Hello all, First let me introduce myself> I am Antonio Guimaraes, and I live in Rhode Island. I work at National Braille Press as a customer service representative, and use note-takers to keep things simple, maintain records, and manage my schedule.
I am transitioning from a Braille Sense to a Braille Note, and have been using the Braille Note for only 3 days. I found that for me, the braille note can not be used out of the box because one needs to get considerable reading done in the manuals to understand even some of the basics. This was not the case with the braille sense, as I deboxed it, and was reading and writing in all of my files the same day. There are issues with the Braille Note, some of which I'll be sure to address later. The reputation of unresponsive tech support is one main issue, and the way the manual is written yet another. That is a conversation for a later time, but I do have some concerns about reading and editing braille files. 1. All my braille files are of extension .brl. Does changing to .brf enable the BN to prompt for less information? When opening the file, I do not want the BN asking if I want to "review previous options." Likewise, I don't need the BN asking if I want to save the file in keysoft format when exiting. 2. Navigating from disk to disk, to folder and subfolder, listing files of any type, and returning back to an easy list of folders and subfolders is frustrating at best. I know intuitively that the way to manage files, find them and open them easily should be completely overhauled. Either I am missing something, or Humanware missed the mark and really needs to improve folder and file navigation. The Braille Sense ease of navigation is exactly why I was able to begin using the machine right out of the box. What are the user experiences, and the general mood on the part of Humanware? 3. Once I painstakingly found and opened my file, the Braille Note assumes that the file is eventually going to be embossed, so it inserts a line break 40 spaces in from the beginning of what it calls a paragraph. The Braille Note definition of a line, and a paragraph is consistent with printed and embossed documents, but as a user I do not want my note-taker formatting things for me. I reached out to a braille note user about this automatic formatting and she is often frustrated when writing long mathematical equations that get broken up by line breaks. The Braille Sence allows me to read by paragraph, and unit, and this should be another reading mode one could get to with space m. This mode of reading goes paragraph to paragraph with the press of the space a, and space dot 4. Likewise it moves unit to unit with space 2-3 and space 5-6. While we are at it, why not show blank lines too. Thank you for your thoughtful response. Antonio M. Guimaraes Jr. ___ Replies to this message will go directly to the sender. If your reply would be useful to the list, please send a copy to the list as well. To leave the BrailleNote list, send a blank message to [email protected] To view the list archives or change your preferences, visit http://list.humanware.com/mailman/listinfo/braillenote
