Audio file
OrbitResearchFebruary2026ZoomMeeting.mp3
Transcript
[Note: This transcript was automatically generated. It will contain transcription errors. Frequent speakers were labeled, while infrequent ones are only identified with numbers.]

Robert Carter
All right. Well, hello everyone. This is Robert, your co-host for the February meeting with Orbit Research. As always, we're delighted that you are here and looking forward to another stimulating discussion. But before we get to the discussion part, I'm going to ask Venkatesh Chari of Orbit Research if you will please step forward and let us know what's been going on at Orbit Research for the last month or so.

Venkatesh Chari
Thank you. Thank you, Robert. It's great to be here, as always. Thanks, everyone, for joining. I'm happy to share a few updates. There's actually been a lot going on, and then sometimes there is a little just show for it externally, but there nevertheless is stuff that I think will be interesting. We are due to launch the long, long-awaited release 2.0 for the Orbit Player. Today, it will go live. soon after this call today. And as we have discussed previously, it'll be an optional install, which means you'll have the choice of installing it to try it out or not, maybe just waiting. We're going to give about a week or so for this phase, which we call public beta, to see if there are any issues, to get some additional feedback. We've already gone through a fairly extended beta test phase with a group of testers, but as is often the case, it's sometimes good to have more feedback. We will also be putting out a hot fix for the current release, which is 1.9, which will be 1.9.3, and this will address a pesky battery reporting issue that occurs in certain circumstances, such as when waking up from sleep, the battery level reporting can be confusing. It also has a couple of other fixes, just improving the audio and the internet radio application. So these are both scheduled to go out today. 2.0 for OrbitSpeak is also in the works. It's undergoing internal testing now. We expect to release it sometime by the end of next month. So 2.0 in general for both the products will include a redesigned media player with a complete music library and support for playlists. The Internet radio will allow importing and exporting of stations. We'll have additional apps such as World Clock, Stopwatch, Countdown Timer. We've improved the Braille Reader application, which links files with our book reader for full navigation, including bookmarks, et cetera. Also has a new screen reader, which controls the overall announcements and the usability of the interface. It's smoother, better, more intuitive. And most importantly, it allows us to do many, many more things in the future and more easily. There's also a full sort of desktop mode when a QWERTY keyboard is connected over either Bluetooth or USB, so you get sort of familiar controls through a QWERTY keypad. The overall, the architecture is expected to have much better stability and modularity. So we can update individual apps one at a time rather than having a complete image always. And also the ability to update softwares is going to be much smoother. We know there's been instances of hiccups in some cases where the updates were not getting installed smoothly. It was reporting something else. And these are all architectural improvements that 2.0 will bring. We've also been working on our Braille products. We released an update for the Aubitator 40 in January, faced a couple of issues there. related to emulation mode and also USB connectivity. So it's mainly a bug fix kind of release. Coming this week, as early as tomorrow, is going to be a release for the Arbitrary 20. This is specific to certain languages, specifically for Hindi, where it addresses an issue with file name translation. We also have improvements for the QWERTY products, the Orbitrator Q20 and Q40, where it resolved a couple of issues where the keyboard didn't function occasionally, and also some connectivity-related improvements when using the HID Braille protocol. also have some new language support for some of the products, so Orbit Slate, we've expanded the languages, and also for the Orbitrator 20 Plus. I know some of you have been keenly following our progress on the carrying cases for our products, so I'm happy to report that we made some significant progress on the carrying case for the Orbit Player. We will be showing a sample of this at CSUN next month, in a couple of weeks' time. And we hope to have it available shortly thereafter, probably sometime towards the end of April. Speaking of conferences, so we have CSUN, which is from the 10th to the 13th. We'll be there. We invite everyone to attend. We'll be in booth 418. And following that, we'll also be exhibiting at Site City in Frankfurt. And then, of course, at the NFB and the ECB conventions in Austin and St. Louis. There are going to be some announcements at CSUN, which I'm trying very hard to not reveal prematurely here. But We're very excited about these new product announcements. And we'll talk more about it during the March call. So that's all I have for the moment. Robert, I'll hand the microphone back to you.

Robert Carter
All right. Well, thank you, Venkatesh. You know, listening to that, I realize Orbit Research now has a lot of products. And when I just, you're kind of going through them. Wow. So there's a lot going on over there.

Venkatesh Chari
Yes, indeed. And by the way, Robert, I wanted to ask, you know, if folks are interested, we could do a very quick demo of some of the new capabilities in the, in version 2 on the Orbit player today. You know, we have Adi with us as well. he can do a quick walkthrough if folks are interested.

