Duolingo - Language Lessons

The new version seems very accessible on a first inspection. If nobody else gets around to updating the page I'll do so soon.

I've been using this app extensively and not having major access problems. Here are a few notes on the program:
1. It wasn't clear at first, and perhaps there is a visual way to get this, but when you go to the page for a language, thelessons that are not available yet at your level are dimmed, and VO says "dimmed." However, there is no indication on a lesson if you've completed it or not, but if you go into a lesson and it says something about reinforcing your memory, that means it's a lesson you completed and you can do it again, but you can also go back and go into another lesson. Usually the last two lessons before the first dimmed one are those you haven't completed yet.
2. The lessons will be called something like adjectives, and within each lesson, there might be anywhere from one to at least nnine sections and the program tells you you are on, say, 3 of 4. There are 20 questions per section. If you quit, you get a message that all your work for that session will be lost, but that just means that section you haven't completed. Any sections you already completed before it are saved.
3. When you complete a lesson, you are on a page with a lot of numbers. What they are points on a chart that maps your work that week. I'm confused by it but it doesn't matter. What happens is whatever level goal you set for yourself, that screen will tell you if you've reached your goal for that day or how many points you still need.
4. Most of the exercises don't come with explanation. So, they give you a sentence withwords you haven't learned yet, and you are either asked to translate by typing or translate by choosing words from a list. Chances are the words you don't know are made clear in the list because, for example, you know you are missing a noun and there is only one that fits. But you also have the option to double tap on the word you don't know and you will get a definition of it. It's not cheating, just part of the learning process.
However, occasionally, especially in the beginning lessons, there is actually some information in the middle of the screen talking about a topic in brief, such as gender. It's really easy to miss these as they aren't spoken automatically, so don't skip around the screen too much at first or you may miss something useful. just expect the first lessons to take some time and when you get used to working the exercises and figure out your own strategies, it gets a lot faster.
5. There is one access glitch when it comes to answers you actually have to type. Sometimes there is an edit field that says "edit" to tap on. Sometimes just the words "type in English" or "type in Spanish." Tap on that and you can type. However, sometimes you get a normal edit field, and sometimes when you start to type you hear a thumping sound and you can't read back or edit what you've already typed. Know that in that situation your keystrokes and your deletions are, in fact entered. When I get lost and don't know where I am in the sentence to be typed, if you double tap on that line that says "type in Spanish" (or English) again, you hear a sound and a menu is presented above that where one option is "select all." Double tap that, and then tap delete on the keyboard and your work to that point is erased and you can start again. Not great, but since most of the rest of the app is so accessible, it's worth fussing with these occasional problem areas.Besides the on-screen keyboard you can use a bluetooth keyboard, dictation for your English answers, or handwriting mode. Also, if you leave the app to type somewhere else, like if you use braille entry in iOS 7 or earlier, the app stays in the same place when you come back, which not all do.
6. When you are asked to speak a sentence, there is an unlabelled button in the middle of the screen. Tap and hold on that button and it will start recording your speech until you release it.
7. To figure out if a word has an accent, you must read over it character by character. If you want to enter these accented characters, tapand hold on the letter, when you hear the burbbly sound, you can move your finger left or right and when you hear the accented variation you want, release your finger and it will be entered, regardless as to whether you are in normal or touch typing mode. This is also true for the n with the tilda over it - tap and hold on the N and slide your finger to the right or left after you hear the burbbly sound. It takes a little practice, but it's not hard when you are used to it. If you want an inverted question mark or exclamation mark at the beginning of a sentence, do the same to the uninverted form. If anyone figures how to do this in handwriting mode, please share as I can't figure it out, no matter what language I am set to when I start handwriting.
8. In iOS 7, not sure if this is the same in 8, I have found VO to cooperate occasionally with these lessons that have two languages. Sometimes I can swipe over the english questions and hear them in English, and when I get to the Spanish I am to translate, it will be read with a spanish voice. But once it stops doing that during a session, I can't get it to do it again. So one must resort to just reading over the spanish words letter by letter to be clear what how a word is spelled, hearing it in english letters with english pronunciation. Here, I'm talking about Spanish, but this is true for any language. I've worked with the French a little and you really have to do the letter by letter checking as so much of these words are pronounced with many of the letters silent.
9. Sometimes when you are to translate a lesson, instead of typing, you have a series of buttons attached to words in the translation language. As you tap them, they are entered in the middle of the screen. If you make a mistake and want to remove a word, tap on it again. Sometimes it's spoken quietly to indicate it's been removed but not always. You can always find the sentence in the middle of the screen and see what words are there. If you need to remove a word before the last one you entered, you must remove them starting with the last one and add them all again. If the word "the" or another word will be needed twice, it will be there in the list twice and you must choose the one you haven't selected before which can be a bit confusing but otherwise, you just remove the first occurance and mess up your sentence.
10. One thing I like to do is turn off speech with a three finger double tap when I know I am on the continue button but before tapping it. That way, when the next exercise starts with a sentence spoken in Spanish, I don't have VO talking over it. When it does that, I find the button to speak the sentence again, turn off VO, double tap the button, then turn vo on again after hearing the sentence. Pain in the butt, but I don't think app developers have control over this function of VO.

