Ratings & Reviews for Diet, Fitness & Exercise Apps for People with Dexterity Impairments
Lose It!
Common Accessibility Issues
Difficulties occurred when built-in voice controlled mobile accessibility features utilizing vocally prompted numerical grid overlays, could not successfully manipulate standard app elements, and when clickable app elements were unresponsive to a user’s assistive device inputs.
Commentary from Reviewers
“Using the Grid system [via Voice Control] made things difficult. Grid is three steps every time. [Enabling the “Show Numbers” [command] whenever possible would make things easier.”
“Changing weights would be easier if there was a better input method, like through voice, e.g., '5 ounces'”
“Scroll wheel works really well with glassouse. Glassouse really has good control of keypad too. Button for going into the next text field, Hitting 'Enter' should take you to next field.”
Using GlassOuse: “After [I] typed in fields there was no way to intuitively get out of the onscreen keyboard.”
Fat Secret
Common Accessibility Issues
Participants with dexterity impairments using iOS Voice Control or a GlassOuse assistive device experienced moderate difficulty exploring FatSecret due to instances of functional elements that were inaccessible, either because the accessibility feature’s numerical grid overlay could not control a button, or the assistive device could not consistently select smaller buttons on the first attempt.
Of note, participants with dexterity impairments were unable to easily control scroll-wheel based entry fields using iOS Voice Control and had to perform more cumbersome steps to accomplish desired outcome in these instances.
Commentary from Reviewers
“Cannot enter birthdate, scroll wheel doesn't work with Voice Control, difficult to type an email address with Voice control (doable, just time consuming)”
“When using voice control, it didn't show a grid number for the menu ('more' option bottom right)
“Processes were pretty easy”
“Scroll wheels don't work with Voice Control; Entry through a keypad rather than scroll-wheel would make completing entries easier”
“Enable key pad access or dictation to input entries wherever scroll wheel is the default entry mode”
“Text is very small, participant has difficulty reading the text.”
“Couldn't locate search. There wasn't a visible option for search. Make search more prominent on the page”
“The save versus check mark button is not intuitive to know what to do, i.e. save your food selection. Confused on which one to click; Just have one or the other, not both”
MyFitnessPal
Common Accessibility Issues
Participants with dexterity impairments using iOS Voice Control (a built-in accessibility feature that enables Apple phone use through voice commands) were unable to easily navigate within MyFitnessPal because the accessibility feature’s overlay could not consistently access clickable buttons and fields within the app interface.
Participants with dexterity impairments, using a Bluetooth-paired GlassOuse assistive device (a wearable gyroscope-based system worn like glasses to enable cursor control using head movements and clicking action using a connected bite-switch), was unable to control app interface, because many of the entry fields were unresponsive or overly sensitive to the device inputs
Commentary from Reviewers
“Entering numbers via a scrolling scale was almost un-doable via voice control and number grid”
“Only being able to use the grid feature to select quick-log options vi the blue plus sign makes the button-selection process far more cumbersome and adds unnecessary steps”
“The plus sign turns into an x, but I cannot select the 'x' b/c the accessibility feature [my Voice Control] overlay covers the 'x' . [I] had to go to the meal logging page and exit out of that in order to escape the expanded quick-log options; show-number command didn't work; had to use show-grid command (more steps, more hassle)”
“Not being able to scroll via voice control made the process of selecting a number (via grid feature) very cumbersome and overly complex in the amount of steps needed”
“Being able to say the number desired rather than having to use the grid to scroll through numeric options in a range would make the process easier and faster”
“Scroll wheel skips numbers quickly. Must be very sensitive [to GlassOuse movements]. GlassOuse takes [me] out of the app because the app doesn't take up all of the screen on [my] iPad Mini 4. When trying to input letters, [the app entry field] it is very sensitive (three 'm's' were inputted while typing the email address)”