Robert Carter
Oh, I think that'd be great. Do you want to, well, we've got two hands raised. Do you want to take these hands and then do it or you want to do it first?

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, sure. No, let's take the hands.

Robert Carter
Okay, we'll take two people here and then we'll stop questions for a little while and let Adi do the demo. So Dennis Long, please unmute yourself and go ahead with your question or comment.

Speaker 3
Hi, Venkatesh. Back in last year, you had said the Orbit Writer would support or does support the Apple Watch. And you also said there was an update coming with stronger vibrations for the Writer. I checked the manual and I didn't see an updated section. for the watch and I haven't seen the update unless I missed it. Did I miss the writer update and the manual section? Is it just user error that I overlooked that or?

Venkatesh Chari
No, Dennis, you have not missed it. We haven't posted it yet. We were working on trying to trying to include a couple of additional things and how these things go. You think something is easy and it's not. So it's something that we are going to release. And at the same time, we're going to probably release this next weekend. At the same time, we have the update to the manual section as well to include the write-up about the Apple Watch. The main reason actually why we kind of stalled on this was because we wanted to make sure that the user interface for adjusting the vibration levels was robust. So there were a couple of doubts. So that's in the process actually of being released. So you should see it in about a week or so.

Speaker 3
Okay, I'll be keeping an eye out for it. Thank you.

Venkatesh Chari
Thanks, thanks, thanks, thanks for the question, Dennis.

Robert Carter
Yeah, thanks, Dennis. All right, well, we don't have any hands at the moment, so let's go ahead with the demo of version two, and then we'll come back and get more questions.

Venkatesh Chari
I think we might be having a technical issue, but I think you want to... You want to explain something about the installation process? Go ahead.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, thanks everyone. I'll still try to get some setup during the call to demo. Sorry, this was a bit last moment. Yeah, I sprung this on Adi just two minutes ago, so I apologize. Sorry, it was my... But I wanted to mention something briefly about installation. So you'll see the announcement in the... mailing list as usual. But this time the install to 2.0 is a two-step process. So you will be offered an over-the-air update to a higher build of version 1, which once you will install that update, it will basically install everything on your device for you to be able to switch to version 2. Now the switch itself is, as you will be able to read in the release announcement, is triggered from a dedicated menu item. So it's not just install and let it go because the device, after the update itself is installed over the air, still loads you up to your safe and existing 1.0 environment. So you'll have to manually trigger an upgrade to version 2.0 option from the utilities menu. Just wanted to briefly mention that because it's a bit different compared to what was available before. So please pay attention to that when you read the release announcement and when you perform the actual upgrade process.

Speaker 3
Adi, this is Dennis Long. I have a question. Something popped into my brain and I apologize. Will people be able to switch? Would I be incorrect in thinking people were able to switch between 1.0 and 2.0?

Adi Kushnir
Good, very good question. I was going to mention that now you can switch from 1.0 to 2.0, but you cannot go backwards because due to architectural reasons, once you are upgraded, it going back in an easy way is not something we can do because the underlying system architecture there is 100% different. So this is why we, especially when we are still in public beta stages, we allow the switch itself to be an option that you have to manually choose to take.

Speaker 3
I think that's a very good approach. I would emphasize in the e-mail that you send out when you send it out to the list, state that more than once because a lot of times people will glance at it. And I would just state that several times once you make the switch, that's it. You're on 2.0.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, we are. writing this as part of the announcement and we'll try to do the best to make sure it is as clear as possible in terms of communication. And over the, once you switch to 2.0, you might start receiving updates on frequent basis at first, once things are smoothened out. And when we, of course, officially remove the public beta designation, That means that this will be the only version that support will be provided for going forward. But that's something I wanted to mention.

Speaker 3
Well, NLS BARD support being 2.0, I may have missed that.

Venkatesh Chari
BARD support is being worked on. We have actually good progress on that. And 2.0, the architectural improvements and the screen reader support that we have included in 2.0 is one of the things that is necessary for Bard support. So we're making progress. It's been pretty challenging, but I'm happy to say that it is now a lot closer than it seemed a couple of months ago.

Speaker 3
Awesome. Sounds like you're making awesome progress with this. I don't have one of the players yet, but I'm watching its development.

Adi Kushnir
Also, by the way, an issue that was reported both on the list and here, the annoying voice recorder problem where sometimes recordings are not deleted properly. You'll be happy to know that this is fully fixed as well as many others. So please, I do encourage, although it's a public beta stage, I do encourage people to take advantage and update and give us feedback. Of course, you can, if you want to wait a bit, you can wait. If you're not an early adapter, this is why it's optional. But we invite everyone who wants to join us to do so.

