[Blindmath] superscript on an APEX question

Tue Oct 1 20:34:11 UTC 2013

These messages are sort of puzzling, there are standards for how to show 
maths in Braille. In the US, the Braille maths code is Nemeth, I believe 
other countries may also use Nemeth but others (such as the UK) use 
their own Braille codes. There also are a handful of Braille codes 
developed by individuals/groups which have been developed but do not 
have such a large following (eg. the LAMBDA software had its own Braille 
code).

If the aim is to get a world standard then this is probably never going 
to happen, one only needs to use representation of numbers as an example 
as various countries do have different representations for those and if 
something that basic cannot be agreed upon at a global level then what 
chance is there for more advanced stuff?

As far as I know nobody has yet made faultless software to perform 
translation into Braille maths (Nemeth or any other country specific 
Braille code), or back translation software either. While I do not know 
why software has not achieved that goal of faultless translation within 
all the time translation software has been developed, if one were 
seriously planning to solve that problem then the person needs to ask 
what they will be doing which makes their effort different from what has 
gone before.

While Braille most certainly has its uses in doing maths, I do have 
concerns over those who plan to be entirely reliant on getting stuff in 
Braille and producing stuff in Braille, with either software or people 
performing the translation when they need to work with a sighted person. 
Such an approach will not lead to independence, what happens when the 
software fails to translate something correctly, what if the human 
transcriber is ill, etc?

Michael Whapples
On 01/10/2013 20:43, Mike Jolls wrote:
>   
>
> I'm currently investigating software that would allow a blind person to enter an equation, and have the computer solve it for them ... in case they didn't know how to do it.
> The goal is to output to a multi-line window so the braille display can be used to peruse the solution line by line and see the exact solution .. how it was arrived at.
> The software would first calculate the intermediate answer, then translate it to braille, and then send it the display.
> I would also like to see the software translate it back to a solution that the sighted teacher can handle.
> This is not a trivial application .. it's certainly taking a lot of work on my part.
> It doesn't even use LaTex which I hear everyone talking about.
> But the goal is to:
> 1. have the teacher give the student the homework in a file in the teachers format.
> 2. The blind student gets it, pulls up the file, and the problem is output in Braille to the display with a set of standard symbols (whatever the standard is).
> Functions could be output as ... "sin", "cos", "tan", "ln", "log" "abs", etc ... and then you'd likely have to have special symbols for integration, derivation, etc ...
> 3. As I say, the software should present the problem to the student, and allow him to try to solve it, or have the program solve the problem for him if he or she just can't do it.
> 4. And, then back-translate to Word or other format that the teacher can just be given the answer file and pull it up and see the answer.
>   
> Anyway, that's whyI say there should be a standard.  If there was, then a lot of people could work on such software.
> At this point, i have a program where you can submit a problem such as => (3+2)*5-sin(30)+1 ... and the program will calculate the answer.  It doesn't do step-by step yet.
>   
> So that's why I say what I say.
>   
>   
>> CC: blindmath at nfbnet.org
>> From: sabra1023 at gmail.com
>> Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2013 13:42:33 -0500
>> To: blindmath at nfbnet.org
>> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] superscript on an APEX question
>>
>> There are very few blind people who know about math, and blind people haven't been doing high-levelacademic pursuits with their sighted counterparts for very long. Because of this, there simply isn't enough research to know which standards would benefit the entire population. Maybe, you could do some of this research and get back to us with the results.
>>
>>> On Oct 1, 2013, at 12:13 PM, Mike Jolls <mrspock56 at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I find it interesting that (apparently .. if I'm reading the replies correctly) that two different people use different methods to represent the same information. Not that someone couldn't do that, but it would seem logical to have one accepted and approved set of Braille characters to represent a certain piece of information. Then, if everyone saved to that syntax, you could have a universal standard program that could then translate and print it out for the benefit of a sighted teacher who didn't understand the Braille code.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I'm all about standards ... it just makes life easier when you want to leverage information.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> CC: blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>>> From: sabra1023 at gmail.com
>>>> Date: Thu, 26 Sep 2013 16:54:17 -0500
>>>> To: blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>>> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] superscript on an APEX question
>>>>
>>>> I don't use superscripts at all. They are confusing for me to read, and I show my work and math for my benefit as well as the teachers. I use parentheses if there are problems with clarification.
>>>>
>>>>> On Sep 26, 2013, at 3:15 PM, Wilson_KC <Wilson_KC at asdk12.org> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks for that info, Daniel. We'll give it a try. kc
>>>>>
>>>>> ________________________________________
>>>>> From: Blindmath [blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] on behalf of Daniel [danielgillen at rcn.com]
>>>>> Sent: Thursday, September 26, 2013 12:07 PM
>>>>> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
>>>>> Subject: Re: [Blindmath] superscript on an APEX question
>>>>>
>>>>> Dear list,
>>>>>
>>>>> I am Daniel Gillen, a college student majoring in physics who
>>>>> is a power user of the Apex. For the longest time, I've known
>>>>> that one needs to be in 8-dot Computer Braille to take advantage
>>>>> of the various plain-text and extended Unicode characters.
>>>>> Hence, the caret (or beginning of superscript material) is most
>>>>> efficiently written in 8-dot Computer Braille using dot 7
>>>>> (backspace) together with dots 4-5. The way in 6-dot mode is to
>>>>> first press space with U (U for uppercase), and then dots 4-5.
>>>>> The option to switch to 8-dot mode is in Braille Options under
>>>>> the Options Menu.
>>>>> (Just as a side note: I find it convenient to use the tilde
>>>>> character for the beginning of a square-root expression. With
>>>>> that, I would end all superscript material or material under the
>>>>> radical sign that has additional text on the base line with a
>>>>> double-quote mark.)
>>>>> I hope this was helpful. As I've been a member of the
>>>>> BlindMath listserv for quite some time, I could help anyone with
>>>>> such questions as this.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thank you,
>>>>> Daniel
>>>>>
>>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>>> From: Wilson_KC <Wilson_KC at asdk12.org
>>>>> To: "blindmath at nfbnet.org" <blindmath at nfbnet.org
>>>>> Date sent: Thu, 26 Sep 2013 17:57:17 +0000
>>>>> Subject: [Blindmath] superscript on an APEX question
>>>>>
>>>>> My student is in a Text Document on her APEX doing math problems
>>>>> in Nemeth. When she puts in dots 4,5 to produce an up arrow for
>>>>> a superscript, she gets a tilde instead. Do you know what she's
>>>>> doing wrong?
>>>>>
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>>>>>
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