Special Words User Guide - Editing the Word List
Editing the Word List
Tapping the Word List icon presents you with a view of all the words in the currently selected profile, in the order they appear in the activities, as shown below. You can use this to quickly move all activities to a particular page, by tapping the text or picture of one of the words, and then returning to an activity.
To rearrange the order of the words, or to delete any, tap the Edit button.
If you tap the Actions button at the top right, you are presented with some Extra Actions, including settings, facilities for sharing resources from one device to another, plus easy access to documentation on the Special iApps website. For more details, see Chapter 6.
Deleting a Word
On the left below we have already tapped the Edit button and and want to delete the biscuit word. We tapped the red and white - minus button to reveal the Delete button. If we don't want to delete the word after all, we can just tap Done instead of Delete.
We can rearrange the order of the words by dragging them up or down using the grey list icons on the right. When finished deleting or reordering, tap Done.
Editing a Word
You can change the text, picture or recorded sound for any word, by tapping its ⓘ button at the right of a word.
To add a new word, tap the + button. This will add the word at the start of the list, unless you first tap an existing word's text or picture, in which case the new word will be inserted after that one. So to add a word at the end, scroll down to the last word and tap on it (which will highlight it), and then tap the + button.
Tap in the text field to change the text. Use the on screen keyboard which appears or the desktop's physical keyboard.
Add a Photo
To set the picture, either tap Choose Picture to select from the photos in the device's existing photo library / gallery, or tap Take Picture to take and use a new picture using the device's camera. For devices with more than one camera, you will be able to choose which one to use. Pictures you take with the camera are not automatically saved to the device's photo library / gallery. If the device doesn't have a camera, the Take picture button will not be present, and you can then only choose pictures already in the photo library / gallery on your device.
Note: Pictures should ideally be in landscape orientation, with an aspect ratio of 4:3 (width:height). Existing photos which have different aspect ratios will be shown in the activities with white gaps on either side or above and below. If you want to edit an existing photo, to select a 4:3 region, use the device's built in editing facilities or one of the free photo editing apps, before choosing in Special Words.
Recording Sound
To record the sound of the word, tap the Record Sound button, and then speak clearly. Then tap the button again (it will have changed to saying Stop Recording). Try not to leave a long gap at the start or end of the recording. If you don't stop recording within 10 seconds, it will stop automatically. Use the Play Sound button to check your recording: you can record it again if you're not happy with it.
When you are happy with the text, picture and sound, tap the Save button to confirm your changes. If you're editing an existing word, you can change any or all of these things. When adding a new word, you must set all 3 items, and the Save button is disabled until you have done this.
It is possible to have more than one list of words, each is referred to as a profile. Each profile can have a different set of words, pictures and sounds, and each profile can use a different language. Profiles are explained in detail in Chapter 7.
Extra Options
When using Choose Picture you can browse for images anywhere on the device's local storage.
On iPad in split view, and on Windows or Mac, when editing a word, you can also drag and drop an image or audio file on to the app, to use as the word's picture or sound. The app supports image files with .jpg, .jpeg, .png and .gif extensions. It supports audio files with .m4a, .mp3 and .wav extensions and, except when using Safari, .webm and .ogg extensions.
Please Note
You may need to grant the app permission to use your microphone, camera, and photo library. If you accidentally refuse permission, you may need to visit your device's privacy settings to undo this. The device may grant or deny permission based on the website (i.e. www.specialiapps.org) as opposed to individual web-based apps, and you may need to manage this from your web browser's privacy settings.
If you add your own photos, text and audio, you will need to back it up, or you risk losing your content. The app stores your content on your device, not in the cloud. Be aware that using iCloud, Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive or other cloud-based services will NOT automatically backup or restore this data: you must use the export facilities explained in Chapter 6.
Clearing website data in your browser will DELETE your content.