Robert Carter
Excellent. Well, Adi, so do you want me to go ahead and take a few questions and then you'll come?

Adi Kushnir
Let's continue with the, let's continue with the questions. If I can get stuff sorted out, I will let you know. But let's take, let's take, yeah, let's continue with the flow.

Robert Carter
All right, sounds great. So Mitch, please unmute and go ahead with your question or comment.

Speaker 5
What changes have you made in the media player?

Adi Kushnir
So the whole, so first of all, it's a completely new interface. So the media player looks like our other apps, like the book reader and internet radio. So it has a proper list of categories and stuff like that. We support a proper music library. So now the media player looks for music across the whole device and supports managing songs by artists, songs, albums, et cetera, et cetera, like expected in many modern media players, instead of just being a file explorer mode only thing. In addition, we have playlist support, so you can create playlists, you can manage playlists, and that's majorly it. And also we improved the audio playback in general to make it more battery efficient and some other under the hood changes. But the biggest change is the whole music library concept and the playlist support.

Robert Carter
All right, thank you. Brandon, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 6
All right, can you guys hear me okay?

Robert Carter
Yes, you're good. Go ahead.

Speaker 6
Two questions. Will the way to switch to two for the Orbit Speak be the same way it is going to be in the Orbit Player version two? And will this, or sorry, three questions. Will this also be the way when it comes to eventual public release? And if you guys fix the Newsline issue I reported a couple months ago.

Venkatesh Chari
So switching to 2.0 is concerned. Yeah, go ahead if you want to answer that.

Adi Kushnir
No, it's fine. You started so you can continue.

Venkatesh Chari
So yeah, it'll be largely similar for Orbit Speak as well. They share the same platform. And we may or may not have this sort of public beta space. We'll see. Most likely we will. Depends on how This public beta phase goes for the Orbit player. So we'll be informed by those, by that experience. And we'll see if it makes sense to do it for the Orbit speak as well.

Adi Kushnir
About the Newsline issue, you will see that it's improved. We still have occasions where through Easy Reader, in some cases, we the login, the fetching of data for Newsline fails. It's improved, but we are still not 100% positive in all cases. You'll see that it's much more usable, yes, compared to what you have at the moment in your hands. So watch out for that. We are still working to sort the final edge cases where it is still a problem. We are working with the Easy Reader team on that.

Speaker 6
Oh, that's good. At least you guys see it now from your end instead of me having a remote.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, this was actually thanks to your help because in our environment it was and still is working as expected, but thanks to the data we were able to obtain from you, we were able to pinpoint where the issue is. Okay, that's good. So I appreciate your assistance and patience.

Robert Carter
All right, thank you, sir. Bobby, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 7
Okay, I know you told me this a couple of months ago, but I want to double check with you. I don't mean to be repetitive, but I want to know if the media player and the file manager in 2.0 will finally be separated because it's kind of annoying. Like let's say I want to switch to a different folder when I play media. I have, like if I hit my context manager, I have to keep going to the file manager if I want to change folders in the media player. I want to stay in one app only. and just be able to go to my folders and end of story. I don't want the file manager and the media player to be comboed.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, they are finally separated. And in the media player, you have an option, of course, to open files or folders through a file picker. Or folder picker dialogue with screen, which is similar to what we have on the Windows machines, where you browse to the folder or file and activate it as expected, but the media player itself is not linked with the file manager anymore.

Speaker 7
Oh, that's the best, and also... Will the battery always read properly because the battery sometimes reads, like if it's not 100%, if it's 80%, it'll say 90%. You know what I mean?

Adi Kushnir
We have done the best to tweak this even in the recent 1.9, yeah, even in the recent 1.X update in most situations, it should report properly already.

Speaker 7
Sounds good.

Robert Carter
Ken, do you have your hand raised? Please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 8
All right. So I've been having a similar issue with Newsline as far as like I would go to the newspapers option in the book reader. And sometimes even if I'm logged in, it wouldn't load anything. And even when I was logged in, sometimes it would say, issue download failed when I would download a newspaper. This is on the Orbit speak, mind you. And I was just kind of wondering if it's an issue with that part of the book reader itself, or is it just the Wi-Fi or is it just A part of the server that you guys have, or what is it?

Adi Kushnir
Yes, so there are occasional times where it does not properly retrieve content. We, like I said, we have pinpointed the issue through Brandon's very big assistance to us, and we appreciate that, and we are working with the relevant parties to to bring a total fix to this.

Speaker 8
Yeah. Also, I wanted to ask about moving files because I tried to format a drive to FAT32 format and I tried to move a file. It does not give progress updates. Is it possible that 2.0 fixes all this or what?

