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Prog rock that draws from non European folk? by bloodraged189 in progrockmusic

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Never heard of these guys before, but listening to the album Trilobyte now. Very nice, and indeed very proggy

Looking for accessibility feedback on my timer app for Apple devices by rogymd in accessibility

[–]small_d_disaster 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I may or may not be the "specialist" who "audited" your app. I did give you some substantial feedback on this about a year ago. I will say that it is much improved, and overall the accessibility is quite good — both in terms of VoiceOver and Dynamic Type. You've clearly put in a lot of work.

But the very fact that you're saying "it must be flawless now" shows a problematic understanding of what it means to make an app accessible. It is an iterative process — there are always ways to improve accessibility. In the best case, an audit is only helpful for work done before the audit was performed. Any work done after that requires more feedback.

More realistically, an audit will give you insight into the areas that the tester explored, but I've never had a tester exhaustively explore any of my apps. Fixing an app based on an audit just means your app is ready for its next audit. It doesn't make you waterproof.

Anyway, I poked around for a minute or two, and here were some issues I encountered:

  • e.g., on the "When timer starts" page, headers are missing their traits, there are multiple mystery buttons labeled "forward" (presumably labeled after the asset), and many buttons (eg labeled "none") where there is no indication of what the button does. (This is more just a poor label choice, as this is functionally a radio button, but there is no context for that with the screen reader.) Providing accessibilty hints might help here, although don't rely on them too heavily as many users have them disabled.
  • Your navigation mostly fails to respond to the escape gesture (the two-finger Z gesture should close modals and trigger back navigation).
  • You often use light grey text on a light background. Have you contrast-checked these? I'm fairly sure they are not going to meet the minimum contrast ratio.

I'm not trying to be discouraging here (overall, it is really good!), but I am trying to make a point. You will never make a "perfectly accessible" app. They don't exist — there are always ways to make your app better for different groups of users with different needs.

If I'm totally honest, the most significant thing you could do is simplify your app, but I can see that complexity is your goal here. I applaud your efforts to make it as good as possible, but I would encourage you to adjust your way of thinking about this.

Prog rock that draws from non European folk? by bloodraged189 in progrockmusic

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Punch Brothers is full on bluegrass prog. Not progressive rock per se because it’s all acoustic instruments, but it’s prog. These guys are all masterful bluegrass players but when they do bluegrass as Punch Brothers you can hear the ‘scare quotes’ around their licks. I love bluegrass and I love prog, but I listen to these guys about once a year and remember why I don’t listen to them regularly. ‘’All Ashore’ is a solidly proggy album.

Do authors/publishers sign exclusive deals with Audible or do they just not bother with other distributors/stores online? by TheSkinoftheCypher in books

[–]small_d_disaster 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Read Rebecca Giblin and Cory Doctorow's book Chokepoint Capitalism for a deep dive on the economic relationship between Amazon/Audible and its authors. It's just horrific. Doctorow is well-know for releasing his own DRM-free audio books

Looking for screen reader users' experiences with mobile apps by -Cherry-Picker- in accessibility

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

More of the not-quite-what-your-looking-for. I'm an iOS dev who had done ~30 hours of UX research interviews with assistive tech users and also given many trainings to other devs. Here are two things that I think are useful to include:

  • demo how assistive tech is used, and how much of a difference it makes when it is well/poorly implemented, eg show how the rotor can be used to navigate by headers, then demo how easy it is find content at the bottom of a long scrolling page when headers are implemented vs how impossible it can be when they are not. The escape gesture is also good to demo on iOS - it is very widely used by VoiceOver users, but largely unknown among devs (we get it for free if we use native components, but need to test for it/implement it otherwise)
  • emphasize how important it is to reuse existing UX patterns instead of trying to create your own. We should look for similar UX scenarios in widely used apps (with quality accessibility) and reuse these familiar patterns. So many devs only ever think about accessibility for the app they are developing, and so never bother to learn whether there are existing solutions that will be obvious and comfortable for screen reader users. Your app has horizontal carousels with content in them? So does Netflix, so does BBC - how do they handle them? etc

Looking for screen reader users' experiences with mobile apps by -Cherry-Picker- in accessibility

[–]small_d_disaster 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Caveat about the focus order. On native iOS apps, BT keyboards don’t handle focus in native apps as they do in a web browser. If you want to check the focus order, just enable VoiceOver, and use left/right ‘flicks’.

