I have a Samsung Galaxy S22 that I’m using for work purposes, as well as playing around with Android generally and keeping an eye on what’s out there for both platforms. I’m having several issues with work apps that mean I’m finding it very hard to be productive with this device. For a bit of context, I use my laptop most of the time but use the phone either when I’m commuting to and from work, or when I step away from the computer for whatever reason but still want to keep an eye on messages and emails.
- The Outlook app seems very hard to navigate with TalkBack, particularly when reading messages or going through large conversation threads. Swiping left and right through the messages is extremely inconsistent, either jumping me to the top or bottom of a message or to another seemingly random message in the thread, rather than continuing down through the message as I would expect. Exploring by touch can sometimes get around this, but it still feels rather clunky and can still give inconsistent results.
- When composing a message in Teams, it seems as though it is not possible to review or change what you have entered. TalkBack’s reviewing and editing commands do not work and neither does navigating via the volume keys (although I expect these are tied to TalkBack’s commands). Obviously this makes it very difficult to proofread or change my messages before I send them.
- Notifications, particularly with Outlook, can often be a good few minutes or even up to an hour behind Outlook on my computer, meaning there’s a good chance I may miss emails for a while after they come in. This is almost certainly not an internet connection issue as all other notifications work fine, as do other devices on my network when I’m using it at home.
- Probably the most significant issue is that it does not seem possible to use any keyboard other than the Samsung one while using apps on my work profile, including TalkBack’s Braille keyboard. I can use Voice Typing but that’s about it. I don’t know if this is a general Android policy for work profiles or if it’s something my organisation have enabled, but I wouldn’t know where to start with asking our IT teams about this. I can say with 99% certainty that they would have no idea.
Just to clarify a couple of points. When I refer to the “work profile”, my organisation uses Microsoft Intune which means I have to first download the Company Portal app to my device, authenticate through there, and then a work profile is created which separates my work apps and files from my personal ones. Surprisingly given Apple’s focus on privacy, Android appears to do a much better job at this kind of separation than iOS. Secondly, while I’m primarily using this as a work device, it was not provided by my company. My company do not provide work phones and suggest we download the apps to our own devices if we need them, but I bought this device from a friend because I refuse to have work apps on my personal device, both for work/life balance as well as security reasons.
Has anyone had experience of any of the points I’ve raised above and have any suggestions on how I could get around them? Alternatively, is there a device that might work better for my use case, such as a Pixel phone using Google’s version of TalkBack? I’m aware Google’s version can be installed on a Samsung device, but I don’t seem to be able to run any ADB commands on this device which I suspect is another restriction by the work policy.
Or, would I do better to get myself and old/refurbished iPhone and stick to what I know best?
Thanks in advance for any advice.