Login
You're viewing the adforward.org public feed.
  • Simon Jaegersimon@procrastodon.net
    Nov 5, 2026, 5:54 PM

    I e-mailed the company who makes the Bluetooth transmitter just to say "Thanks for an accessible Windows app; this is why latency is important for screen reader users." I got a reply less than half a day later and thought it was worth sharing:

    Hi Simon,
    Thank you for reaching out and sharing your experience. We're very glad to hear that the FMA121 works so well for your setup and that you've had a positive experience with FlooCast's accessibility.
    Yes, the accessibility support is intentional, and there's actually a bit of history behind it.
    When we first developed FlooCast, we used Tkinter, Python's standard GUI library, to build the interface. In September 2024, a user contacted us about accessibility issues. We then discovered that Tkinter's UI components didn't provide proper screen reader support. This came as a surprise, as we had assumed a standard UI library would support accessibility. It was clearly something we had overlooked.
    Following that feedback, we rewrote the UI using wxPython, which provides much better accessibility support, and released the updated interface in version 1.1.1. Accessibility has been a supported feature of FlooCast ever since.
    We're very pleased to hear that this effort has made a real difference to your experience.
    And of course, any further suggestions you have would be greatly appreciated!
    Best Regards,
    Ranson Sha
    Flairmesh Technologies
    www.flairmesh.com

    💬 11🔄 54⭐ 73

Replies

  • André Polykaninemenelion@caneandable.social
    Nov 5, 2026, 5:56 PM

    @simon Woooow, absolutely heartwarming and fantastic! What is the transmitter name? I don't need one so far, it seems, but I'll remember them and recommend to anyone.

    💬 1🔄 0⭐ 1
  • Simon Jaegersimon@procrastodon.net
    Nov 5, 2026, 6:00 PM

    @menelion If you follow this thread back, it should lead you to a whole post about low-latency transmitters/receivers, which I've been playing with for a while. Yeah, it was great to hear back from them and I'm honestly impressed they took the time to re-write the UI.

    💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • alysalys@selfy.army
    Nov 5, 2026, 6:25 PM

    @simon I’ve had the same experience with Tkinter 😬 , including rhe (planned) WxWidgets rewrite.

    💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • Sarah Russellblindbat84@disabled.social
    Nov 5, 2026, 6:40 PM

    @simon Wow, this is awesome, not just asimple thanks, but a quick, yeah so... about that, here's how it happened. So cool.

    💬 1🔄 0⭐ 1
  • Kevankev@dragonscave.space
    Nov 5, 2026, 6:56 PM

    @blindbat84 @simon I have several Bluetooth transmitters/receivers but none offer extra-low latency like that. Lowest I can get right now is around 100 ms.

    💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • Simon Jaegersimon@procrastodon.net
    Nov 5, 2026, 9:06 PM

    @kev @blindbat84 You can't do much better than that unless you get something that can send and receive Unicast / LE Audio. And you have to be careful, because many of the transmitters and even receivers will only support Auracast, which is a public stream by default. The Avantree Audikast 4 is a good example--if you want a private broadcast, you have to set it up in their app and encrypt it with a password. otherwise, anyone can listen in on your computer audio just by being near the transmitter. I have no idea how accessible the app is or how secure the encryption is, so I skipped it.
    The only portable receiver I've found for Unicast is the AuraGo AS70P I mentioned, and the FMA121 transmitter is the only device I can find that can plug into a 3.5mm jack and broadcast the audio to a Unicast device. There's the cheaper and slightly smaller Ugreen BT701, which is a USB-only transmitter that shows up like a standard audio device and lets you pair up to two Bluetooth receivers/headphones to it. That also supports Unicast, but it has an aggressive power cutoff on Windows and Android, and the recovery is very choppy for half a second or so, so you have to do something that plays audio in the background if you don't want your screen reader experience to be miserable. I also can't find a good Unicast receiver that's cheaper than the AuraGo.
    There's an older protocol called AptX Low Latency (shortened to AptX LL), which could get down to about 40 MS. I still have some devices that support it. But it has the opposite problem--it's hard to find portable receivers or headphones that have AptX LL support, even though it's really easy to find transmitters that do.
    Ultimately, the FMA121 transmitter is about $60, the AuraGo AS70P receiver is around the same price, and I don't think you can get much cheaper than that without compromises.

    💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 1
  • 💬 1🔄 0⭐ 2
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 1
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 1
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 2
  • ReadingTheDots (Lynn I)ReadingTheDots@vivaldi.net
    Nov 6, 2026, 12:53 AM

    @simon That is such a nice response to your email. They seem to really care about customer satisfaction and accessibility. Both very refreshing these days.

    💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
  • 💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0