thought like you up till I listened to it, but having heard it I support the decision fleksy made. We should also remember fleksy didn't just leave us with no way to use fleksy at all while they sort the problem out that would have been very easy to do. Also they say in the interview that they have developers dedicated to the accessibility side of things.

Hi. Did you guys see that there is a new version of the regular fleksy in the app store? The update info didn't mention anything about accessibility, but who knows?

I have found the update works better with VoiceOver, and if you read the comments above the developer refers to improving accessibility for the SDK. One thing I have noticed is that the orientation lock options appear to have gone from fleksy settings can anyone else confirm this?

Hi all, I was just in contact with the fleksy developers about the missing orientation lock settings and the reply I got wasn't good "Orientation lock is impossible. Imagine an app with unlocked orientation using a keyboard with a locked orientation." while I can understand that point I think this means I will be sticking with fleksy vo. this is because I prefer using my phone in portrait unless I have to use it in landscape. I know I can toggle my orientation lock off, but it would be a hastle for me to have to keep going into control center just to do this. I also don't like using the phone with unlocked orientation because I find for me the orientation can change very easily which can make navigating apps annoying. I know I will miss out on the sdk, but I am not two bothered about the apps fleksy currently supports as I don't use any of them. and I just think this new version will probably slow my productivity down. I am quite happy just using fleksy for messaging. Also I am wondering if having a reduced area rather than the hole of the screen to type in will slow down my typing speed with fleksy.

@alex Please bear in mind that it is these nuances we have to figure out with the new SDK structure. We want to provide the best possible interface for VoiceOver users in our main app and partner apps, and we are working to release this within the timescales we've committed to. Ioannis@Fleksy

Hi, I can appreciate all that, I will certainly try the new release when its ready, but I am definitely keeping a copy of fleksy vo on my iphone and in iTunes even after the two apps merge back together in case I prefer the older version.

Hello everyone!

Today Tweetings 2, a popular and accessible Twitter client app, integrated Fleksy SDK.
We wanted to take a moment and note what this means for the VoiceOver community, in ways that will become apparent in the coming days:

- This is the first fully accessible integration using our main Fleksy app (not the VoiceOver version).
- It is the first visible evidence of us restoring full accessibility into our main app and SDK. More to come in this area.
- Tweetings supports 10 languages, including English, German, French, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Turkish and Greek. Most of these languages have never been released for Fleksy VoiceOver users before. We’ve put a lot of work to introduce so many new languages, for all our users.
- The Tweetings team have done an awesome job making their own app accessible, so we recommend you try it.
- All apps that integrate Fleksy SDK going forward will be equally accessible!
- To enable Fleksy in Tweetings 2 – and all upcoming apps that integrate the latest version of Fleksy SDK – follow the helpful AppleVis guide created by awesome Fleksy user @JaffaStar (or Paula in AppleVis): http://www.applevis.com/guides/ios-ios-apps-iphone-voiceover/enabling-fleksy-keyboard-tweetings2-app#comment-24846

You will be seeing more updates for Fleksy VoiceOver users in the coming weeks and months, so stay tuned!

Team Fleksy

Today, we are pleased to announce full accessibility is restored in our main app. Get the update and try it yourself: http://fleksy.com/app

We are extremely excited for this and I wanted to share some thoughts here from our related blog post (full read: http://fleksy.com/journey-towards-accessibility-we-are-home/).

"We had committed to reach this milestone in 6 months, but we’ve worked twice as hard and we are delivering in less than 3 months.

The new, fully accessible Fleksy app has some more benefits especially for VoiceOver users, which we worked extremely hard for:
- Type in 8 new languages. Our sighted users have seen these introduced recently, but they had not been made available in the VoiceOver app.
- From now on, every new language introduced will be automatically available for all users.
- Every new iOS SDK partner now gets a fully accessible SDK. This means, you will be able to use Fleksy in all these new apps! Already, Tweetings 2, GV Connect, and 1Writer have updated to our accessible SDK. Our ambition is for a full system wide accessible keyboard, and new apps are coming online every day. Please tell your favorite apps about us.

Transitioning back to Fleksy:
- The app has been completely overhauled for better user experience for all users and to better compliment Fleksy’s increased availability in other apps.
- Type at the bottom part of the screen. Similarly to Fleksy in other apps, typing in the new accessible Fleksy app is registered only in the keyboard area – the same area the system keyboard would occupy. This way, you can still interact with the rest of the app, above the keyboard.
- Support for 10 languages: English, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Turkish. Download yours in Settings.
- Your settings, language and dictionary words will sync across all apps that implement the latest version of our Fleksy SDK. Your Fleksy VO learned words will also carry over automatically.
- Fleksy now uses the default iOS share menu for sharing your text, located at the top right.
- Swipe left and hold has been temporarily disabled as we resolve some bugs around it.
- Swipe up with two fingers currently does nothing. Tap at the top part of the screen to reach menu items.
- Familiar features may be missing. Fleksy has seen a lot of changes in the past 6 months. Expanding to a broader audience and more apps has allowed us to re-evaluate all features and focus on the ones that compliment Fleksy in its current state best. Do you miss a feature? Others might be too, so post a new idea in our feedback forums.