11. If you want to use more than one language, you need to go to your profile, tape change under your language, than tap add and choose another. Do not worry, you do not lose your progress in the first language, even though the button says "change". When you want to work on the other language, you have to keep going back to your profile and tapping change to start work in the second language.
I've been quite successful at using this app, and also finding it really has helped me learn much more than I'd expected. One thing I do is regardless as to whether the exercise is to speak the sentence, I usually speak it aloud anyway, and repeatedly tap the button to replay until I'm comfortable that my pronunciation is a decent replica. I knew a good deal of Spanish before starting this, but very little French and am having success with both. Five days after starting work on Spanish, I was on the street and heard a woman selling home-cooked Spanish food. Yes, that's against the health regs, but it was fine. Anyway, I rarely process what people are saying in Spanish in passing, but this time I understood her immediately, had a discussion about what she had, how much they cost, whether she had change for a 20, etc., all in Spanish and completely fluidly in a way I haven't done in decades, and I really felt it was a result of the work I've done in this little app. I also turned on a spanish language radio station and had the same experience - where usually I generally pick out words, and now I was understanding everything. It doesn't seem like it should have that much impact. It's really a simple little app and you don't spend time memorizing vocabulary words or exploring the grammar in depth, but it really really works.

.

Hi Everyone,
I am planning on making a podcast for this app soon.
I have been finding this app very useful.

thanks in advance for putting together a podcast for this app, I played around with the app today and like it. Looking forward to listening to yur podcast.o

I have enjoyed using this app. Does anyone know how to enter accented letters when typing on a braille display? Looking forward to the podcast as well.

One thing I missed and just noticed is that in the spanish lessons, the on-screen keyboard has a line at the top with accented letters and the inverted question and exclamation marks. It's a little odd because the letters are all uppercase, but the punctuation marks are quite useful.
Also, in my notes above, I talked about how sometimes the non-English words and phrases would be read with a voice appropriate for that language and sometimes not. I discovered that I have the English voice I use on my language roter twice - it's the Australian voice and it's there as the default voice and a second time. If I have the roter set to it as the default voice, then the other languages switch off more often the way they ought to in the app. I have tested that for French, Spanish, German, Italian, and Dutch and it worked for all except the Dutch.
I keep being amazed by this app despite it's imperfections. There are so many powerful apps that we just can't access, so we never really get the full range of tools that sighted users get out of their phones. Or it takes so long to use them that they end up being impractical - like trying to read a restaurant menu while dessert is being served. This is a noteable exception. Not only is it a really useful app that gives us a unique and powerful tool, but we *can* use it the same way sighted users do. Got a little time, in a doctor's waiting room, on a bus or train while commuting, or before falling asleep? Learn a little of another language, as much or as little as you want in a day. I think it takes a little longer to get through a lesson than it might for a sighted user, but the difference is not so much that it changes the nature of what one can accomplish with the app.

I was using this app when it updated today, and the check and continue buttons vanished from VoiceOver's perception. They're not just unlabeled, but I can't locate them at all.
I sent the developers a quick note via the feedback link within the app itself, but if others could do similarly, especially if they're more experienced in this sort of reporting, that'd be ace. I feel fairly fumbling.
I do so love this app, I'd hate to see it become inaccessible.

I am not sure how this works with a Braille display--I should hook up mine and check it out, but using Braille input, if you switch to the keyboard of your target language, you can use the Braille rules for that language. For example, if I switch to the Spanish keyboard and then switch to Braille input, I can get an accented a with dots 1-2-3-5-6 (of), e-accent with dots 2-3-4-6 (the), i-accent with dots 1-4 (st), n-tilde with dots 1-2-4-5-6 (er), o-accent with dots 1-4-6 (ing), and u-accent with dots 2-1-4-5-6 (with).

