• Retweet: @vmwarefusion : Fusion 50% off today, one day only. Details: http://is.gd/9Gqi Coupon code "CyberMondayDeal" # 2008/12/01
• It's Thanksgiving Day in the United States. We're thankful for Apple's commitment to accessibility in their products. # 2008/11/27
• We've added social bookmarking and "Send this to a Friend" to the Mac-cessibility Site as a trial. Let us know what you think. # 2008/11/27
• Apple released Safari 3.2.1 today. No known accessibility changes, but a good update to have nonetheless. Stability is the focus. # 2008/11/25
• News: Comparing Accessibility of the Big Three Operating System http://www.lioncourt.com/?p=247 # 2008/11/21

Tonight, Apple released iTunes version 8.02. The list of changes in Apple’s release notes includes improved accessibility with VoiceOver, as well as other stability improvements and bug fixes.

What the accessibility improvements include is not yet apparent. If you spot any, let us know. You can download the update from the Apple menu’s "Software Update" option.

Apple has released an update to the iPod software on it’s latest iPod Nano 4G, which is the model that includes spoken menus. This update fixes a number of bugs and adds support for the new earbuds with microphones, which are expected from Apple in the coming weeks. It also provides the ability to turn off the iPod’s rotate feature, which automatically activates Coverflow mode.

Users of the speaking menus will notice that all of the spoken menu content for your iPod will be re-generated when you update your device. We are not yet certain whether or not this update fixes a problem when some spoken menu items would stop speaking when their associated category was updated. (i.e. when new podcast episodes were added to a show, or new songs by a particular artist).

You can install the update by connecting your iPod Nano 4G and selecting the "Check for Updates" option in the iTunes iPod Settings pane.

Mac-cessibility Quick Tips is a feature of Lioncourt.com to provide brief tips and tricks to assist blind and visually impaired Mac users improve their Apple experience. Not all tips will be specific to VoiceOver, and most will work on either Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger or Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. Now for this week’s tip!

When editing ID3 tag information on your media in iTunes, there’s a plethora of options, divided into many pages of the "Get Info" window, which can be accessed by selecting the track or tracks you want to edit and pressing Command-I.

To make navigating this window easier, use Command-the number keys to select the tab you wish to work with. For example, Command-1 opens the "Summary" tab, Command-2 opens the "Info" tab, and so on. Focus will automatically be placed on the first field of the selected tab.

This tip also works in the window to edit information for multiple tracks, as well as the iTunes Preferences window.

Happy editing!

Tonight, Apple released iTunes 8.0.1 with a number of bug fixes and enhancements to their popular digital media management software. According to the release notes with this update, we will find access to iTunes U with VoiceOver, as well as improved syncing of speaking menus for the iPod Nano 4G, and other improvements to access of iTunes with VoiceOver.

The complete list of big fixes reads:

• Seamlessly plays the current song when creating a new Genius playlist.
• Improves syncing spoken menus to iPod nano.
• Addresses an issue of deleting HD TV episodes when downloading.
• Improves checking for updates from the App Store.
• Improves accessibility with VoiceOver.
• Addresses problems syncing Genius results to iPod.

As always, the update can be found by choosing "Software Update" in the Apple menu of Mac OS X.