Voiceover and the two fingered double tap.

By MHicok, 27 September, 2012

Forum

iOS and iPadOS

I have noticed that when using voiceover, the two finger double tap activates the music player. Is there anyway to turn that off?? I know you can double tap again and it will stop, but just wondering if you can stop it all together.

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Comments

I don't think so

I don't think there is a way to disable this, or any VO gestures. For a little clarification, the two finger double tap starts and stops audio. It doesn't specifically and only work with the music app. If you are reading a book in Read2Go, or listening to a podcast in iCatcher, the same gesture starts and stops these too. But if no apps are open, it appears by default the music app will open and start playing.

Two fingered tap?

Hi. Is it at all possible you might have confused the gesture? I ask because to stop VO from speaking, it's two fingers, tapping the screen once. If you are not asking about this, please accept my apologies, but i know i had gotten the pause speech gesture wrong, so I wanted to help if I could at all.

2 finger double tap jester.

Hi. a further clarification on this. the 2 finger double tap is for starting and stopping things across IOS. An example of this, is when your in the clock app, you are able to start, and stop the stopwatch this way. also. Once again, I hope that this assists someone.

Cool.

I had no idea it would stop and start the clock. That's cool.

Two fingered tap for the timer?

Does that gesture work with the timer? would help tremendously if I'm cooking something. Thanks and glad we started a discussion like this.

Yes, it works for the timer.

Because of this thread, I tried the two finger double tap in the Clock app. I stopped and started the timer and stopwatch this way. It seemed to me that you had to start the timer with the button, but once it was running, the gesture worked great.

magic tap

Hi Also, as an addition in iOS 6, developers may now use the 2-finger magic tap in their own apps. This means that it's no longer limited to official apple-apps, developers can assign it to perform some spisific act within the application if they so choose Malthe

Voiceover and the two fingered double tap - continued

I too find that the two finger double tap starts the Music app in many Voiceover enabled apps. This is usually inappropriate, disconcerting and annoying. Therefore I would say it is a bug in Voiceover; I can hardly believe it is a design feature.

The apps include:

Home Screen
iBooks
Notes
Mail
Contacts
Photos
Settings
Kobo
Kindle
Nook
OneClick
Dropbox
Videos except when a video is playing. In this case the video is paused and restarted.
Safari

But not

Clock In this case the gesture starts and stops the stopwatch if this has been selected.

The problem does not occur if there are no songs available in the Music app. It occurs in both iOS5 using an iPod Touch and iOS6 using an iPhone 4.

Apart from this previous posting I can find no other reference to this problem on the web. Do most people just repeat the gesture and blame themselves for being clumsy?

No

At this time no there is not a way to turn it off completely.

Voiveover bug

I don't want to switch off the facility. I want Apple to recognise that there is a bug and correct it in iOS 7. Alternatively they can explain why it is a design feature.

Why is an explanation needed?

Hello John. Why is an explanation needed? The two fingered double tap rarely plays my music unintended, and I can simply pause quickly, and so called annoyance is gone. No one will ever be happy, I suspect when the IOS comes out, because there will always be someone who dislikes, this, or wanted, that, in the new release. Wait and see if something is a true bug before considering it and thinking apple is in the wrong. Think of this, if double tapping were able to be turned off, how much more frustration would users have if they did it by accident or someone helped them, because they thought it would be useful? Facebook implamented this, to like and comment, I like it, no pun intended. As long as a microsecond of attention is paid by someone to ensure they are on what they want to comment or like, there should be no concern. My two cents worth.

Two-Finger Doubletap In Blindsquare

As the subject states, blindsquare uses this to stop it's own voice from speaking, very handy for negotiating the menus in Blindsquare so that one doesn't listen to speech values. Having been blind from birth like many of us, the gesturing concept, at least for me, is new territory relatively speaking. Sighted folks gesture all the time. I do find that in Blindsquare, sometimes that gesture invokes the music player but that may be in part due to my own clumsiness. It happens very rarely and I love the feature, seeing that it is indeed application specific, like in the timer and every podcast and audio app I have on my phone. I really don't understand the complaints and I think it should stay exactly as it is.

Here Here

Doug, i completely agree about how useful a feature it is. I don't have blind square, seems a little to expensive for my taste, having said that, it's a great feature. And I for one, would rather learn gestures if I can so that I'm not always acting so, for lack of a better term, blind. But that's a whole nother topic. :) Here's to another IOS coming out soon and new things to explore.

VO 2-finger double tap

My first iPhone was a 3GS. It was running iOS version 3 point something. My reason for telling you this is that the two finger double tap has been used to stop music since way back then. IT is even mentioned, surprisingly enough, in the iPhone manual under Accessibility Voiceover, stating: "Two-finger double-tap: Answer or end a call. Play or pause in Music, Videos, YouTube, Voice Memos, or Photos. Take a photo (Camera). Start or pause recording in Camera or Voice Memos. Start or stop the stopwatch"

How is it a bug?

