I've read it since 1958. Pam.
-----Original Message-----
From: via Talk
Sent: Monday, January 11, 2016 2:05 PM
To: bj colt ; Window-Eyes Discussion List
Subject: Re: Interesting fb post
hmmm, you can't do poetry or a play in synthesized speech, Braille is
essential for that or hearing a dramatic reading, but sometimes you need
both. I would not be without Braille. I have read it for more than 60
years.
bj colt via Talk <talk@lists.window-eyes.com> wrote:
Hi Terry,
While I did read braille, speech has overtaken that method of
reading. When I did my Hon BA Social science course. I read hundreds
of books. I mean hundreds. I scanned in every single one of
them. Reading them in braille would have taken me abgout 40 years. My
fingertip senses have reduced dramatically because of playing the
guitar and neuropathy from Diabetes.
I could never go back to braille. At one time I did read 60 words a
minute. Which isn't fast, maybe between mid and high but not
fast. Some people could read it fast. However for the deaf bllind
1,000 dollars is something else. Or for those who prefer
braille. About time the price was brought down. Rip off bastards.lol
Live long and prosper, John
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Terry Bartlett via Talk" <talk@lists.window-eyes.com>
Sent: Monday, January 11, 2016 5:29 PM
To: "talk list" <talk@lists.window-eyes.com>
Subject: Interesting fb post
> Today, blind people fluent in Braille can read computer screens s
>
>
> through refreshable displays that convert words to raised dots – but
>
>
> only one line at a time.
>
> For the sighted, imagine a Kindle that presents just 40 characters per
>
>
> page, says Sile O’Modhrain, an associate professor of Music, Theatre
>
>
> and Dance at U-M, who is blind. Forty characters amounts to about 10
>
>
> words.
>
> The process is slow. It doesn’t give context. It’s expensive. And
>
>
> O’Modhrain believes it's one of the factors contributing to Braille’s
>
>
> declining use. Even though fluency in the nearly 200-year-old code is
>
>
> linked with higher employment and academic performance for the
>
>
> visually impaired, fewer blind people are learning and using it.
>
>
> Taking Braille’s place are text-to-speech programs that make it easier
>
>
> and faster to consume electronic information, but at the same time,
>
>
> hold back literacy.
>
> So O’Modhrain, who is also in the School of Information, has teamed up
>
>
> with engineering researchers to build a better Braille display – one
>
>
> that could show the equivalent of a whole Kindle screen at once. In
>
>
> addition, it could translate beyond text, rendering graphs, charts,
>
>
> spreadsheets, maps and complicated equations in a medium the blind
>
>
> could more fully understand with their fingertips.
>
> “What we’re trying to build in this project is full-page tactile
>
>
> screen for something like a Kindle or an iPad where you could just
>
>
> display refreshable text in real time,” O’Modhrain said. “Relative to
>
>
> what’s done today, and how that’s done, it’s a complete paradigm
>
>
> shift.”
>
> In the 1950s, about half of blind children learned to read Braille,
>
>
> according to the National Federation of the Blind. Today, that number
>
>
> is just 10 percent. Yet 80 percent of the blind people who are
>
>
> employed know Braille. Those numbers don’t tell the whole story, as
>
>
> definitions and health outcomes have evolved over the years. But the
>
>
> trend they suggest is real.
>
> “When you’re learning to read and write, it’s hard to find a
>
>
> substitute for physically encounter text – whether it’s in visual or
>
>
> tactile form,” O’Modhrain said. ”There are many studies that show that
>
>
> listening to something is not the same as reading it.”
>
> The system she is developing with Brent Gillespie, an associate
>
>
> professor of mechanical engineering, and Alex Russomanno, a doctoral
>
>
> student in the same department, would make e-reading for the blind
>
>
> more efficient and a lot less expensive. Today’s commercial one-line
>
>
> Braille displays cost around $5,000. If you were to directly scale up
>
>
> the mechanism behind it to show a whole page, it would cost around
>
>
> $50,000, Russomanno says. The U-M researchers’ aim to offer that
>
>
> capability at just $1,000 per device.
>
> How can they make a bigger display at a fraction of the cost? Their
>
>
> answer is microfluidics – a branch of science and engineering that
>
>
> involves specially etched chips with tiny channels that guide flows
>
>
> of liquid or air. Microfluidic chips are modeled and made like the
>
>
> integrated circuits of computers. They are printed rather than
>
>
> assembled.
>
> “We use the equivalent of electronic logic and circuitry,” Russomanno
>
>
> said. “When I say that, I’m referring to the way a computer works,
>
>
> with transistors and resistors, except ours is not electronic at all.
>
>
> It’s fluidic. Instead of high voltage and low voltage you have high
>
>
> pressure and low pressure, and instead of electric current flow you
>
>
> have fluid flow and you can achieve the same basic logic features.”
>
> And like the 0s and 1s that undergird computing, Braille is a binary
>
>
> code. Each Braille cell (which is sometimes a letter and sometimes a
>
>
> whole word) contains six dots that can be either raised or flat to
>
>
> convey different information.
>
> Michigan engineers have developed technology that may soon lead to a
>
>
> refreshable braille tablet the size of a Kindle.
>
> “The dots are either there or they’re not,” O’Modhrain said. “That’s
>
>
> why this circuit is so elegant.”
>
> With just two input valves, the researchers are able to generate more
>
>
> than 50 different dot states. The valves move fluid that controls tiny
>
>
> bubbles that raise or lower dots.
>
> At this point, they've shown that they can drive the dots with
>
>
> bubbles, and that they can print a microfluidic device that could let
>
>
> them efficiently control those bubbles. Over the next year, they'll be
>
>
> working to integrate the two and produce a larger prototype.
>
> "We would like to think a device like this would make reading
>
>
> electronic Braille more attractive again, make it close to the
>
>
> experience of reading a traditional book," O'Modhrain said. "Another
>
>
> challenge is convincing educational authorities to teach Braille
>
>
> again. It has dropped out of the system in terms of the education of
>
>
> blind people and we think it’s important to bring Braille back."
>
> About Michigan Engineering: The University of Michigan College of
>
>
> Engineering is one of the top engineering schools in the country.
>
>
> Eight academic departments are ranked in the nation's top 10 -- some
>
>
> twice for different programs. Its research budget is one of the
>
>
> largest of any public university. Its faculty and students are making
>
>
> a difference at the frontiers of fields as diverse as nanotechnology,
>
>
> sustainability,
>
> healthcare, national security and robotics. They are
>
>
> involved in spacecraft missions across the solar system, and have
>
>
> developed partnerships with automotive industry leaders to transform
>
>
> transportation.
>
> Its entrepreneurial
>
> culture encourages faculty and
>
>
> students alike to move their innovations beyond the laboratory and
>
>
> into the real world to benefit society. Its alumni base of nearly
>
>
> 70,000 spans the globe.
> --
> --
>
>
> -
>
>
>
> Poetry and Hums aren’t things which you get, they’re things which
> get you. And all you can do is go where they can find you.”
>
> ― Winnie the Pooh
>
> Terry Bartlett
>
> Ph: +6434847487
>
> Fax: +6434847145
>
> Mobile: +64212063874
>
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