Want to set up tablet texting for my deaf dad. How can I do this?

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Want to set up tablet texting for my deaf dad.

We have a Verizon tablet that we are not using - we have another 7 months on it. It is set up on a data family plan with unlimited texting. (Found it pretty much useless for our needs - very small memory)

How can we set that up for my deaf dad to use for texting? He is 90 so it has to be user friendly and large type. Is there a good tablet texting app? He still has most his marbles.
 

Rukbat

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Re: Want to set up tablet texting for my deaf dad.

If his vision is good, the only problem is going to be hearing the notification tone or noticing the vibration, so install a launcher that does badging. That way, the texting icon will get a little number "badged" onto it if there's an incoming unread text.

I'm pretty hard of hearing (100db down at 4KHz) and, until I had my cataracts removed, my Note 3 wasn't really large enough for me to notice the badges, but I could hear a really loud notification tone (a submarine dive horn). If he can see, he should be able to see badges on even a 7" tab. He doesn't have to be able to read the number in the badge - the fact that there's a red circle there means that he has at least one text. (Nova Launcher goes on every phone I own. It has a free badging app, but only the paid version of Nova [$5] will use it. There may be other launchers that do badging on their free versions, but it's been so long since I used any other launcher that I can't remember.)

There are also other Android apps for the deaf - see this page Purple seems to be pretty good. Also, if he signs, Skype would be useful. If not, any chat app - an IRC client, Hangouts or Skype - would allow him to carry on a conversation with anyone who doesn't sign in real time.

(I like the fact that someone who's 90 is still interested in living in 2015. People see white hair and automatically assume "technically illiterate". Most of us who developed this stuff way back when have white hair now.)
 

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