I'm a little confused by the comments that the gesture starting music in other VO-enabled apps is a bug, and not a deliberate design feature. The apps that were listened don't involve "starting and stopping" anything, other than VO speech, which is paused with the two-finger single tap. So what function would the two-finger double-tap have in those apps? If none, then why wouldn't Apple enable you to start and stop your currently playing audio from within those apps? After all, lots of people like to multitask and listen to music or podcasts while they work...and it's certainly easier to do that with a gesture than by switching back and forth between apps.

I think we're all in most agreement, this is not a bug

Hi Joseph. What confuses me, is why this person wants an "Explanation" of the design feature. As I understand it, without Voice Over on, it's possible to start music with the push of the power button, though I don't know how that works. If this person is so curious write accessibility@apple.com and seeif they rspond? Of course with the new IOS and the legitimate beta bus and unsupported things they need to fix, I wonder if there won't be anything other then a form letter. If they choose to write that email, I'd be interested to hear the reply of why the design feautre was enabled. If I or anyone else has gotten your original comment of the annoyance wrong, please chime in and correct us.

Crazy to call this a bug

This is clearly a feature, and a really useful one. As well as starting and stopping audio and timers, it answers and ends calls, makes Siri listen and stop listening (if Siri is already open, and is used by 3rd party apps like facebook to like and share, and Shazam to easily start tagging a song. So accidentally starting some music playing from time to time isn't that much of a problem to me, but that's just my opinion. Apple aren't really fans of user customisation :) so I doubt they'll allow the feature to be switched off :)

Definitely not a bug!

Hi! I have read this thread with interest, and discovered here how many uses the two-finger double-tap gesture has which I didn't even know about. This gesture is definitely not a bug, in fact it's probably one of the most useful VoiceOver gestures, given that it can be used for so many things, not just starting and stopping audio, but answering a phone call, hanging up a call, and all the things mentioned above. So my advice to anyone who gets a bit annoyed when they accidentally start their music is, just do another two-finger double-tap if you don't want that music, and it- will go away immediately: after all, just because somethng might annoy some people, that doesn't make it a bug.

I'm not even entirely sure

I'm not even entirely sure how one would "accidentally" start music. It's not a very easy gesture to do accidentally, so if you're doing it in an app that doesn't involve starting and stopping something, it should probably just be assumed that it'll start any paused audio playback, or start playing from the music app.

Thanks for resonses

Thank you for your responses. You all consider that this effect of the two fingered double tap is not a bug and is therefore a design feature. I accept this position.

I do however struggle to understand the design philosophy behind the behaviour. Through clumsiness and inexperience of the Voiceover interface I can easily make a two fingered double tap when, say, listening to an ebook in the Kindle for iOS app. The switch from a speaking voice to music I have found disconcerting.

I would have thought that the App developer would have some means controlling the effect of inappropriate gestures. This clearly happens in the Clock app. Perhaps under Apple’s design philosophy the two fingered double tap to start and stop the Music app is not considered inappropriate in most apps. Perhaps it gives a consistency to the whole Voiveover interface.

A final thought on this

Hi John. Though I don't use the kindle app, I have somehow two finger double taped and music has started. I think ti just, happens, and we have to say oh crap, or insert your own word here. I would've used my real word, but I don't thinkit's appropriate ;) Seriously though, I think it's just something that we need to deal with, and now with the Voiceover tutorial, people know what that does and can when something happens like that, just, stop and everything should be fine. If it's a real bother to say you or others, just, don't put music on your device. Just a thought. Glad you answered back and understood that it's a design feature. :) Siobhan

My ideas on this

It looks as if the two-finger double-tap is here to stay. It's been in iOS since way back when, and I believe it's in iOS 7 as well. So if you just aren't good at it let me encourage you to keep practicing it. I really can't think of another gesture that would better handle everything the two-finger double-tap does. Sorry but I'm afraid I agree with the majority here, it's a cool gesture and I'm glad it's there.

Solution to the 2-finger double-tap problem!

I found the solution to stop the 2-finger double-tap from automatically playing music in the Safari app. Here it is: Turn the music options off in Settings! Here's how:

Go to Settings, then under that go to the ITunes and App Store.

Toggle the "show all music" switch to "off."

Now press the back button and under Settings, go to "Music. Double-check that the music switch is toggled to "off."

Now go to General and Storage. Under the music storage tab, delete all the storage you've accumulated in there.

Exit out of Settings.

Now whenever you do a 2-finger double-tap in Safari or any other app, music won't play because the music player is de-activated.

Hope this helps!
Angie
iPhone 5S, IOS7

forgot to say

If you just go to the Music folder under Settings and toggle it to Off, it'll automatically turn "show all music" (or whatever that setting is called) off in the "iTunes and App Store. I like to check they're both off, though, just in case.