Adi Kushnir
Yes, so in 1.0 based software, when you move files, it gives a generic message of when you copy or move, it gives a generic message of like copying the file with some report. But in 2.0, we have actually one of the features of the new screen reader is proper progress tones, similar to if There are folks here who use NVDA on an active basis. You know that it has tones that change. It like goes up and down based on the actual progress of the task. So yes, in version 2.0, we have proper screens every time that a copy paste or any other operation that has progress is ongoing. We have a dedicated screen with the proper progress bar and this is audibly indicated.

Speaker 8
Okay, and one more thing though. Do you know what your screen reader will be called or is it just like a generic screen reader or what is it? Do you know?

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, there's this is an internal.

Adi Kushnir
It's an internal project, yeah.

Venkatesh Chari
It's not something that we intend to publish or have available for Android in general, at least not at the moment. It's intended to allow our apps to interact with Android and with the system.

Adi Kushnir
There's been a message on the chat asking about an issue with the media player when playing songs over USB and shuffle mode. Yes, these kinds of things are addressed with the new media player also, which will be coming to OrbitSpeak end of this month, end of March, like Venkatesh indicated. So thank you for the query.

Robert Carter
Yeah, thanks for catching that, Adi. I don't, I'm not able to see the chat where I am at the moment. Excellent. Thank you. All right, Anthony, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 9
Well, everybody, it's nice to be back. I missed the last meeting because I didn't receive the e-mail until it had because it was earlier in the month. Couple of questions. The will version two, I'm still experiencing a problem with the audio, if you have the equalizer on flat on the orbit speak and you turn the volume up above 60%, you start to get clipping all over the place. That's the first thing. UK library support is the next one. And a couple of things with the book reader. When you load a talking book, there is a message that pops up that says, this book is over 200 megabytes. Do you still want to download it? Yes. And you say yes. And about half a second later, even on like a one gigabyte book, it starts playing and you think this is just annoying. You know, if it was going to take a couple of minutes, I could understand the message. And the final thing is, could we have an option, maybe in the reader, that when you start it, if you're listening to like a Daisy book, it just starts playing it like other players?

Adi Kushnir
Okay, so let's go one by one and please, if I'll forget something, please remind me, okay? So Equalizer. Equalizer and in general, the audio algorithm is improved in 2.0. So you'll see it end of next month on the speak. And I'm sure you'll be happy not only clipping in some situations, there were also cases where if you play with parameters such as playback speed, sometimes it will take a while before these parameters get applied and you have a pause in between and it's not nice and smooth. So in 2.0, these glitches are ironed out. So that should be addressed. The second one was about...

Speaker 9
Yeah, there was there was one about the message with that you get when you load the data.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, we removed, we removed. this message in the next update, it'll be gone. This was a precaution that we needed to put in because previously large books would take time to load. We have been able to significantly optimize that and now this is no longer necessary. So the next update will get rid of it.

Speaker 9
Right.

Adi Kushnir
And about your feedback that you want the book reader to always open to the last book, even if you... completely close it. Yes, this is actually an enhancement request that we have. We will not only have it in the book reader, we will also have a mode in an update to 2.X, not in the initial 2.0, but in an update, which will allow you to select also what the unit itself starts up to. Does it go back to the home screen, or does it go back to the book reader, or does it go back to where? basically, where you wanted to land. So we received that request and it's on the roadmap to get done.

Speaker 9
Okay, yeah, UK library support was the other one.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, stay tuned for when we, let's say like this, when we will announce support for Bard in the US, which is in progress, Stay tuned also for UK support.

Speaker 9
Yeah, can you make sure it sort of reads the, because like the RNIB have descriptions of the book, and it would be useful if it sort of read those out when you were searching for books or because otherwise you have no idea what the book's about?

Adi Kushnir
Thank you for the feedback. I took notes. Stay tuned for when this will be available. then we can go into more details about that.

Speaker 9
Okay, cheers, Adi. Thank you very much.

Robert Carter
All right, thank you, Anthony. Myrna, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 10
So, Adi, I don't know if this is an OrbitSpeak thing or it's the database that you guys are using for radio. You search for Mushroom FM, you go into, it says what country, you go New Zealand, you search for it, finds it, and then it does not play. It says error. It won't do Mushroom FM and it won't do Mushroom Escape for some reason. I don't know why.

Adi Kushnir
We'll take a look. I noted it down. We'll take a look. Must be a database thing.

Speaker 10
That's what I was thinking, that it's It's maybe that it's not even you guys, whatever database that you're using, it could be, but it just doesn't. I mean, you know, other things are great. It's fine. But I've noticed that every time I want to hear, you know, Mushroom FM and Mushroom Escape, no way.

