Creating LAMP VI on iPad sen 2021-04-25 The LAMP AAC system is available for iPad, but the VI-specific icon set and layout is only included on the dedicated Accent device, which is an order of magnitude more expensive. The tools to create this system exist though, so it can be done by hand! - Section 1 - Export Full LAMP VI Pageset - This section took me about 5 minutes. 1. Download and install the free PASS software from PRC, which lets you simulate one of their dedicated devices on a device on a Windows computer. (https://www.prentrom.com/prc_advantage/free-software-download-pass) 2. Open PASS and select Tools -> Toolbox -> User Area. 3. Select Replace User Area, select any area, then select Pre-defined and then English. 4. Select LAMP Full VI, then confirm Yes when asked if you're sure. Answer Yes again when asked if you want to switch to this area now. 5. Select Tools -> Toolbox -> Transfer Memory -> Save One User Area, then select the LAMP VI area you created earlier. 6. Specify a file to export to, anywhere is fine just remember where it is. - Section 2 - Convert PASS Export to LAMP WFL - This section took me about 10 minutes. 1. Open https://ishareprc.com and sign up for a new account if you don't already have one. The free trial period is enough to do the conversion you'll need and once the conversion is done you don't need this account anymore. 2. Once you're logged in to iSharePRC, select Add a File and enter any title for the file that you want to call it, this will be used as the name of the pageset on your iPad later on (I called mine "LAMP VI sen"). 3. Click Choose File and select the file you exported from PASS earlier. 4. Click Upload File, then once that completes click Convert Vocabulary. 5. This will take a few minutes to convert to LAMP WFL format, wait until you get a message saying the conversion is complete before proceeding. - Section 3 - Load LAMP VI Pageset into WFL App - This section took me about 5 minutes. 1. On the iPad, click Vocab in the upper left, then Choose New Vocab. 2. Click the Menu button in the upper left, then iSharePRC. 3. Click Login to iSharePRC and enter your login information. 4. Tap the folder labeled Files, select the converted file, then click Download. 5. Tap Okay, then Done to get out of the iSharePRC download screens. 6. Select your new vocab to launch into it, it will open but without any icons loaded for many of the buttns. - Section 4 - Fix Icons - This section took me about 8-10 hours. 1. Load up PASS on your Windows computer again, and have your vocab loaded on the iPad beside it. 2. Tap Menu on the iPad, then Edit Page. 3. Starting with the upper left and working your way along each row (or any way that works for you), perform steps 4-8. 4. Edit the button on your iPad and on the PASS version. 5. Open the icon browser on the iPad. 6. Look at the icon name on the PASS screen and search for the same thing on the iPad. You have to type the entire name, using partial searches doesn't work for most of these icons. 7. Save the button on the iPad once you've selected the new icon, and exit out of the edit screen on PASS. 8. Repeat for all icons on the main screen. 9. When the main screen is completed, go into the upper left icon and complete the same process (steps 4-8) for everything on that screen, and then the sub-menus within that screen. There are three levels for much of the system, so you need to do the same process on all levels of all screens. - Notes and Tips - - A much simpler route to try first is using the Classic Invert accessibility feature on your iPad. This inverts all colours, so the backgrounds of buttons will be black but the icons will be the same design though. It only takes a second to try though and see if it works for you, and saves a lot of effort! It didn't work for me personally since I needed the higher-contrast simplified-lines icon versions used in LAMP VI. - If you don't want or need the VI pageset organization (motor plan simplified so that if you want the word that's on the main page you hit the button in the same place twice instead of having to find it on the second page, corners used for frequent things since they're easiest to hit with low vision, etc.) you can skip the first 3 sections and just use the info in the Fix Icons section to change some or all of the icons to match the LAMP VI icon system. Most of these are the name of the regular icon with a 0 (zero) after them, but not all of them follow this convention which is why I had to use PASS to look things up. - PRC could always remove the VI icons from the iPad version entirely in the future, so just be warned that it's possible this pageset might break at some point. I don't think they would do this and it will probably keep working, but PRC seems to want you to buy a full Accent device if you need the VI pageset, and they don't really advertise that these icons even exist on iPad. Personally an iPad makes a lot more sense for me so it was worth the extra effort. - Since most screen have +s (icon VERBS0), +ing (icon VERBING0), +ed (icn VERBED0), +en (icon VERBEN0), etc. on them, I downloaded a Macro Keyboard app and loaded these very-commonly-used icon names into it. That way I could just click one button on the keyboard to "type in" the name when I was setting up these icons. This saved a lot of time since these 6 or 8 icon names appear hundreds if not thousands of times. - If you're an AAC user yourself and want a copy of the completed pageset to save the time doing it yourself, reach out and I'd be happy to send a copy! I'm not offering this to people who aren't using it themselves as I don't want to get into a situation where I'm trying to support a parent using it for someone else if things break and their communication is affected.