You'd have to consult the Braille rules for your target language. I do tend to shy away from using Braille input for Duolingo, since the input field for entering a translation is usually inaccessable, and a misplacement of your fingers could cause you to enter an incorrect word that you won't know about until you press "check" and are told that you made a typo.

Aaron C--you mentioned above that you couldn't wait for the Esperanto course to go live.

For those of you who haven't yet discovered this, the Esperanto course is live. I am taking it in the IOS app, and am having good luck with it, other than the issues mentioned above. I tested out of many of the basic modules, since I already know some Esperanto, so I'm not sure if the course explains how to type, but I've been using x-notation, and that works well for me. For all of the circumflex-ed letters (c, g, h, j, and s) and u-breve, just append an x after the letter (cx, gx, hx, jx, sx, and ux).

Since there is no Esperanto voice for IOS (that I am aware of), you will just need to get used to the English pronunciation of Esperanto words, or read through them letter by letter. VoiceOver with Samantha pronounces the special letters correctly. Do listen to the audio pronunciations when they are available so that you can hear how the words are pronounced. I usually try to listen to the spoken sentence before looking at the written version, to make sure that I am able to hear, and comprehend what is spoken. Again, as stated above, you may need to three-finger double tap to turn off speech, double tap the "speak text" button, and then re-enable speech.

Good luck.

To continue to the next problem in a given lesson, swipe to the bottom of the screen. When I use the app, there is a perfectly clear continue button in the same place where the check button is. To continue after the lesson, touch the bottom center of the screen. sometimes swiping doesn't show it, but there's always a button there labeled continue. Again, this might just be for me. if it helps, I'm running the latest version on an iPhone 6, software version 8.3. It took me a bit to figure out where the button is at the end of the lesson, but I promise, it's there.

I am having the same problem a lot of others here are now having. I am using an iPhone 5 with the latest version of iOS.

Does anyone know how to contact the developers about this? I tried locating a "contact" link on their website but couldn't find one.

I would also encourage everyone else who is having this issue with Duolingo to write to them about it...that is, if they can find the contact information! The mroe people who write to them, the more they'll have to listen! There is strength in numbers!

I am still waiting to hear back about how I can contact them!

I suppose, if anything, you can just tweet them at their Twitter account listed above. That's what I did, though have yet to hear back. (I did provide a link to this page so they could see "reviews" directly from blind consumers.)

I do hope they care about their blind users!

There is a "contact us" link at this page:
https://www.duolingo.com/help

There's also a form to send them feedback directly within the app, if you tap through to your profile. It opens up an email and auto-fills which versions and courses you're using. Pretty handy.
I haven't gotten any answer back yet, though I'm not much surprised given that they just announced a hundred million users last week. It doesn't sound like the latest UI changes were very popular with anyone, sighted or not, so hopefully a fix will come soon.
For what it's worth, I'm also still on a 5s, I don't know if the 6's are having better luck..

I'm using an iPhone 6, and the only problem I encounter with VoiceOver is it not reading what I'm writing when translating sentences from Spanish to English. I've had no problems whatsoever continuing to the next lesson, though admittedly, I was very frustrated at first.

I have tried repeatedly and the continue button is invisible to VO. I am also using a 5S. I wrote the developer when this first happened through the form in the app. I received no response at all, not even an automated recognition that it had been received.
There was another update in the past few days that has not fixed the problem. I'm wondering if a bunch of us submitted negative reviews in the app store, whether that would get some attention.

However this is done, the review needs to be fixed. The app is completely unusable on a 5S. I don't know what is different about a 6 that would make a difference, but that difference should be noted.

If anyone has both a 5 or 5S and a 6 or can get access to both, I'd be interested to know. Again, if you put your finger at the very bottom center of the screen, at least for me, the continue button is always there. It's baffling that so many other people are having this problem and I'm not, since I'm usually the one having problems. Lol.

Hi, I am new to this forum, and I just downloaded the Duolingo app. I have an IPad mini that I running the app on. I read through the posts here, and saw that I should look for a "continue" button at the bottom center of the screen. I also understood that I would have to slide around to find it as it didn't appear when "swiping". I still don't see any button, and in fact I had someone who could see the screen look for it, and it didn't seem to be there at all. Anyone have any clues? The beginning accessibility for profile and such was great. Even the first lesson spoke well. I use Alex speech and the French was read properly.
Thanks so much.

To me, this sudden drop not only in accessibility of the app itself but also in the responsiveness of Duolingo to our concerns is quite stunning!