Adi Kushnir
Noted. Thanks.

Speaker 10
And thank you for doing the time. I said this last night to Venkatesh. Thank you so much for when you're reading a Bookshare, when you're doing a Daisy book, you can do by time.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, this was so cool.

Speaker 10
That is so cool. All right, that's it.

Robert Carter
All right. Thanks, Myrna. Go ahead, Venkatesh.

Venkatesh Chari
No, I was just going to say that the radio stations sometimes not loading is unfortunately a relatively common issue that we see. And that's because I think the database sometimes goes out of date and it is periodically refreshed. It's an open source community project. So sometimes it takes a little bit of time. I think if you notice something like that, I don't know exactly how the mechanism is, but reporting it or offering a correction, I think there is a mechanism to use it because I think it does depend on people calling it out.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, there is. We're using a radio browser. So if you Google radio browser, you'll see their website and they have a report form that you can call to action when something needs updating. They usually respond pretty quickly. And of course, whenever they update, it gets updated on our side. And by the way, if somebody has an idea of another free radio database that we can use and perhaps allow you to choose let us know. We'll happily take a look at that.

Robert Carter
All right. Excellent. Mitch, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 5
All right. Audie, have you thought about allowing people to add audiobooks into the book reader? And another retail service you guys might consider is OO Tunes.

Adi Kushnir
Thanks for both questions. You can already add audiobooks to the book reader if you upload them as zip files. If you take a zip file with MP3 content and you put it in the books folder, or you add a book, add a book manually from the book reader and you select the zip file, it should work with it. So that's about audiobooks. In the current architecture, that would be the way that it's supported, so it has to be zipped. By the way, speaking of that 2.0, we have archiving capabilities in the file manager, so you can zip and unzip directly from the device. And about the other suggestion, yeah, Altwins is a commercial service, but we are actively looking for other alternatives to radio browser to have as a backup and something more robust. So if you guys are aware of something, please let us know.

Speaker 11
Just Richard, if I could jump in here. About the books, audiobooks, you have to manually create the books folder. Is that going to change in 2.0?

Adi Kushnir
Yes, and also there are 2.0, also there is an audiobooks folder on that Android creates by default, so the 2.0 also picks up.

Speaker 11
Okay, yeah, because currently the audiobooks folder doesn't see the books in there, so.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah.

Speaker 11
Okay, great.

Adi Kushnir
But in any case, you can always manually add, Mitch, as you asked. So if you go to the context menu, you have a add book option, and you can browse to the file.

Speaker 5
Yeah, because all my stuff is already is unzipped.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, I know, about unzipped files, the current book reader and the way it's constructed. This is the way it's going to work. I am, we are considering adding a dedicated mode in the media player itself for audiobooks, perhaps later, but. For now, the current book reader is, you have to have zip files.

Robert Carter
All right, Bobby, please unmute and go ahead. Bobby, are you there? Okay. Go ahead.

Venkatesh Chari
Bobby, your microphone seems to be muted.

Speaker 7
Hello.

Robert Carter
Now you're now you're there. Go ahead.

Speaker 7
Okay. About the radio stations. I know Myrna was mentioning Mushroom FM. Now, is this 2.0 going to have a feature where you could import your own radio stations? You know, then will Mushroom FM work if it's imported from M3U or PLS favorites list?

Adi Kushnir
Yes, we in 2.0 we support both import and export. Import supports M3U and PLS, yes.

Speaker 7
Yes, so Mushroom FM should work if you import it yourself, right?

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, I see no reason why not.

Venkatesh Chari
But my URL hasn't changed on their side. Sometimes that happens.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, but then you can grab the latest one and import it. But still, it's good to know that it does not work in the database by default. All right, thank you.

Robert Carter
All right, Bobby, thank you. Dwayne, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 12
Yes, I have a problem. Like when I'm listening to a podcast, it'll quit playing and go back to the home screen.

Adi Kushnir
That is not nice. Please be in touch with our tech support team because we addressed these issues a long time ago. We'll check what's going on with your specific case, perhaps. Software is a bit out of date due to...

Speaker 11
All podcasts do the same thing. I'm sorry.

Adi Kushnir
Hello.

Speaker 11
Oh, I'm sorry. I do mainly podcasts on it and big, big podcast feeds. And a lot of times it does the same thing, especially when it's like... 1500 podcast episodes, it'll go back to the main menu and then it'll lose your place. And then you've got to go hit the one chord and the four chord 3000 times or whatever to go back to where you left off. Yeah, it does that.

