Description of App
From the app store:
Glympse is a fast, free and simple way to share your real-time location using GPS tracking, with any of your family, friends or coworkers!
No sign-up required! Those you share with can view your Glympse from any web-enabled device.
Send a Glympse to let friends and family know you are on your way. Request a Glympse from a colleague who is always running late. Set up a Glympse group
for your family reunion.
App Features:
+ Easy: no sign up required
+ Safe: your Glympse automatically expires
+ Live: share location in real time with dynamic map
+ Open: share with anyone – no app required to view
+ Passive: runs in the background
+ Global: works anywhere you have GPS and a data connection
Use Glympse to:
+ coordinate a social night out with friends
+ let your spouse know your ETA when you’ll be home from work
+ let your family know you are safe while running or cycling
+ find friends at a concert festival
+ provide a courtesy notice with ETA to a client when stuck in traffic
+ share a charity run route with followers on Facebook or Twitter
+ direct emergency or roadside personnel to you quickly
• Glympse supports iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and now Apple Watch and iMessage. Please note that an iPhone or iPad with cellular data are best suited for
sending Glympses as they have GPS for pinpoint location and can share your location while you are on the move.
Comments
More information about the app
I was able to send a Glympse to my sighted husband several different ways and he could track my entire route on paratransit as we wound our way through Silicon valley, dropping off and picking up various disabled passengers. Strangely, he couldn't get the app on his Android device, a Nexus 9 to track my route, but on his Windows PC, he could open a web page and view it fine. This was very helpful because he could tell when I was getting close to home and could pop dinner in the oven at the appropriate time. Though I could have used an app like BlindSquare to tell where I was and phone him, we are finding it much easier for me to simply send him a Glympse so he can track where I am and how far. You can send a Glympse via email or text message, and I tried emailing both his business and personal account, as well as texting his cell and his google voice number. All options worked with the exception of his Nexus 9 not being able to track within the Glympse app.
When he sent me a Glympse, I could actually track his progress, which surprised me, but it's because it is using Apple maps whose accessibility is surprisingly good.
What doesn't work so well is the lack of accessibility in the app itself. I know which button to tap now to send him a Glympse but that's about all I can do. And if I don't have a very solid internet connection I get Error at the top of my screen followed by the text "Toast Notification" which turns out, according to Wikipedia to be some Android development thing -- a notification that automatically dismisses itself. My guess is that the programmers aren't filling in the correct fields in their development IDE to appropriately label both messages and controls (elements, widdgits, whatever Apple calls them!)
Visually I bet there's more information, but that's all voiceOver can see.
So below is my correspondence with their support. Let's hope they make good on their accessibility promises!
*********Pasted from Email:*******
## In replies all text above this line is added to the ticket ##
Ticket #47461: Requesting better support for Voiceover
Your request (
#47461)
has been updated.
To review the status of the request and add additional comments, follow the link below:
http://glympse.zendesk.com/hc/requests/47461
You can also add a comment by replying to this email.
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Nicole Miller, Feb 3, 1:07 AM PST:
Hello Deborah,
Thank you for your email with your suggestions. We found your ideas to be important and worthwhile for a future release.
We’re in the process of wrapping up a new version and will look into making some accessibility changes.
Hopefully in a new future release soon, you will see these changes incorporated.
Please don't hesitate to get back to us in the future.
Thank you again,
Nicole
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Nicole Miller, Feb 2, 4:57 AM PST:
Request
#47467
"Error Toast notification" was closed and merged into this request. Last comment in request
#47467:
When I try to do many things in Glympse, such as access settings, attach a photo to my profile or change the language back to English (I got it stuck for
a while in French) I get "Error" at the top of the screen followed by "Toast Notification". I am attempting to use Glympse with VoiceOver on iOS 10.2.1
which is challenging because many buttons have no labels or funny labels such as icsendwhite". I am not sure if the error is caused by VoiceOver running
in the background, but it would be more helpful if it was more explanatory.
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Armstrongdeborah, Feb 1, 9:14 AM PST:
I am blind and an experienced iPHONE user. Glympse is a great tool for sharing my location with my friends on Android, especially if I need them to find
me. But so many buttons are unlabeled. Please improve the app so it better supports VoiceOver users. If you are in Silicon Valley, I am happy to demo the
issue in person. I work in Cupertino and live in Milpitas.
This email is a service from Glympse Support.
[1QLWR7-OG37]
i'm giving this app a try
Thank you for posting this app. Even though it is not the most accessible, it sounds like it will help me by allowing a sighted family member track my location. Hopefully, the accessibility will get better.
No change in Version 3.22.0
On March 27, version 3.22.0 was released. And sadly there have been no accessibility improvements. I don't know how to get through to these guys. This is just such a perfect app for blind folks who need sighted friends on different platforms to be able to track their progress and find them. All the company needs to do is label some buttons correctly. As a programmer, though not an app developer, I know this isn't really hard!
And they need to get rid of error messages that read simply "error".
I wish this app wasn't free, because I'd be happy to pay for a more stable, more accessible and better designed version. Maybe some app developer needs to make a better competitor and separate me from a few dollars!
Despite my whining, I've used Glympse every day. When I ride paratransit I never know if the ride will be 15 minutes or 2 hours. I can ask the driver, but often even he doesn't know because he gets realtime updates on a tablet to pick up clients. It's so helpful to have my husband know how close to home I am on the route.