The Aesop Player's focus is on providing a simple user interface for audio books. Now that Aesop Player is installed on your tablet (see Getting started) let's explore the user interface to see how it does that. Be sure that at least the sample books are installed - it will display a special screen asking you to do that if there aren't any books. There's more on how to add books in Managing Books.
For the user (see Roles for what we mean by "user") there are only two screens to consider, the Book Selection screen and the Playback screen. The caregiver and technical person will need to use other screens, which are discussed under Configuration and Managing Books.
The sections below are separated into a description of the displayed screen and a section on each of the gestures (motions the user applies to the screen). There are only a few gestures, with simple meanings.
Both screens for the user are displayed in a simple frame. It's mostly black and exists to give a larger edge for holding the device when it's held by the edge. It has no touch function. In the upper right corner there's a fairly conventional battery status display giving charge state (blinking while charging). It turns red when the charge is low. "Maintenance Mode" is displayed across the bottom when the device is in Maintenance Mode, which is associated with a Dedicated Player.
Whenever a book is not playing, the title of the current book will be displayed. Each time a book title is freshly displayed (e.g., when coming back from sleep or when changing books) it will also speak the current book title. (Sometimes it doesn't speak a title if it's done so very recently.)
The word "START" is displayed. It blinks. The blink rate can be changed here if that helps the user see it.
The "gear" icon at the upper left corner is used to enter the Settings screen. By default it works with a single tap, but it can be set here to make it hard to accidentally enter Settings mode.
Also displayed at the top are the progress in the book in both time and percentage, and in a small font, the
chapter title.
At the lower left of the colored area is the
The book length information is computed the first time the book is displayed, so it may appear as ?? for
a while when a new book is looked at.
total length
of the book.
The word "Completed" will be displayed at the lower right when the player has played to the end of the book.
The Managing Books section discusses book titles in more depth. It is possible to change the displayed book title, which might be necessary if it is too "computerish" or excessively long for a spoken title.
The book position and the "Completed" flag can be reset via the Managing Books screens.
The chapter title is a It really is the title found in (or the name of) the currently playing .mp3 file. "best guess". The chapter title is not used anywhere else, but may be helpful for the caregiver.
Books are changed by "swiping" the display (almost anywhere on the screen) to the left or right. It will change to the next book (in alphabetical order, forwards or backwards), and the screen color will change. The title will be announced. This selection is "circular", so it will go from z back to a, and vice-versa.
Tapping anywhere near the middle of the screen (most of the screen is the button) will start the currently displayed book at the point where it was stopped. The default setting is to back up 5 seconds to help restore mental context (that can be changed here).
If the proximity detector is enabled (see here) waving a hand over the screen will awaken the device, and announce the book title. The device's usual awaken procedures also will work.
The device is set to ignore the start gesture (and when playing, the stop gesture) for a selectable timeout after it is made. This keeps accidental touches from shaky hands from being interpreted as repeated gestures. The timeout can be selected here.
The playback screen is similar to the Book Selection screen. It has the same title and time information as the Books Screen. It displays "STOP", blinking similarly to Book Selection, and the blinking setting for "START" applies to it.
It has conventional "Rewind" and "Fast Forward" buttons. Press and hold each to activate; the motion will speed if you hold long enough. It will block the Stop operation while activated. By default it will generate a "tape-recorder" like sound while Rewind or Fast Forward are engaged.
Tapping anywhere near the middle of the screen will stop the current book, similarly to start.
Flipping the whole device face-down will pause or stop playback. A setting here allows returning the device face-up to continue playing (the gesture is then a "pause"). The same setting can be used to disable the feature.
Stop points are never less than one minute apart; nearby duplicates are simply ignored. Using this feature does not affect the "Completed" flag.
This feature is by default off, and can be enabled with the setting here.
Devices might not always recognize a two-finger swipe if the fingers are too close together. Try it, and note that a more relaxed (and separated) position works better.
Aesop can be set to stop playback if it concludes the user has fallen asleep. Shaking or moving the device enough resets the timer used to determine that the user might be asleep. There's no specific pattern of motion, simply that the device has moved enough. Tapping Start is needed to resume if the timeout occurs.
The same as the Books screen.
The same as the Books screen.
Audio volume (loudness) is normally (for Android) controlled through small buttons on the side of the device, which can be difficult to use/feel. Aesop also uses gestures for that, described below.
If the device is used for other purposes than Aesop, the volume could be changed accidentally. The Aesop Player saves the audio volume in use each time the player is stopped and restores the volume when it is restarted. It saves separate values for each kind of audio device. All wired headphones count as a single device type. Each Bluetooth device is different. The built-in (device) speaker is distinct from the headphones.
Generally users need not concern themselves with saving the volume, Aesop should just do the right thing.
Some wired headphones have a simple (mechanical) volume control. That control may need to be adjusted independently of this setting.
Some users may find that they want the book read slower or faster than the original recording. The speed can be adjusted to fit the user's ability, either faster than or slower than the original, with no pitch change. The gesture-based speed controls for the Aesop player are similar to the volume controls.
The screen is awakened when the headphone buttons are used.
Adjusting volume and speed without caregiver involvement makes the device easier to use. Since books vary somewhat by audio loudness, and performers differ in their pace, users may wish to make the sound louder or softer, or play faster or slower, themselves, without involving a caregiver.
It is possible to control the volume and playback speed with the same sort of simple gestures used above, ones that don't require vision or much tactile ability.
If enabled, pressing and then dragging (and then holding) anywhere near the center of the screen while the book is playing allows the user to adjust the volume and speed. Press and drag to the right for volume up, to the left for volume down, up for faster, and down for slower. The audio will continue playing, and you'll immediately hear the effect.
Once the direction of the drag is recognized, a series of "tick"s will be heard overlaying the audio, and with each tick the volume or speed will be raised or lowered by one step. When a limit is reached, the tick will be replaced by a double-beep, and there will be no effect. Reversing the drag will reverse the direction (either faster↔slower or louder↔softer). Ending the drag (lifting the finger for a moment) and reestablishing direction is needed to change between volume and speed. (This sounds more complicated than it is: give it a try.) Aesop will also say one of "Faster", "Slower", "Louder" or "Softer", or when adjusting speed, "Normal" for no change in speed (1.0x). (These can be localized to other languages.)
While these adjustments are being made, the volume level or speed factor will be displayed instead of the time.
The volume and speed are limited. The volume is limited by the hardware to (usually) 15 steps, and the lowest steps are nearly inaudible, so Aesop stops with slight sound remaining. Speed ranges from half normal (which is quite slow) to 4.5x normal (which sounds excessively fast). For most listeners speed from slightly below normal to around 1.8x normal will be comfortable. The extremely high rates are allowed because formal research1 shows that some individuals can understand at that speed. As the speed increases the sound may become choppy; using a higher bit rate (quality) recording may help with that.
For users that have trouble with the drag option above, there is a similar set of controls that are activated by tilting the whole device at about a 45-degree angle and holding it there for a few moments. Tilting to the left is equivalent to dragging left (etc.) It takes a moment of (relative) stillness at one of the 45-degree angles to engage, so simply moving the device will not usually trigger it. The audio prompts are the same. This can be enabled independently of the dragging version. If the user prefers to keep the player on a lap or in a pocket, this may not be useful.
The initial state of the dragging Audio control options is enabled, and tilting is disabled. Experiment with them to determine which works best for the user.
1. Danielle Bragg, Cynthia Bennett, Katharina Reinecke, and Richard Ladner. 2018. A Large Inclusive Study of Human Listening Rates. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '18). ACM, New York, NY, USA, Paper 444, 12 pages. ↩