[Closed] Cast your Votes now for the AppleVis Golden Apples of 2015

By AppleVis, 18 December, 2015

We are pleased and excited to announce that voting for the AppleVis Golden Apple Awards of 2015 is now open. Read on to see which apps and developers have been shortlisted and to cast your own votes.

The AppleVis Golden Apple Awards is our community's opportunity to recognize and acknowledge the hard work and dedication which developers have put into making great and accessible iOS and OS X applications over the last twelve months.

To be eligible for consideration for the Golden Apple Awards of 2015, an app must:

Be fully accessible to blind and low vision users.
Have been launched or significantly updated during 2015.
Be from a developer with a demonstrated and long-term commitment to full accessibility.
Demonstrate excellence in design, functionality and operation.

Candidates for Developer of the Year must:

Have a long-standing, exemplary commitment to making their apps fully accessible to blind and low vision users.
Be receptive and responsive to the needs of blind and low vision users in a timely manner.
Have delivered significant new features or updates to their app(s) during 2015, particularly updates which directly benefit blind and low vision users.

Voting will close at 23:59 PDT on December 24, 2015. Voting is open to all registered users of the AppleVis website; if you are not already registered and would like to vote, you can create an account now, then come back to this page to cast your votes. The voting form is at the end of this post, but will only be displayed if you are logged in.

Below are the nominees for each award:

Best iOS App

1Password - Password Manager and Secure Wallet

1Password allows you to securely store and retrieve your website logins, credit cards, personal information, secure notes and more. With support for Safari extensions, 1Password makes it possible to quickly login to websites without having to remember any of your passwords and fill forms with credit card and personal details without typing them in.

Read 1Password's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Drafts 4 - Quickly Capture Notes, Share Anywhere!

Drafts is both simple yet powerful. Open the app and you are presented with a new, blank draft – ready for you to type. Once you have finished typing, extensive output options let you send your text to Twitter, Facebook, Mail, Messages, a Calendar event, quickly save (or prepend/append) to Dropbox, Google Drive or Evernote--and much more. Advanced multi-step actions and Javascript integration can combine all of these options into a single double-tap.

Read Drafts' AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Overcast: Podcast Player

Overcast is a powerful yet simple audio podcast player, with features such as Smart Speed, Voice Boost, and Smarter Playlists to help you manage and optimize your podcast listening.

Read Overcast's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Workflow: Powerful Automation Made Simple

Workflow won an Apple Design Award at this year’s Worldwide Developers’ Conference (WWDC). These prestigious awards acknowledge the mobile and desktop apps which raise the bar in design, technology and innovation. In the case of Workflow, the award specifically recognized its accessibility with VoiceOver. According to Apple’s own report on the 2015 Design Awards:

Workflow is a powerful automation tool, available exclusively for iPhone and Apple Watch, that connect apps and actions together to automate things you do every day. Selected as an Apple Design Award winner for its outstanding use of iOS accessibility features, Workflow delivers an excellent implementation for VoiceOver with clearly labeled items, thoughtful hints, and drag/drop announcements, all of which make the app usable and quickly accessible to those who are blind or low-vision. The creators of Workflow understand that true accessibility is not just a technical task, it also requires design and usability consideration.

Read Workflow's iOS App Directory entry for more information

Best iOS Game

A Blind Legend

This “hack-and-slash” audio game harnesses the power of binaural sound to bring characters and actions vividly to life around the player. Taking the role of Edward Blake, the famous blind knight, players must find their way through the High Castle Kingdom and avoid the many traps and dangers that lie in store for them.

Read A Blind Legend's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Audio Rally Racing

Audio Rally Racing lets you experience the thrill of speed and reckless driving on country roads and city streets. First you choose a car, then you can start competing in the various races and circuits available. With your navigator telling you what’s coming up, your goal is simply to drive as fast as possible; get around the curves; and avoid the obstacles in your way.

