Hi everyone,
I have a rather small, but also for me rather annoying, problem.
Because I use VoiceOver I have my earphones plugged into my iPhone almost all of the time, as not to bother everyone around me with the constant talking. Also, I often carry my phone around in my pocket. This leads to a problem.
Sometimes, when I pull out the phone or put it back in the pocket, I accidently hit the headset buttons. Hitting the volume buttons is not a problem, but if I hit the middle button and I've listened to music, e.g. through Spotify, the music starts again. Sometimes I don't notice it either because the sound is low. Once it ran for an hour without me noticing it.
So, does anyone here know a way to get around this? I've searched a lot and have not really found any way. As I said, this is a really small problem, but for me it is annoying and it hinders me from playing music and so on because I don't want to risk it accidently starting. A bit strange, I know.
The only "solution" (rather a ugly workaround) that I've come up with is to have an app that uses the same API to play either a very short file with only silence or just a non-existent file, so that the music API won't have anything to play when I hit the button. I can make it behave quite like that through a somewhat complicated maneuvre in Spotify, but it's just too much work to do every time. Problem is, no such app exists that I know of and I'm not an app developer.
If anyone can come up with another way I'd be very grateful.
By blindpk, 3 August, 2017
Forum
iOS and iPadOS
Comments
Sent feedback to Apple.
I've now sent feedback to Apple with two suggestions of improvement regarding this "problem". Firstly the ability to clear the "Now laying" UI (the one in Control Center) and secondly to provide the option to disable audio playback to start when the phone is locked. This would work by making the audio continue to play when the phone is locked but when you pause/stop the audio you won't be able to start it again until you unlock the phone.
I also updated the topic title here for clarity.
I feel like if they were
I feel like if they were going to make it so you can't resume audio playback when you're phone is locked that should be a setting because I play music when my phone is locked a lot. If you don't use the pause button on your headphones there's a strange work around to disable it. You have to unplug the headphones halfway, so that the sound still comes through them but it sounds distorted and quiet. Then you hold down the pause button for about ten seconds and slowly plug the headphones back in. This usually works but sometimes takes a few tries
Consider faulty headphones
It is possible that you are not actually bumping the play/pause button, rather your earpods could be damaged. Too many times to count I have had to replace mine when the wires in the cord right close to the jack start to go. One of the first signs I notice is my phone seems to be starting or stopping music when I don't want it to. This is usually followed by the headset volume control stopping working, then if I let it get that far, the left or right channel will cut out. I think the wires breaking is aggravated by leaving the headset plugged in in my pocket, and the less than conventional angles I hold my phone at when using the onscreen braille keyboard.
Not positive this is what's happening to you, but a new set of earpods might be worth a shot. If you can isolate the faulty cable as your problem the apple store has been good to me about providing replacements if they're under warranty.
Good luck. When someone comes out with a no lag wireless head set blind people the world over will rejoice.
Thanks
Paige: Yeah, it would have to be a setting. I find it a bit strange that there is no such setting already, since you can turn off many things on the lock screen (like Siri). The workaround you suggest will not work for me since I want to be able to use the button for answering calls etc.
Keith: It's possible that the earpods are damaged, however, I don't think so. They show no other signs of it and I had this problem with the phone when it was brand new, using the brand new earpods.
Hopefully, someday, something will be implemented to get around this.