Click and Type Portable and Other Portable AT Apps

Click-N-Type, the fantastic, free, configurable on-screen keyboard with word prediction now has a portable version which can be run completely from a flash drive! How cool is that?

More and more AT users who need specialized software are able to carry what they need from computer to computer on a flash drive. In addition using portable versions of common applications like Firefox and Thunderbird allow you to maintain your accessibility settings and add-ons from one computer to the next. Wouldn't it be great if school, college and public libraries offered flash drives of AT software for use? How cool would it be if disability support services created a flash drive from each student who could benefit from such software, trained that student on the software and allowed the student to use his or her flash drive of portable AT Apps on any computer? (In a presentation once I had the head of IT for a district complain that free software for schools isn't free because of the time in takes to install and monitor it, flashdrives full of accessible software was my answer.)

AT Apps to run from a flash drive:

• AccessApps a suite of accessibility programs
  
• Click-N-Type Portable Onscreen Keyboard with Word Prediction
• eCalc is a large key on screen calculator
• eTextReader allows you to read the plain text of Project Gutenburg Files
  
• Onscreen Keyboard Portable transfer you home Windows Onscreen Keyboard settings to any computer

Links to full collections of Portable Apps or App Suites:

• PendriveApps
• PortableApps
• MakeUseOf's List of Free Portable Apps
• WinPenPack

Don't forget you can use Package Factory to convert many program (like Classroom Suite Player) to run from a U3 SanCruz thumb drive. Here are my instructions on how to do that.

Running Programs from a Flash Drive

One of the challenges of working with technology in a school system is that you often don't have "administrative" privileges on computers to run or install software and because software that is vital to our classrooms is often not vital to the rest of the school we have come up with creative solutions.

One solution is to run smaller and somewhat simple programs from a flash drive, thus altogether avoiding the need to install programs to a computer. This isn't easy because most software isn't designed to be run from a flash drive.

One solution (and this is likely one of many and it only works on Windows) is to use a flash drive with a U3 system (like the SanDisk drives). U3 is an operating system that allows programs to run directly from the flash drive. However programs must be converted to work with U3 and as you can imagine many of the programs we find useful with our students are not available in u3 compliant format.

Luckily there is some free software that can convert (smaller, simplier) programs to be U3 compliant. It is called Package Factory. To make everything even better their is a tutorial on Techbytes. I spent a couple hours trying to convert two programs over the weekend and today at school one of them worked instantly running off the drive. The other one... well I am not sure I can make it happen but I will give it a try soon.

I haven't tried all of the programs below, but they might be worth a shot:

• Switch It Player
• Power Point Viewer
• Watling View Switch Games
• HiYah Activities

Also I did get the Classroom Suite Viewer that comes with News-2-You membership (and with Aimee Solutions Programs) to work.

Everyone is doing it -- writing about and downloading Access Aps

Access Aps is a free set of open source software, like Open Office, and assistive technology softwares.

Here are some of the applications on Access Aps:

• Access Apps help
• Accessibility Essentials
• Aspire Learning
• Open Office
• AMIS DAISY reader
• DSpeech
• PowerReader
• Rapid Set
• The Sage
• Type Faster
  
• VuBar
• Quick Res
• Sonar
• Virtual Magnifying Glass
• Mozilla Firefox
• WebbIE
• Click N Type
• Dasher
• Mouse Tool
• Art Weaver
• Audacity
• Audiobook Cutter
• GIMP
  
• Unfreeze
• VLC Media Player
• CamStudio Portable
• KompoZer
• Scribus
• Wink
• 7 zip
• Clam Win
• Converber
• KeePass
• Sumatra PDF
• TOP OCR
• Anagramarara
• Jooleem
• Othello
• Stranded II
• Suduku
• Thunder Screen Reader

You can choose from a full download, a lite download or "pick and choose" to get only what you/your learners need. The Access Aps need to be downloaded, unzipped and then installed on a flash drive to make it portable and usable on any computer. You will need a 2G or bigger flash drive.