I indeed recall hearing that, in the past, the developers were quite responsive to our needs when we informed them of them.

I suppose they just don't care anymore about their blind and visually impaired users.

Perhaps a bunch of negative reviews from us in the app store might put some sense into them. Also some negative tweets/other posts on social media might help... This isn, indeed, shameful.

Also, though, I wonder if the issue is only with iPhone models before the 6...? If it is, I'm not so sure they'll get around to ealing with that one so quickly, as they might expect, I suppose, everyone immediately to upgrade to the latest and greatest... :/

Just tweeted them about the e-mail no-contact issue! They did reply, and...

They asked me, again, what the issue was. I described it with as much detail as I caould, over Twitter, and they said that they would "look into this and fix it"! So, now, it's in writing and it sounds pretty promising! Let's see how this goes...

LESSON IN THIS: Twitter is a more powerful tool than we all might think, especially when we begin mentioning company names. (At least, I think that's what did it.) Perhaps we should all start employing this method among our advocacy/activism strategies.

And I have the exact same issue. I cannot see the continue button. Even if I put my finger exactly on the place where it should be, (yes, my friend had to show me), all it does is make the little "Thunk thunk" sound that usually indicates you're finger is touching on an area with no content.

My friend has a 6 plus and 8.3, and hers is A OK, whereas my 6 with 8.4 renders the app inoperative. So, I doubt it's a phone model issue.

Sad to hear about their unresponsiveness as well. I'll try email and Twitter, and see what happens.

I recently downloaded the app and am encountering the same issue with the continue button not being visible to voiceover. A friend told me a work around with turning voiceover off and then touching the bottom right corner of the screen. However, this is extremely frustrating and time-consuming to do whenever I want to move to the next question. Definitely going to email/tweet the developer about this. The app looks really great except for this one problem.

Sad that we may have to get an entirely new phone in order to make this app accessible again... :(

As fr as I know, they STILL haven't come up with a new update fixing this issue. Their silence is, if you'll pardon the expression, deafening, at least since I started that stir on Twitter about this that I mentioned above...

It's sad. This was such a great app before recent events and they apparently used to be very responsive to our concerns...

Shame, Duolingo, shame on you for denying access to this app to so many blind people who were really learning a lot from it.

The missing button just became accessible again after I installed the update which was released a few hours ago. I would not go as far as calling DuoLingo fully accessible, and I must say that I find it disappointing that it took them like TWO months to apply this rather small fix. But well, they are back on the right track I guess...

…for now. Their latest update fixed things for me too. Emailing and tweeting got me nowhere, which is still a concern, but I’m happy they fixed things regardless.

I feel I should let folks know that, should the app’s accessibility go belly-up in the future, their web-client is a very good alternative. Mere days before the update I decided to give that a try, and it worked great for me.

L

When I started tweeting about the inaccessibility a while back, I actually did get their attention there on Twitter and got in writing that they'd be addressing the issue, so I think calling apps like this out, especially on social media, can be effective. I was calling them out on Twitter quite a bit for being unresponsive befroe that, kind of Twitter shaming.

Also, I think the reason it took so long to get this is that they really didn't even release any update for 2 months since the last one, which, again, though, is rather poor app development/design practice, IMO.

Duolingo just got a lot more visual. Now a cast of over 30 original characters from around the world brings context to every sentence you learn. A child says "I am a girl", a waiter says "What do you want to eat?" and the voice even changes based on who is speaking.

Duolingo can also now teach over 500 words with original, colorful illustrations. Foods, animals, colors, people, professions and more come to life.

I would hate to think that, "getting more visual" will possibly reverse their recent strides in accessibility. I would hate to take one step forward, only to take three steps back.

I plan to check back here often, consider a permanent switch to the web-client, and use my Update button with utmost care.

Concerned,
L

I have to agree. I haven't used this app since I heard about the accessibility flaws.

Hi,
I haven't noticed any accessibility issues yet. I am in Turkish basics so I am not sure how it is for the other languages or if I'll encounter accessibility issues later on in the lessons. I'll let you all know what I find.

I said before that it's a pretty good alternative in case the app misbehaves again.

I should rephrase. It's an, ok, alternative. So far I am able to complete lessons with no trouble, but the log-in process is problematic. The, "Log In" button itself, seems to be in a read-only edit field, and cannot be clicked on. I had to reset my password in order to get back in. Luckily, bookmarking my Lessons page seems to make this a non-issue for the time being.

I have been using the new Duolingo for some days now and have had no accessibility issues with it, at least none that weren't there a few updates ago. I can really see no accessibility changes for the worse since then.