Read Audio Rally Racing's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Blindfold Bowling

Blindfold Bowling is an audio game that challenges you to make the perfect strike. You throw the bowling ball by either flicking with one finger; aiming with one finger and flicking; or setting the exact angle with your thumb and forefinger, and then flicking. The faster you flick, the faster you throw the ball. You will hear the ball rolling down the alley, hopefully followed by the falling of pins. Like real bowling, you can get a strike, a spare, or even miss completely with a gutter ball.

Read Blindfold Bowling's iOS App Directory entry for more information

Dice World - Dice with Friends!

Dice World features a collection of popular and fun 2-player dice games - Yahtzee, Farkle, Pig, Threes, Balut and 24 - offering multiple game and player options and the ability to track your performance.

Read Dice World’s iOS App Directory entry for more information

Best Assistive iOS App

BARD Mobile

BARD Mobile provides access for qualified US citizens to braille and talking books directly from the National Library Service (NLS). The BARD catalogue contains nearly 70,000 books, magazines, and music scores in audio and braille formats, with new selections added daily. With the BARD Mobile iOS app, you can play NLS audio materials on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. If your device is connected to a refreshable braille display through Bluetooth, you can also read the braille materials available on BARD.

Read BARD Mobile’s AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Be My Eyes - helping blind see

Be My Eyes enables blind and low vision iOS users to connect with sighted volunteers via live video chat to ask questions about objects or situations that they have encountered in their daily lives - be that choosing the correct color shirt, locating the desired store in a mall or reading the label from a food container.

Read Be My Eyes' AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

BlindSquare

BlindSquare uses GPS and the compass to locate you and provide you with information about the surrounding environment. The app is aware of when you travel by car, bus or train and starts to report interesting places in front of you (for example, the next transit stops) and street crossings when you are passing them. By changing the radius, you can limit the area you are interested in. You can also search by search term or by category. You can select an interesting place from the search results to find more information and get directions.

Read BlindSquare's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

KNFBReader

KNFBReader converts printed text into high quality speech to provide accurate, fast, and efficient access to both single and multiple page documents with the tap of a button on the iPhone. Picture accuracy is facilitated by a Field of View Report, Automatic Page Detection, and Tilt Control. When used with a document stand, the app will automatically detect when you turn the page of a book in the stand or insert a different sheet.

Read KNFBReader's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Voice - Take Pictures & Have Them Read/Spoken In Many Languages with Fast OCR

Voice allows you to take a picture of anything that has text on it, and then have that text read to you within a few seconds. The app includes a number of advanced features that you might not expect to find on a free app, such as a book mode, a field of view report, auto-capture, Smart Crop, column detection and reading, document background cleaning, and a lot more.

Read Voice's AppleVis iOS App Directory entry for more information

Best Mac App

1Password - Password Manager and Secure Wallet

1Password is a password manager that offers both security and convenience. Anti-phishing protection, automatic strong password generation and support for all major web browsers ensures that entering of passwords, identities, and credit card details into web forms is fast and secure. Additionally, it provides a secure place to store confidential information and notes.

Read 1Password's AppleVis Mac App Directory entry for more information

Audio Hijack

Audio Hijack allows you to record any application's audio, from Internet streams to DVD audio and everywhere in between. If your Mac can play it, Audio Hijack can record it. And that's not all - Audio Hijack can also enhance any audio using industry-standard VST and AudioUnit audio effects.

Read Audio Hijack's AppleVis Mac App Directory entry for more information

Carbon Copy Cloner

Carbon Copy Cloner provides the peace of mind that comes from knowing that your personal files and data and your operating system are all preserved on a bootable backup should disaster strike. Restore individual files from the Finder or boot from your backup to restore your Mac to a previous state.

Read Carbon Copy Cloner's AppleVis Mac App Directory entry for more information

LaunchBar

LaunchBar is an award-winning productivity utility that offers an intuitive and efficient way to search and access any kind of information stored on your Mac or on the Web. It provides instant access to your applications, documents, contacts, and bookmarks, to your music library, to search engines and more. Just use a keyboard shortcut to bring LaunchBar's input window to front and start typing. As you type, LaunchBar displays the best matching choices.

Visit the LaunchBar website for more information