Touch settings

Also called Hold time, Release time, Touch guard, Acceptance time, Debounce

Hold time, release time and touch guard: three timing settings that turn an unreliable finger into a reliable one, without buying anything.

What it is

Touch settings are the rules a device uses to decide whether a touch was meant. A tablet out of the box assumes a quick, clean tap from a steady finger. Change the assumptions and the same finger becomes accurate.

There are three that matter. Hold time (sometimes acceptance time) is how long the finger must stay on a cell before it counts. Release time is whether the choice fires when the finger lands or when it lifts. Touch guard (sometimes debounce or repeat delay) is how long the device ignores further touches after a selection, so a tremor cannot fire the same cell four times.

Who it can help

Anyone whose touch is real but messy: a hand that brushes the screen on the way to the target, a finger that lands and bounces, a tremor, a grip that cannot lift cleanly. Children who are still learning to isolate a finger. Adults with Parkinson's, cerebral palsy or essential tremor.

It won't help a person who cannot reach the screen at all, or who cannot sustain contact for even a fraction of a second. For them the answer is a keyguard, a different switch site, or another access method.

How it works

Hold time: set it to 0.3 seconds and a glancing brush does nothing; the finger has to mean it. Go too high (over about a second) and a person who cannot hold still gets nothing at all, so creep up in tenths.

Select on release: the cell fires when the finger lifts, not when it lands. That lets a person land anywhere, slide to the right cell, and lift. For a hand that slides, this single setting is often the whole fix. Touch guard of half a second means a bounce or a second unintended touch is thrown away.

Most tablets carry these in their own accessibility settings (on iPhone and iPad under Touch Accommodations; on Android under Interaction controls), so they apply to every app, and a good AAC app carries its own versions as well.

Getting started

Tonight, on whatever tablet is in the house, open the accessibility settings and find the touch options. Turn on a hold duration of 0.3 seconds, select on release, and ignore repeat at 0.5 seconds. Then watch the person use their board for five minutes and count the misses.

Change one setting at a time, and write down what you changed and what happened. That log is exactly what a therapist wants at an assessment and it stops the settings drifting when a device is reset.

Where to get help

AbilityNet runs My Computer My Way, a free step-by-step guide to the accessibility settings on every phone, tablet and computer. The ACE Centre and CALL Scotland publish guides on tuning touch access, and an occupational therapist can help match the settings to the hand.