The only thing I notice as a person with some vision, for instance, is little illustrations at the beginning screens for each lesson.

I am presently working through Italian basics.

Here's an interesting one, I've seen this happen on more than just my iPhone so it's not just an issue with mine alone. I'm able to get through some parts of a lesson, but when I reach a certain point where I'm asked to translate what someone says from Spanish to English, I type in what it says, hit the check button, and....nothing. It just sits there, and my text seems to disappear. I don't hear any kind of sound to indicate that what I'm typing is either right or wrong, the text just completely disappears, and the app simply sits there and does nothing which effectively means I'm stuck, and can't continue a lesson. has anyone else encountered this and if so, how'd you fix it? I looked through all the other comments and people had said that in previous versions the continue button wasn't accessible, but it is now. However when you double-tap it, nothing happens. This has happened on another friend's iPhone 6 with Voiceover enabled. Thanks, hope someone has some ideas.

The lessons always work fine for me.

I briefly tried out the web-based version of Duolingo. There is a way on the website to see the new grammatical information introduced for a lesson. Is there a way to do this in the app?

I have found this app to be terrific. The only accessibility bugs I found that 3 buttons were unlabeled. Two are right before the continue button, but I'm not sure what those do, and one of them is the button to let you quit your lesson. But you could even label them your self. They cause no problems and I have been able to use this app flawlessly sence I got it a year ago. I think, however, that some of the issues people were facing wer general bugs because some sighted users were complaining that things were disappearing from the main screen.

Regarding the bug others are experiencing where you submit an answer and you don't get a correct or incorrect noise - I've run across this too.

However, this only seems to happen when you hit the "Practice" button or try to "Test Out" of a specific skill.
Regular lessons seem to work.
I'm worrying, though, that I may need to "Test Out" of skills to progress and will thus be stuck, but so far I've been able to progress in German with regular lessons.

Does anyone know the best way to report bugs? I tried checking their website but only saw some kind of troubleshooting forum, which I wasn't sure was the only place to contact them? I figure maybe if they know it is just with the Test/Practice parts, they may be able to figure out what is wrong and fix it.

I started using this app in April after our honeymoon in Tenerife when I decided that the next time we went back I would be better with my Spanish. This latest version which was updated on September 6th seems good to me. I don't know whether I just missed it in the previous versions but I do like the fact that you can now find out what the spanish words mean if you have never come across them before. I've also learned some valuable tips from other users by reading this thread. I had a lot of trouble recording my speech but didn't realise that you were meant to hold down the button.

I did find that when I upgraded to IOS10 the audio went very quiet but turning off audio ducking in the voiceover section has solved this problem. It also seems that the two buttons at the top of the app do exactly the same thing so it's hard to label them.

Also, I'm also interested in the social aspect so if anyone cares to add me my name is KerryFielding.

I quite often use a Logitech keys-to-go with this app but have to type on the screen as I can't find the accent keys. If anyone knows how to invoke them I"d really appreciate knowing. Thanks.

I haven't been using the app for a while and now I have noticed that for some reason I can't access the settings to change, for instance the time at which I want reminders or to see my dueling friends. Has anyone else noticed this or knows how to access the settings in the last version 4.10.4? thank you.

OK, so, earlier this month, I thought I had reached the end of the language course I was studying because I had reached the bottom scrolling and couldn't go any further. I was indeed surprised that I was done with it so early. Then, I continued to receive e-mails from Duolingo telling me to continue on to Challenge 13 or something like that. Yet, again, I could go no further in the course than I already had. The app simply wouldn't let me scroll down any more than I already had. When I clicked on the link to "Challenge 13" in the e-mail, all it did was take me to the course page and still would not allow me to go any further. Indeed, I never received any e-mail or notification confirmation that I had indeed completed the course at all!

Has anyone else had this experience? Is this a VoiceOver issue or just a bug with the app? Have I, rather, in fact, reached the end of the course but Duolingo keeps erroneously sending me e-mails?

Help would be much appreciated.

Hi everyone,
I started using duolingo yesterday (English-Italian). It has worked great with the first few tests but now that I have finished basics I I cant seem to go to the next category. There is a list of category but each row contains two of them without separate buttons per category. There are 3 unlabelled buttons on the screen but i cant figure out which one leads to the specefic category (basics ii) that I want and if that buton would be concistant in future. They do have distinct numbers in the label so i presume you know what they would mean if you memorize those.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Greetings, Anouk,

I wish that Klingon was available on this app