Adi Kushnir
I'll be happy to take a look at these cases if you don't mind exporting your whole collection.

Speaker 11
Actually, the biggest one is called The Professor of Rock. That's the one I just finished. It's 15190 some episodes.

Adi Kushnir
And it does that. If you can e-mail us to tech support, this will be very appreciated. Give us the podcast name. We'll try to reproduce in-house and we'll definitely come back.

Speaker 11
I'll do that.

Adi Kushnir
On that. But it would be good to get more details because we know we had some issues like these in the past, but we have tried the best we can to address it. And we did not hear from people so far that they continue. So please, if you see these cases, please let us know. Of course, version two is much, much more stable. So I doubt that in that one, we'll still see things like that, but we don't want customers to get stuck. So please reach out to our tech support and raise this and give us as much details as possible.

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, and I just want to make a request, if I may, Robert. So it's wonderful that folks often report and seek help on the mailing list, that's wonderful and that's really what it's there for. But if you're looking for specific help on a topic for any of our products, please do drop us an e-mail at techsupport at orbitresearch.com or call us on our 800 number. That makes it much easier for us to ensure that you're getting a response, we are able to track it more easily. We do continue to monitor the list and we usually reach out to people, to individuals off the list when they have specific issues, but it makes it a lot, lot easier if you report these kinds of things directly to us as well.

Robert Carter
Excellent. Anthony, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready.

Speaker 9
Yes, a couple of things. First letter navigation in some of the dialogues. I've got quite a lot of talking books and, if you've got a couple of 100, it would be nice to be able to jump to the 1st letter of the, you know, the file name. And the other one is as the documentation gets longer, you know, and there's more features in the unit, Is there anything you could support other than text files? Because it would be useful to be able to sort of jump about with links. I don't know whether something like markdown or, you know, text is just a bit cumbersome.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, we actually have a, okay, to, first of all, first line navigation. Please let me know where it's not working for you in Vergun 2. What we do to the new architecture, what happens is that if we develop something, it works everywhere. For example, if we introduce first letter navigation and lists, then every app that has a list will automatically inherit that. In version one, it was a manual work in each territory. So please let me know when you see that, where you see it not working. Yeah, okay. I'm sure that once you'll get the version 2 next month on OrbitSpeak, you will like it because it would just work everywhere without questions, even for new apps we add over time. And about the user guide, we actually changed it to be in Word, I believe it is. So Please contact me off list. Right, okay. Not off list, offline. I mean, and we'll take a look with you what's.

Speaker 9
Yeah, I mean, it might be.

Adi Kushnir
And you're running an orbit speak plus, so there should be no, issue there, but we are moving. We also on the orbit player, it's not text, so it's not TXT anymore.

Speaker 9
Right, yeah, it just would be useful if it had links, you know?

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, we.

Venkatesh Chari
Did you mean, Anthony, did you mean links?

Adi Kushnir
Table of contents, I guess. Table of contents. Yeah.

Speaker 9
So, you know, you could jump to a specific bit without having to scroll through or go and find it.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, about that particular thing we're looking at, we're looking to see how can we add support for that. So, yeah, I appreciate the comment, but at least navigation should be easier than TXT.

Speaker 9
Yeah. Could you put some Braille tables on, because sometimes I can't remember the symbol for things like the at sign and stuff like that. And it would be useful to have some documentation somewhere that you could in the help or something.

Adi Kushnir
You mean the computer Braille?

Speaker 9
Yeah.

Adi Kushnir
Okay. Thank you for the feedback, Paul. Noted. In version two, in version two, you'll be. saved from that because you will be able to system-wide use literary braille and contracted braille tables. So this will make it easier, but we'll note it down.

Speaker 9
Okay, thank you.

Robert Carter
All right, James, you have your hand up. Please go ahead, sir.

Speaker 13
Thank you. This is a follow-up to Anthony. Anthony, you're in the UK. Do you have one of the RNIB Orbit cards of books? Because if you do.

Speaker 9
Yes, I do, but...

Speaker 13
Okay, so stop right there. is a Braille reference section on that card and it's got all the different Braille codes and all the different signs in all the Braille different codes. Absolutely appreciate your point for Orbit research, but just to get you out of a hole quickly, have a look at that Braille reference section on your card.

Speaker 9
Okay, yeah.

Venkatesh Chari
Thank you.

Speaker 13
You're welcome.

Venkatesh Chari
Thank you, James. James, just curious, is that something that folks outside the UK can also have access to or is it?

Speaker 13
Technically, yes. I believe to get hold of the RNIB card of books, you should contact your local blindness organisation who will contact RNIB to make the purchase. That's what I understand the procedure is. Also, regarding Braille reference information, it's just something we put together. There are, of course, your official Braille authorities like UCAF in the UK, Bana in the States, and they will also have that reference information available for you.

