Hi folks,
The finals are over, and I got a chance to go through many
interesting emails from this list. Here are quite a few opinions
and updates:
* I myself have updated to KeySoft 7.5.31. I find that opening
zipped BookShare books is same as before: using bks format.
* As for opening standard zip files: in theory, now you can open
any zip files, although I (or someone willing to do it) should
test its limits. Some of the "unzipping" tests that I've planned
include not only BookShare books, but zip files with multiple
files and folders underneath zip archive. If both tests gives me
(or others) positive results, then I can "unofficially" declare
that zip files are supported - and thus, allow me to update my
PBWiki site imensely. This would place us "almost" same ranks as
Braille Sense family - the only thing missing would be zipping
files and folders. Also, in order for mass adoption of zip files
to occur, there should be a shortcut to zip and unzip files from
File Manager and/or Directory mode.
* Speaking of Braille Sense and its "superiority," as our friend
Gregory has mentioned: Personally, when I look at a product, I
look for potential and technicality of thproduct -
specifications, operating systems, usability, etc. Well, it
could be due to my college major, but it also has common sense
reasons: that just judging from outside appearance could be
misleading and dangerous. I've seen some Korean post on Braille
Sense, and some of my friends in South Korea has expressed some
technical flaws with this unit, including media player bugs, not
being able to be recognized as USB storage device (according to
one user) and so forth. The same types of posts that we
BrailleNote users see can also be found under Braille Sense List
as well--suggestions, bug reports, questions about upgrades and
so forth. Often, I've seen a weak product quickly catch up to
the "mainstream standards" with surprising news. A pretty good
example in mainstream society is increased attention to Apple
products over Microsoft. Similarly, for us, the announcement of
CE upgrades from 2.12 to 4.2 (does this answer your question,
Paul?) came as a shock both here and outside. This was not an
easy matter, and it would be similar if HumanWare announces a CE
upgrade in a future version of KeySoft. With this in mind, I
personally view that, a harsh comment just because of what's
going on right now would spark yet another controversy and in the
end would find ourselves answering multitudes of questions about
inaccuracies of information from users themselves. So, the best
advice that I can give you, as a college student about instart
studying computers and a user of BrailleNote who keeps an eye on
other products, is this: please consider what HumanWare
programmers would say, and please consider how they would
sacrifice their own time to come up with a solution to things
that were brought here, including a build of BookShare fix
release for Classics.
* As for limit of storage cards, the 2 GB limit is placed on SD
cards (normal version). No support for SDHC cards, but I view
that it can be fixed. As for CF cards and USB drives, there's no
limit (the only limit would be voltage) - I tested and confirmed
that Western Digital 500 GB hard drive (2.5 inch version) works
with BrailleNote. If this works, then I can envision even a
Terabyte (TB) drives in stores today would work, as well as
larger CF cards up to 1 TB (I can see it coming in near future,
starting with 128, 256 and 512 GB within short notice; but in
order to produce a card larger than 128 GB, knowledge revision to
CF standards should be written, because the current standards
support up to 137 GB).
* As for PK's case, I've seen it once. I see what the originator
had in mind: increased probability of dirt accumulation, subject
to weather conditions and so forth. At this moment, just like
BrailleNote mPower and Classic cases, the only defense could be
that it was done that way to allow access to microphone button
(along with the mic itself) and joystick.
In summary of this post, I'd like to leave you with a comment: It
is better for a potential user to ask questions and learn from
current users rather than existing users giving a new user a
headache with complaints that this newbie would not understand.
In other words, I advise that we be all considerate when dealing
with recent issues that were posted on this list. Thanks. (Hope
this post was useful). If you have any further comments about
this post, feel free to contact me (either here or privately, if
you deem necessary).
Cheers,
Joseph
___
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