We know there are still a few rough edges and bugs in today’s app, which we will fix with updates. But we couldn’t wait to make it available to you nonetheless. Please let us know if you find things we missed in our mad rush to launch this as quickly as we could.

We won’t immediately retire the Fleksy VO app, just to be sure we have a smooth transition. But you can go back to the main Fleksy app with immediate effect.

And a final thought:

We know separating the two apps caused anger and frustration to many in our early community. We have worked really hard to restore this trust, not with words, but with actions.

We are truly hoping that today we can turn a page and count on the support of the VoiceOver community to bring Fleksy, a technology we invented, to more apps, more devices, and more users. It won’t be possible to work so hard, and for such an ambitious goal, without the support of the visually impaired community behind us.

Thank you, and Happy Typing

- Ioannis Verdelis, Co-Founder"

After reading this, I sprinted to the iTunes listing to see if iOS 6 was supported. I cheered when I saw it was.

I downloaded and installed the update.

On my Touch. it crashes back to the home screen almost immediately.

I cleared out my task switcher and rebooted, but the same thing happened.

I deleted the app from the Touch and reinstalled. Same thing. It crashes back to the home screen.

Thank you I love this news! Going to download it now!

And now is when I come and I proudly swallow my previous comments.
Thanks very much.

Thanks everyone - yes, please let us know about any bugs and we'll work them out. Brand new feedback mechanism in the app too so you can reach us directly. Thank you.

PS: We already know about the outdated instruction, and working on it.

IT is great that you guys have brought the accessibility back to the app. My question is where can we find a complete list of apps that are including Fleksy as an alternative keyboard? Thanks.

Not sure what I am missing as I just downloaded the new and improved all in one accessible Fleksy and seem to be getting stuck in the menus no way to actually start typing and when I go in to options and click start typing nothing happens. Not sure if I got a buggy version or if the app wasn't ready to be merged.

I have a jailbroken iPhone 5s, and with the tweak called, "Fleksy Enabler,"this new Fleksy works well across the board of IOS. I 'm using the tweak called, "Fleksy Enabler," which make Fleksy seems like very closed as a native iOS keyboard.
Great work guys, although there are still some minor bugs I have notice, but they are tolerable. I just wish the spelling words feature would be back on the next update.

I have noticed the Settings button takes you to several options, a lot of which either don't work with Voiceover or the button labels don't give you a clue what they do.

I had this problem too. Remember that the fleksy keyboard is now only located at the bottom of the screen where the actual iOS keyboard would be. Did you try tapping down there or were you using it like the old versions of Fleksy?

Glad to see that Fleksy has reintroduced accessibility in to one app, as I think that is great, but for some reason I guess I am just so used to typing on the old Fleksy that now typing only on the bottom part of the screen I rarely get a word right. If you have the time and patience to reprogram yourself to type in this bottom part I am sure you will love the app, I think though for me I am just so over this app and all the headaches and changes. Good luck to them, and who knows maybe I will take the time to adjust at least I have the option, but for me bluetooth keyboard is the way to go.

Hello it's nice to be able to use this app again. It's somewhat odd, though, that when backspacing, VoiceOver sometimes reads the word before the word being deleted. Wondering if I'm the only one lk seeing that.
If someone could tell me is it possible to enter punctuation like the quote, at sign, apostrophe, etc. Anymore? I don't see a way to enter symbols mode, if so, how is this done?

With the new Fleksy, it's rare for me to actually manage to get a word right. I also had a weird experience, while trying to post in Tweetings 2, where I did some sort of swipe gesture, and Fleksy deleted everything I'd written. Once it was all gone, it got stuck making the sound it makes when the last character is deleted, and no amount of touching or swiping would make it stop. Closing Fleksy itself did nothing, and the sound didn't stop until I closed Tweetings 2 from the app switcher. So I haven't given up on Fleksy, but I'm also not having much luck with it either; for now, I find myself reverting back to Fleksy VO.

Hey all, thanks for your feedback!

As we are working to resolve pending issues, I am listing the known ones and some differences in behavior from Fleksy VO.

Known Issues that will be resolved:
- Swipe left and hold is currently disabled in the main app.
- Swipe left and hold may start deleting indefinitely in other apps like Tweetings. This is why we temporarily disabled the function in Fleksy app (until we fix it).
- It is not possible to capitalize or Enter at this time.
- To read back the typed text, select Options menu and then Options menu again. A faster way will be introduced.
- When swiping left to delete, VO will read the previous word, not the one that was actually deleted. We will change the behavior back to say "Deleted word"
- Accuracy will be improved further.
- Instructions are outdated.

Feature changes:
- To go to symbols, swipe left or right with 2 fingers.
- Swipe up with two fingers does nothing at this time. To go to the menu, tap at the top part of the screen and navigate with VO to Options, Settings or Share.
- Favorites, Reply links, Raise to speak, Spell words, Lock orientation and Export dictionary features have been removed.
- The share functions don't clear the text automatically anymore.