Venkatesh Chari
Right, Great. Thanks, James.

Robert Carter
All right. I love how we're able to efficiently answer questions here. It's awesome. We're like, we're not a Braille reference, but we're an audio reference on Zoom. I'm glad it works this way. Anybody else have questions or comments? Go ahead, Mitch.

Speaker 14
Hello, how are you?

Venkatesh Chari
Good evening.

Robert Carter
Good.

Speaker 5
Evening. Are you going to update your YouTube channel with the new features?

Venkatesh Chari
I'm sorry, is the question, are we going to update our YouTube channel with the new tutorials, you mean?

Speaker 5
Yeah, with the new tutorials. Yes, hasn't gotten updated in a couple months or something like that, I mean.

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, as we, so we actually haven't added new tutorials in a few weeks, in a couple months actually. So as we do add more, yeah, they will be posted to the product support page on our website and also to the YouTube channel. But I'll double check. Thanks for, thanks for bringing this to my attention. I'll double check and see if there is any.

Adi Kushnir
I think it's up to date for now.

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, that may not yet be reflected on the YouTube channel, but I'll definitely double check.

Robert Carter
All right. Carrie, please unmute and go ahead when you're ready. Not hearing you, Carrie.

Adi Kushnir
There was someone else who was trying to talk.

Venkatesh Chari
It is unmuted, actually.

Robert Carter
Yeah, you do appear to be unmuted. Hello.

Speaker 14
That's Marissa from South Africa. How are you?

Robert Carter
Fine. Is this Carrie?

Speaker 14
Now it's Marisani from South Africa.

Robert Carter
Okay, go ahead.

Speaker 14
Yes, I've been raising this question over the past few months. Unfortunately, I've not been answered. Since the update, I think the August update when the USB feature was added, I've had problems when I connect USB and try to play something, e.g. music from the USB. Only one song from the least plays and after that it goes back to the SD card and it is in a shuffle mode. So I don't understand what's happening.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, we addressed this before. Another customer was asking about that. Which device, by the way?

Speaker 14
It's open speak. I have open speak and it's doing it even right before I get to the meeting today. I tried again. It's still doing it. It's not been.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, we. have had issues like these where it jumps between drives in the media player. And like we stated, we have redesigned the media player. And in the next update you'll receive that will include the new media player, this will be addressed.

Speaker 14
And the other challenge is when I'm in an edit field where I have to put passwords, for instance, it's mixed. And then I have to put capital. I cannot press.7 as a capital, for instance, O, which is.1, 2, 5, and 7. It doesn't do the capital. I don't know why.

Adi Kushnir
I replied, yeah, you contacted our tech support recently, correct?

Speaker 14
Yes, I did. So I was just, yeah.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, so I wanted to follow up with you on that, because here it works for us. I'm we're entering password.

Speaker 14
I don't understand, because it used to do that before, but recently before then, I think in November, August, I just saw it doing that. I don't know what is happening, because if I have to put password that mixes with uppercase, I no longer can do that.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, we let's follow up with you. We will follow up with you via tech support. Okay, we received your. query and I'll follow up with you over through tech support and we'll see what's going on.

Robert Carter
All right. Can we try you, Carrie, one more time? We haven't been able to hear you yet, but you appear to be unmuted. So, Carrie, can you do anything else to bring your audio up? All right. Ken, please unmute and go ahead.

Speaker 8
Yeah, I know I asked a question before, but I have a couple other questions. So sometimes I would lift up the orbit speak and it would just turn on. I'm not sure if there's an accelerometer in that thing or if it's supposed to do that. And another question is, sometimes it would say, Communication error placed with start device.

Adi Kushnir
This sounds like old software, both of these issues. Okay. The Orbitspeak has an accelerometer, but we disabled it. Some earlier builds had it enabled. There was a lift to wake setting that Android has. So we... Yeah. disabled it, and also we addressed this communication issue. Please, be in touch with us, so we'll help you update.

Speaker 6
It's already up to date, though. That's the thing. I updated it like completely.

Adi Kushnir
It might be reporting that it's up to date, but perhaps the, as you know, we had some issues with our previous software updater mechanism before we fixed them in one point, whatever the version number. is. I don't remember right now. We are, I think we're at 1.8, right? I believe, or once, I think 1.8. 1.7 point 10, 1710, something like that.

Venkatesh Chari
I don't remember that. The release, yeah.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, 1710. Orbit speak is 1710. Yes, orbit speak is 1710. So it might not have been fully installed for you, so please reach out to us and we'll sort it out.

