[Blindmath] producing Nemeth math as a blind person

Debbie Willis dwillis at aph.org
Tue Nov 18 19:33:32 UTC 2008


A braille cell is made up of six dots; these six dots are arranged in two columns with three dots in each column.  The upper left dot is dot 1; left middle is dot 2; left bottom is dot 3; upper right is dot 4; right middle is dot 5; right bottom is dot 6.  These six dots correspond to a variety of manual and electronic note takers and braille writers.  The keys on the note takers and braille writers are generally arranged in two horizontal sets; we'll call set 1 on the left, and set 2 on the right.  Starting with the rightmost key in set 1, this key corresponds to dot 1.  The middle key in set 1 on the left side corresponds to dot 2; and the leftmost key in set 1 corresponds to dot 3.  Starting with the leftmost key in set 2, this key corresponds to dot 4.  The middle key in set 2 on the right corresponds to dot 5; and the rightmost key in set 2 corresponds to dot 6.  By pressing one or more of the six keys simultaneously, a person is able to produce readable braille or to take notes in braille.  There are also some QWERTY keyboards that have been programmed to accept 6-key entry, i.e. select letters or numbers have been mapped in such a way to correspond with braille dots 1 through 6.
Debbie

-----Original Message-----
From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Rich Caloggero
Sent: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 2:03 PM
To: navydarlene at yahoo.com; Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] producing Nemeth math as a blind person

I believe 6-key refers to the 6-key type keyboard found on Perkins Braillers
and many portable electronic notetakers. Instead of each key entering one
letter / number / symbol, you actually punch several keys to enter a given
symbol. The keys you press are the ones which form that symbol in braille,
so if the symbol is the  letter "d", you'd press keys 1, 4, and 5 on the
6-key keypad.

Hope that helps.
-- Rich

----- Original Message -----
From: "Darlene Dorr" <navydarlene at yahoo.com>
To: "Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics"
<blindmath at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 11:48 AM
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] producing Nemeth math as a blind person


Can someone please explain what 6 key entry is? My son uses duxbury, not for
math as of yet because he still uses a perkins brallewriter but am unclear
what 6 key is.

Thanks

Darlene


--- On Tue, 11/18/08, nlibre at gmail.com <nlibre at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: nlibre at gmail.com <nlibre at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] producing Nemeth math as a blind person
> To: "'Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics'"
> <blindmath at nfbnet.org>
> Date: Tuesday, November 18, 2008, 9:23 AM
> I use 6-key entry with Duxbury for Nemeth and LaTeX and it
> works very
> nicely.  I also use Perky Duck a lot when I'm not on a
> computer with a full
> version of Duxbury.  That also works just fine.  In
> addition to the
> software, you have to make sure that the keyboard you are
> using supports
> 6-key entry.  There are keyboards that will not support it.
>  For example,
> two weeks ago, I was working with a university student on a
> project for his
> transcription class and he did not have access to a Perkins
> Braille writer
> on campus but assumed that he could use Duxbury because it
> was installed on
> the DSP lab computer with JAWS.  When he started having
> trouble entering the
> symbol for "t", I checked and realized that it
> was the keyboard.  Since it
> was a Sunday, of course there was no one with
> administrative rights to the
> computer to try and adjust settings or install Perky Duck
> to check if it
> might work with the keyboard.  Even the keyboards were
> locked to each
> computer so we could not swap keyboards and try to trouble
> shoot it that
> way.  Fortunately, I had my laptop with me and we just used
> Perky Duck on it
> and transferred the files for embossing.
>
> Nicolás
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org
> [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Lori
> Sent: Monday, November 17, 2008 11:29 AM
> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
> Subject: [Blindmath] producing Nemeth math as a blind
> person
>
> Hello all:
>
> I used Nemeth math all through school so I'm familiar
> with hand brailling
> it, however, I'm wondering if there are electronic
> methods that a blind
> person can use. Is something like scientific Notebook
> accessible for someone
>
> who is totally blind? What equipment and technology is out
> there that is
> accessible to blind people. Also, if you are handed a print
> worksheet is
> there a program to use to scan and put into braille that is
> accessible to
> the blind?
>
> Thanks,
> Lori
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your
> account info for
> Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/nlibre%40gmail.co
> m
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your
> account info for Blindmath:
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/navydarlene%40yahoo.com




_______________________________________________
Blindmath mailing list
Blindmath at nfbnet.org
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
Blindmath:
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/rjc%40mit.edu


_______________________________________________
Blindmath mailing list
Blindmath at nfbnet.org
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for Blindmath:
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/dwillis%40aph.org




More information about the BlindMath mailing list