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Apple Highlights Vision Pro's Accessibility Features with Head, Wrist, and Index Finger Controls

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Apple's new Vision Pro headset is controlled with eye and hand movements by default. For those with accessibility needs, however, features like VoiceOver, Pointer Control, and Dwell Control will allow users to interact with visionOS in other ways. In a WWDC session for developers, Apple has provided more details about these features.

Vision-Pro-Pointer-Control.jpg
Pointer Control​

Pointer Control will allow the Vision Pro to be controlled based on head, wrist, or index finger position rather than eye tracking. Users will be able to adjust movement sensitivity to further fit their individual needs.

Dwell Control will provide on-screen options for Tap, Scroll, Long Press, and Drag, allowing for users to interact with the interface without using their hands.

Vision-Pro-Dwell-Control.jpg
Dwell Control​

There's also Guided Access, an accessibility feature that will promote focus by restricting visionOS to a single app at one time. Apple says the feature aims to minimize distractions by backgrounding other apps, removing non-essential UI elements, and suppressing hardware button events that could be distracting.

Vision-Pro-Guided-Access.jpg
Guided Access​

Apple's screen reader VoiceOver will be available on the Vision Pro. Users will be able to set up a VoiceOver shortcut in the Settings app on visionOS that allows for the feature to be activated with a triple press of the Digital Crown.

Vision Pro is launching in early 2024 in the U.S. for $3,499, and more details about the headset are available in our Vision Pro roundup. For more details about the accessibility features, check out Apple's WWDC session.

Article Link: Apple Highlights Vision Pro's Accessibility Features with Head, Wrist, and Index Finger Controls
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2023/06/07/apple-vision-pro-accessibility-features/
I wonder how the device works with people who have strabismus/lazy eye.

For example, my right eye is my dominate eye. However, when I switch between my left and right eye my alignment changes a bit. Not too noticeable in public but I do not have binocular vision despite getting surgery to fix the cosmetic issue.
 
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moabal said:
I wonder how the device works with people who have strabismus/lazy eye.

For example, my right eye is my dominate eye. However, when I switch between my left and right eye my alignment changes a bit. Not too noticeable in public but I do not have binocular vision despite getting surgery to fix the cosmetic issue.
Click to expand...
Apple should plan onto having a "pirate" edition (SE) to be sold for half price. Jokes aside, I am certain that they will find a way to address various issues of significance to a minority of their customer base. Eye asymmetries are quite frequent and their algorithms might already account for that.
 
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madebybela said:
so many possibilities with an AR interface and they choose to port over the awful iOS settings layout.
Click to expand...

This is what visionOS is, it’s just iPadOS with the white space swapped out for frosted glass. All the apps are identical.
 
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cool stuff- always accessibility-minded. hope we see visionOS become less of an iPadOS clone in the future, but they’re off to a good start.
 
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Wonder if it has all the features of the iOS Magnifier.
Door detection, object detection, text detection, point and Speak… These things could be transformative on the Vision Pro.
 
moabal said:
I wonder how the device works with people who have strabismus/lazy eye.

For example, my right eye is my dominate eye. However, when I switch between my left and right eye my alignment changes a bit. Not too noticeable in public but I do not have binocular vision despite getting surgery to fix the cosmetic issue.
Click to expand...
I was thinking about this as well, as I have right eye strabismus and amblyopia.

On the most basic level, there may be an accessibility toggle to ignore input from one eye for the purposes of eye tracking. At least I hope there is.

I’ll be interested to see how the rest of the UX shapes up on this, as I also don’t have binocular vision.
 
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I really hope there’s some kind of option in accessibility, to use some kind of gesture rather than use the hardware buttons. e.g... blink three times to take a photo; close your eyes for five seconds to put the device to sleep.

I have cerebral palsy and my comedy hands will not be able to use the buttons. 😫
 
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madebybela said:
so many possibilities with an AR interface and they choose to port over the awful iOS settings layout.
Click to expand...
I don't revise the settings often so I don't have a lot of complaints about it. Perhaps there is some benefit to users in having a common, familiar UI across devices? I imagine there is also some benefit to developers.

We're probably going to see a lot of apps slowly evolve their content and layout to take advantage of the environment. It'll leverage their existing experience and codebase, and then later entirely new apps and interfaces/objects will completely replace rectangular constrained apps. Pretty exciting stuff. For example, widgets are neat, simple, but still constrained to the rectangular design that we've known forever, decades. Imagine a weather widget that is just a small floating cloud or sun in the corner of your space or real desktop. I think we'll see all sorts of objects and animations like that come from developers' imaginations.
 
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displayblock said:
I don't understand how pointer control works either. The article says index finger but the included photo shows the pointer following their thumb.
Click to expand...
The picture shows that "wrist" is selected. It may just be the angle that makes it look like it is attached to the thumb.

The checkmark that shows which item is selected is hard to see, and doesn't follow one of their other guidelines for selected items, as far as I interpret them.
 
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moabal said:
I wonder how the device works with people who have strabismus/lazy eye.

For example, my right eye is my dominate eye. However, when I switch between my left and right eye my alignment changes a bit. Not too noticeable in public but I do not have binocular vision despite getting surgery to fix the cosmetic issue.
Click to expand...
The first presenter in this video has some vision issues (he doesn't have full control over eye position) but he doesn't directly address that condition, and just talks more generically about blind or low vision.
 
I'm interested in seeing if they're addressing people who have more vision accessibility needs, like low vision, or strabismus, etc... Many people have eyes that aren't perfectly stereo, like in strabismus, so it would be interesting to see how that's addressed for tracking, etc.

Moreover, I can't wait to see how this enables medical treatments for eye conditions. Strabismus in particular, I could see vision therapy exercises or other therapeutics to help people manage vision conditions.
 
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tennisproha said:
I'm interested in seeing if they're addressing people who have more vision accessibility needs, like low vision, or strabismus, etc... Many people have eyes that aren't perfectly stereo, like in strabismus, so it would be interesting to see how that's addressed for tracking, etc.

Moreover, I can't wait to see how this enables medical treatments for eye conditions. Strabismus in particular, I could see vision therapy exercises or other therapeutics to help people manage vision conditions.
Click to expand...
I agree on the therapeutics. I have had strabismus all my life. I had surgery for it as a little kid and it was not successful. In middle school I decided to get it again for cosmetic purposes. Cosmetically, the second surgery was successful within margin of error. Unless I am directly in front of someone and tell them to watch my eyes when I switch between them, no one can tell anymore.

However, like many people who get the surgery, I did not gain binocular vision. I have seen online there are different headsets that have games or exercises that help people with this.

So I am excited to see what may come to VR headsets that can help people with this. Although I am able to cope with condition and live a full life, my depth perception could be better!
 
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