Hi Rick:
Terrific question! Let me start by saying that my bias is toward a member of
the Braille Note family for your school district. There are several good
reasons which I will list and I will also suggest some questions you might
pose to vendors and others knowledgeable in the field.
First, at this time, the Braille Note family has the largest installed base
by far! That matters because bug fixes and good support are dependant on
the size of the population a company like this serves.
Second, I believe you will find that the Braille translator used in the
Braille Note family is Duxbury. I know that this is not the Translator used
in the PacMate. In fact, this would be a serious concern were I making this
purchase for school children. Why the PacMate uses a different translator
is beyond the scope of this message, but as a pure bases of comparison, this
may be enough of a concern to rule out the PacMate.
Third, the premise of the PacMate is using commercial software. What
Freedom Scientific doesn't address well is who will pay for the cost of
developing the set files(scripts) for the commercial software. Believe me,
that is no small matter so that piece of the argument in favor of the
PacMate is mute to say the least and disingenuous to say the most. If you
accept this point, I would once again remind you of my first point about the
size of the installed base.
Fourth, the Braille Note family uses a token system to indicate print
formatting. As a life time Braille reader, I can tell you that this is by
far the best system for relating to print formatting.
Now for some questions you might ask to further clarify the issues. Rather
then asking if the files can be transferred (I'm sure they can with all 3) I'd
ask how the print format information is conveyed to the Braille reader. I
think you will find that the token system in the Braille Note family is the
best by far.
Hardware is a big deal! It is also a matter of personal taste. I hope you
are buying units with a Braille display. If so, you might just want to ask
a few of the potential users which display seems most natural and
comfortable. I would caution you in that regard that a display that is
refreshed by pressing router buttons in a location where they can easily be
confused with other buttons is a recipe for trouble. It will slow down
Braille reading particularly in young people.
Finally, I would look at the history of manufacturers in terms of
cannibalizing there own products by forcing customers to buy new hardware by
unnecessarily obsoleteing the old hardware. This will hurt your district
in the long run. I trust something here is helpful.
Alan Holst
----- Original Message -----
From: "Rick Boggess" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Braillenote List'" <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 4:54 PM
Subject: [Braillenote] Reading/Transferring Word and Duxbury Files
I am sorry for the earlier message which I forgot to edit to reflect the
appropriate product name. The message should have read as follows;
I'm looking at notetakers for our school system. I would appreciate
hearing
from those with experience transferring Word and Duxbury files to and from
the BrailleNote. Is this possibel? Does formatting remain in tact?
Rick Boggess
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