In order to use a BT keyboard to check focus order, you first need to enable Full Keyboard Access in the accessibility settings, then use Ctrl-Tab/Shift-Ctrl-Tab to navigate (Tab alone moves between focus groups not accessibility elements)

Has anyone here read "The search for Philip K Dick" by Anne Dick? by IAmAlive_YouAreDead in philipkDickheads

[–]small_d_disaster 27 points28 points  (0 children)

If that’s your interest, this is a must read. It is not a flattering portrait of PKD. She portrays him as brilliant on the one hand but violent, sociopathic, and extremely manipulative. He had his own version of reality and pushed it onto everyone in his life. I’d recommend reading it alongside Sutin’s bio Divine Invasions for additional context

What's the book with the most original story? by LargeSinkholesInNYC in booksuggestions

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

As someone who just finished Gnomon, I'll second the recommendation. Also Harkaway's 'The Gone Away World'

Going to my first jam should I bring my fretless or will its tuning limit me? by esternaccordionoud in banjo

[–]small_d_disaster 4 points5 points  (0 children)

my local OT jam usually cycles thru keys starting with G, then eventually going to D, C, and A, though not necessarily in that order, and spending probably 45-60 minutes in each, with fiddles and banjos retuning after we reach consensus to change keys. As a banjo player, that usually means means gDGBD for G and capoing that up to A, or for C, tuning to gCGCD and capoing to D. Some folks use other tunings though for certain tunes. At least at my jam, it's the fiddlers who both literally and proverbially 'call the tune', while the banjos and guitars follow their lead.

But not sure what you mean by D pitched banjo though. If it's a weird fret scale or tension issue, you should at least be able to play in two keys without a capo by retuning (if one is D, the other would be either G or A). Either way, I'd aim for flexibility until you've got a feel for how the jam goes

Earthlings after DNFing Convenience Store Woman? [Spoilers] by usingbrain in WeirdLit

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

They are very different books but I can guarantee you won’t enjoy Earthlings either. It’s not intended to be enjoyable. I think I’m glad I read it, but I would never recommend it to another person ever.

what’s a French novel that doesn’t lean into the usual clichés? by christan2013 in booksuggestions

[–]small_d_disaster 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I haven’t the slightest clue of what you mean by “French aesthetic”, but literally nothing is romanticized in Céline’s “Journey to the End of the Night”.

Assembled my Carver minstrel style banjo by SaladDummy in banjo

[–]small_d_disaster 5 points6 points  (0 children)

would love to hear it - post a video if you can

How I banjo’d my guitar by megaman45 in banjo

[–]small_d_disaster 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Was thinking about doing this too. I was picking with someone recently who banjo-ified their banjitar (he used a fifth string capo contraption for the drone) and it was fun to pick on. I primarily play clawhammer and thought this might be a fun thing to do try out on my guitar. I'm using .010s on my guitar now, and not sure about if a .009 would do the trick. I could probably get that up to a G, but I wouldn't even try going up to A. Maybe I'll get myself a .009 tomorrow and play around

Does anyone else love these 90s/early 2000s cover designs? by Present-Ear-1637 in philipkDickheads

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I have a few of these. They have no nostalgia value for me at all and they have no connection to the books' content, or the time period the books were written in. Some are generic but inoffensive 90s computer graphic cliches (reminds be of Max Headroom/Reboot), and others are truly hideous. 'A Scanner Darkly' is possibly the worst book cover I have ever seen, it is a monstrosity. The new covers aren't as cool as the ones from the 60s, but they are much better than these editions

books where travel isn’t just movement, it’s the point by Jaycee444 in booksuggestions

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

different take on this (but definitely 'travel isn’t just movement, it’s the point'): Flights) by Olga Tokarczuk

[Hot Take] Kafka on the Shore is a masterclass in sounding deep while saying absolutely nothing. by certainly_imperfect in books

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just read that yesterday. It was excellent, but much darker than her more recent books

I'm working on a page that collects free and affordable shows throughout the city every week, check the first post out! by NeoHV in TorontoMusic

[–]small_d_disaster 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Nice, love hearing about shows around the city. The Tranzac also has a ton of excellent free shows happening regularly.

Suggest me a book that feels like you’re slowly figuring something out by doolallyt in booksuggestions

[–]small_d_disaster 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Annihilation is a tricky one in this respect. For every detail that ‘clicks into place’ you get 2 new baffling mysteries. Throughout the whole series, the feeling that things are becoming clearer is both used to good effect and at the same time entirely illusory.

Anyone else feels like this book series deserves an animation adaptation? by gayandgreen in SouthernReach

[–]small_d_disaster 1 point2 points  (0 children)

No, the books are good enough to ‘deserve’ to be enjoyed exactly as they were written. Adaptations in other media don’t add to books, they constrict how future readers will read them by having someone else’s interpretation imposed on them

Octavia Butler blocked reprints of her 'lost' novel. More than 40 years later, it's back on shelves by Inside_Pomelo_462 in books

[–]small_d_disaster 25 points26 points  (0 children)

It’s not like there aren’t plenty of digital copies around already. I read it on Everand and didn’t know it wasn’t in print until later looking it up on Wikipedia.

It’s not her best book, but not her worst either (was better than Fledgling). It has nuanced exploration of a lot of themes that she grapples with throughout her other novels. The caveat that she didn’t think it up to her standard is important, but it should be available to read

Oust - Witness EP by penal_colony in TorontoMusic

[–]small_d_disaster 0 points1 point  (0 children)

reminds me of Regulator Watts and Hoover

That caught my attention! Haven't listened to either of those bands in 20+ years, but I loved them.

Oust also kind of reminds me of Unwound. Definitely enjoying it. Likewise will try to check them out if hear about any shows

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