Home

sling

#iACast 28 – The Future is NOW

by
DirectTV Now

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

This podcast was recorded on December 1, 2016, and it is hosted by Michael Doise. Accompanying Michael on this episode is Jason Earls, and Jessica Smith.

This episode covers the following topics:

  1. Black Friday/Cyber Monday DealsIn this segment, we discuss our holiday spending and deals we found interesting.
  2. W1-Enabled HeadphonesIn this segment, we discuss Beats and Apple’s AirPods.
  3. Directv NowAll three of us subscribed to AT&T’s new Directv Now service. Listen to us compare its accessibility and ease-of-use to other services, and hear our opinion on the service as a whole.
  4. Why Unlimited Data isn’t Always GoodIf you can stream Directv Now as much a you want as an AT&T cellular subscriber, why isn’t that good for consumers? What about consumers with other networks? What about other services that want to compete with Directv Now? Hear us discuss these issues and more.
  5. iAccessibility NewsCheck out iAccessibility.net for all the details on app betas, our training program, and more.

We sincerely hope you enjoy the content covered in this episode of our podcast! We have more content in the editing process, and we can’t wait to share it all with you soon! Thank you for listening!

Sling’s Accessibility should be in a Sling.

by
The Sling icon

Sling TV is an online cable service that brings cable TV channels to your smartphone, tablet, and computer. While Sling TV brings much to the table like affordable plans and a 7 day free trial, their accessibility and app features have much to be improved upon. Lets take a look at both of these things.

Sling Accessibility

Sling TV allows for users to sign up and sign in to the app, but the accessibility stops there for the most part. While users can find the menu and guide, a user can not browse the channel listings that are in the app. Visually, the channel listings are in a scrollable control that slides left and right and once an option appears in the middle of the screen then that channel’s listings appear. This functionality does not work with VoiceOver, and the schedules will also only tell the times that something is to be shown. The show title only appears as an image with no alt text included.

Sling TV App Features

While iOS has moved on the Sling TV app has not. While using the Sling app on iPad I noticed that they do not support Picture in Picture support at this time, and the interface is still that of an iOS 7 app that does not scale with size classes as most modern apps do.

Conclusion

While Sling TV provides a great online based cable TV experience, it still lacks features that other services provide, and VoiceOver users will find that the app lacks the accessibility required for everyday use. As a low vision user I plan to continue my subscription after my trial, but milage will vary when this app is concerned. Hopefully support for accessibility and feature sets will improve when single sign on and the TV app are released to the public because they both support Sling TV.

Back to Top