Speaker 8
All right, sure. Thanks.

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, and if you can check, yeah, which version you have installed and let us know in your e-mail.

Adi Kushnir
It's also the build number. Yeah, you have two parameters there, the actual reported application version and what we call the build number, but please contact tech support. But these issues have been rectified. a while ago, so we would definitely not want you to experience these.

Speaker 8
Okay, thanks.

Speaker 10
Right.

Robert Carter
All right, Bobby, if you will unmute and go ahead with your comment or question.

Speaker 7
Am I unmuted now?

Robert Carter
Yes.

Speaker 7
Oh, I am.

Robert Carter
Yes, you are.

Speaker 7
Okay, Robert and everybody. I was wondering if there's any possibility, I know that you try to get a demo in of the 2.0, but if it's not going to happen because the session's almost over, but I'm wondering if there's a possibility that either you could do one on your Tech Doctor podcast, Robert, because you're in here, or better yet, if Tony Schwartz could do a demo of 2.0 when it comes out. That's my request for the day.

Venkatesh Chari
Thank you. Thank you, Bobby, for that. Great suggestions.

Adi Kushnir
We will also record something. We wanted to do an official demonstration on our own, so we will also do that.

Venkatesh Chari
We won't put. No, Robert and Tony are the best.

Adi Kushnir
Yes, exactly. They are.

Speaker 7
They're very patient. They're very patient. They really explain things. They're very slow. They don't get mad if you mess up. They're just they're just like the two best people that I know.

Robert Carter
Well, thanks for the kind words, Bobby. Dwayne, I believe you wanted to make another comment or ask a question. Please unmute and go ahead.

Speaker 12
Okay, am I unmuting?

Robert Carter
Yes, sir.

Speaker 12
Okay, what about the, when you plug it up to charge, it charges, but it beeps all the time. Has that been fixed?

Adi Kushnir
Which device?

Speaker 12
The Orbit player.

Adi Kushnir
So yeah, we have been getting. several reports on that, but we cannot replicate any of them. And in fact, even the people that reported this to us before reported us later that it's gone for them. So it's a bit, do you have any specific, if you have any specific steps in order that you're taking, it would help us to try to pinpoint it. Did it start after a recent update or was it always the case for you? I.

Speaker 12
Believe it was after the recent update it started and I've turned it off and plug it up to charge and it charges, but it just beeps constantly. And I know there have been some reports on it, but I don't know. Orbit speak does the same thing. It beeps a lot when you're charging.

Adi Kushnir
Also the also player.

Speaker 12
Orbit speak.

Venkatesh Chari
Yeah, it's thanks for reporting this. It's good, really good for us to know. It's and as Adi mentioned, some of these things are a little bit tricky for us to troubleshoot because we can't reproduce them. We don't doubt that you're experiencing that. We will follow up with you separately and try to get a little more detail so that we can get to the bottom of things. If you wouldn't mind, folks, just drop us a quick e-mail saying that you're having this issue and which unit and which model and which software version and build you have, that'll help us a lot.

Robert Carter
We got busy with lots of questions and comments and Adi stayed busy the whole time. And we are at the end of the hour. Do you all still want to try to do a demo? I'm still having. Postpone it to next time.

Adi Kushnir
Yeah, I believe it would be better to do that because we'll be, better, I'll be better equipped for that.

Robert Carter
Sounds good. And if we talk and if you would like me to do the demo, I could do it as well. I can easily connect up and do it. So whatever works, but we'll figure it out before the next monthly meeting.

Venkatesh Chari
Sounds great, Robert.

Robert Carter
All right. this has been an excellent meeting. I sure appreciate everybody's comments and questions and thoughts. It's so cool when we can come together and move things forward. I'm really happy about it. So thank you all for being here. Adi, Venkatesh, either of you have any final comments?

Venkatesh Chari
No, I think this is a great meeting. Thanks for having us, Robert. Thanks everyone for attending. We continue to put our efforts into the newer products, but also on our existing products. And we just want you to know that we continue to stand by all of our products. As we go into version 2.0, I would really appreciate folks reporting any issues they have. Please share them with us on our tech support e-mail or by phone. If you have any glitches at all, we'll be happy to help you as quickly as possible.

Robert Carter
Any final comments from you, Adi?

Adi Kushnir
No, I thank you for all the assistance that you give us, all of you, and We look forward to continue improving, so please keep it coming.

Robert Carter
All right. Well, I guess that will do it for the February Orbit Research Monthly discussion, and I do appreciate everybody being here, and we will plan to be back in March. Have a good rest of your day, you all.
