Universally compatible with
all Apple devices
AutoVerbal Pro
AutoVerbal, as the name implies, is an assistive communication app for your iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch. This autism app actually spawned from text-to-voice ring tone apps so this was a natural progression after having designed those ring tone apps. And I applaud the effort. It's great that developers are thinking about the autism community and those with disabilities. In fact, some may find this app to be adequate. Unfortunately, I do not for several reasons which I'll get to in a moment.
First let's discuss what AutoVerbal does. It provides a voice for those who don't have a voice or, like my son, choose not to use it often. You have two options; 1- Type in what you want to say and then touch speak. 2- Touch one of the many icons and hear prerecorded words/phrases. It's pretty simple, and that may be to the benefit of your child depending on where they're at developmentally. I like the simplicity of it from a user's viewpoint. But the simplicity is also a downfall as far as how the app is organized.
To use a prerecorded message you swipe up and/or down to find the row that contains that certain icon and then right or left to zero in on the icon you need. Icons are grouped into meaningful categories by row. AutoVerbal Pro let's you choose between a male or female voice, small or large icons, and built-in or internet-assisted voices. The default icons/phrases sound good for the most part. You can customize the top row of icons by adding your own pictures and typing what you want them to say. But your custom icons and the text-to-speech sounds electronic.
There are other versions of AutoVerbal that are less expensive and include different voices; AutoVerbal GirlTalk, GuyTalk, Espanol, etc. As you might guess, GirlTalk uses an adult female voice, GuyTalk uses an adult male voice, and Espanol makes AutoVerbal speak Portuguese. OK, it speaks Spanish. AutoVerbal Pro allows you to use a male or female voice... in English. I love the creative names they've used for these apps.
Unfortunately, the downfalls of AutoVerbal are many when using internet-enabled voices. So use the built-in voices. But it's a catch-22; Built-in voices don't sound too great, but the internet voices cause all kinds of problems. When using internet voices in conjunction with the text-to-speech the voices are terribly slow to speak. To be clear, most of the issues are with the text-to-speech and the custom buttons. All the default buttons sounds pretty nice.
Touching the white box in the upper right corner makes the app verbally repeat what is printed there. Depending on which icons you use, the voice they produce can often be at different volumes, tones, or qualities. And the icons produce one voice, but when you touch the white box to repeat, it's another voice.
In custom mode, you have to restart the app in order to switch from big buttons to small buttons, and vice versa. But this is likely only a one time change and it's not really a big deal.
With the custom row of buttons, I found that AutoVerbal would often not say the correct phrase I had typed when I used the big buttons option. It would print the correct phrase, but it would speak the phrase from the previous button I had used. Again, this was when I used internet voices.
When customizing your phrase, the app wants to capitalize the first letter of each word. This is a minor annoyance.
Interestingly, you don't have to use just one finger when scrolling rows of icons. You can use multiple fingers at the same time and scroll several rows at once. And you can change the background to 1 of 10 different images.
The icons for certain items are a bit questionable. Another big issue with AutoVerbal Pro is expandability. Some rows of icons are already too long. When more icons are added it will be very difficult to search and find the one you want. It's already a bit difficult. That will frustrate users fast! With nearly all the other communication apps available you have greater control over customization. AutoVerbal doesn't offer a lot in terms of customization. It's a decent effort, and it may work for you as an entry level AAC app, but it needs much refinement in my opinion.