If a feature you have been enjoying is on the list, please let us know you would like it back by creating a new Idea or voting existing ones at our feedback forum: http://feedback.fleksy.com/forums/239155-fleksy-keyboard-for-ios
As Fleksy evolves into more than an app we are re-evaluating all features from zero.

Thank you for the feedback!

Bill

I downloaded the Fleksy app. because it was excessible again. But I am having the same problem as a few others. I am unable to get to my keyboard. It will not let me out of the menue list. So I am unable to do any kind of typing.

Sorry I am using the iPhone 5c.

Hello,

One great option that Fleksy VO had was the "Copy and Clear" when pressing the Home button. This option would be much appreciated.

I mean this next sentence to sound blunt.

It was moronic removing the copy and clear function as an option.

Hello Brandon, in addition to bringing back features missing from the app, I would really appreciate it if you could add the spell word toggle again in settings. As I am a hearing in pared user, I found this feature to be invaluable for me when checking if a word is what it is by the addition of the spelling of it by Voiceover.

Again, as others have commented and am just confirming.
VO doesn't announce the previous deleted word. I must admit I was confused when I saw this behaviour.
Raise to speak isn't working for me. Therefore, when I put my hand near the speaker grill nothing happens.

I am using an iPhone 5 running 7.1.1

If there are any other quorkes that I find, I'll let you know here.
Having said the negative though, I am pleased that the mainstream app is back onto the path of becoming accessible again and as of all things, at times they got to get worse before they can become better. Something like that anyway.
I will continue to use the VO versions for now but will certainly keep trying the mainstream app and provide you guys feedback where given as you continue to improve with the experience for VO and sighted a like in up-coming versions.

Do keep up the good work! :)

I am having trouble getting to the symbols in the latest Fleksy app. I read in this thread that you have to swipe left or right with 2 fingers but this is not working for me. I'm doing my swipes at the bottom of the screen since that's where the keyboard is now. What am I missing? Also, how do you get to numbers? Any help would be appreciated. Keep up the great work with Fleksy. At the moment I have the new version as well as the Fleksy VO app and I just switch between them. I love what you have done with the main app. Can't believe you got it fixed in a relatively short period of time.

Hi, I just guess where the letters are, but most of my guesses are not correct

Hi all. just asking. will the Flexy SDK be supporting twitterrific? if so, when, and if not, is there a way where I can intigrate Flexy in apps that don't have it supported yet? thanks all.

Earl, I can answer your question about numbers. When you do the two finger swipe to the left or right to bring up the numbers/symbols keyboard, the numbers are aligned like they are on the iOS keyboard; that is, a row of 1 to 0 from left to right on the top row of the keyboard. I hope that helps.

Daniel - thanks for your feedback. We are aware of these issues, and are currently working to fix them and add features. We plan on adding the spell word feature, Voice Over announcing the deleted word, raise to speak, and more functionality in coming releases. It takes some time to develop these features in the app and insure that they are bug-free, but it is definitely one of our priorities.

Earle - You should be able to swipe left on the keyboard with 2 fingers to access numbers and symbols, and swipe left again to access secondary symbols. (you can also swipe right with two fingers to access these as well) I have just tested this again on a few devices and it is working properly. If it still doesn't work for you, you can share your device and OS information with me so I can help troubleshoot more effectively.

Jonathan Candler - our Fleksy SDK certainly can support Twitterrific, but it is up to the Twitterrific developer to integrate it into their app. We would love for Fleksy to be in Twitterrific and many other apps, but those app developers need to make that decision. We have made our SDK very simple to integrate for developers so that they will want to add Fleksy, but you can also help push developers to add us by contacting them via email, twitter, and other channels and expressing your wishes. Many apps have integrated Fleksy all because of our passionate users! If app developers see a benefit, they will add us.

Earl, you are not the only one.

I am definitely loving the new fleksy, and I appreciate everything the developers have done to make it this way. The one feature that I really miss is the lock orientation. I like to lock it into landscape and have a more spread out keyboard. I'm also experiencing the issue where voiceover doesn't say the word I deleted, it says the previous word instead. I also have questions about some of the toggles in the settings:
1. What is fast delete?
2. What is the spacebar row?
Thanks to the developers for all of their hard work on restoring accessibility to fleksy.

I love the new app. Thanks to the developers for all your hard work. I can't seem to find the new line button though. Can you please tell me where it's located on the keyboard?

Samantha - thank you for your feedback, and we are glad you appreciate our efforts! We are aware of issues like the "deleted word" not being announced, and are working on the fixes for future updates. For other feature suggestions, like lock orientation, you can vote on them at http://feedback.fleksy.com/forums/239160-fleksy-vo-for-ios. The features with the highest votes will be prioritized. Regarding your questions about the toggles in Settings, Fast Delete is a default setting in VO Mode, allowing you to delete a word at any point by swiping left. Spacebar row is automatically disabled in VO Mode since it is used by those who prefer to use the spacebar instead of swiping right for space.

Diana - currently the Fleksy app does not have a button for new line in VO Mode (in Fleksy VO this is swipe down with two fingers). This feature, as well as several others, is one that takes some time to develop. Please submit an idea and/or vote on features at http://feedback.fleksy.com/forums/239160-fleksy-vo-for-ios. Thanks!