[BlindMath] Scanning braille for sight reading

Wed Jul 26 23:51:50 UTC 2017

I think that if you are learning braille, you should learn by typing on a braille keyboard.

Sabra Ewing

> On Jul 26, 2017, at 4:27 PM, George Bell via BlindMath <blindmath at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> I think you are misunderstanding Perky Duck.
> 
> You can NOT type in normal letters and numbers.
> 
> You use the f d s and j k l keys representing dots 3 2 1 and 4 5 6 to write
> a braille file.
> 
> It is that file which can then be saved in various formats.
> 
> I'm surprised that Hadley's tutor does not appear to know about Perky Duck.
> It is virtually a standard world-wide.
> 
> George
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: BlindMath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of John G
> Heim via BlindMath
> Sent: 26 July 2017 17:17
> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
> Cc: John G Heim
> Subject: Re: [BlindMath] Scanning braille for sight reading
> 
> I would be okay with a program that allowed me to type braille via a
> standard keyboard, like the package someone described from duxbury. But if I
> am supposed to write the value for pi, it would be cheating to type
> 3.14  and have the software convert it to Nemeth. I need to make the number
> symbol, dots 3, 4, 5, and 6. Then the symbol for 3, dots 2 and 4, And so on.
> 
> I wonder if an editor exists for linux that allows you to press several keys
> at a time to make a braille symbol. Press the s, j, k, and l keys all at
> once to make a number symbol.
>> On 07/26/2017 09:56 AM, White, Jason J wrote:
>> You could just use a good text editor such as Emacs, and set the fill
> column to 40 characters (or whatever your preferred line length is). You
> would need a braille display with a braille keyboard for text entry. BRLTTY
> supports computer braille text entry under Linux. If you want page breaks,
> you could introduce form feed characters manually or write a script to
> automate it.
>> 
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: BlindMath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of John G
>>> Heim via BlindMath
>>> Sent: Wednesday, July 26, 2017 10:50 AM
>>> To: steve.jacobson at visi.com; Blind Math list for those interested in
>>> mathematics <blindmath at nfbnet.org>
>>> Cc: John G Heim <jheim at math.wisc.edu>
>>> Subject: Re: [BlindMath] Scanning braille for sight reading
>>> 
>>> I think what somebody else said was right -- the instructor is used to
> people
>>> taking photos with their phone and submitting that. But the whole reason
> I'm
>>> doing this is to find the best tools. I think I am going to see if I can
> find a linux
>>> text editor that allows me to generate brf files.  That ducksbury tool
> sounds
>>> interesting to me but right now, I must have linux.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> On 07/26/2017 08:52 AM, Steve Jacobson via BlindMath wrote:
>>>> John,
>>>> 
>>>> I can see where increasing the DPI might help since the braille dot is
>>>> smaller than most characters.  Another thing to experiment with is
>>>> whether your scanner is getting the image in black and white or color.
>>>> I frankly don't know which will work the best because such things seem
>>>> variable.  I have had cases, though, where low contrast differences on
>>>> a page came out better in black and white because of the binary
>>>> nature, but it seems likely that approach might cause some dots to not
>>>> show at all falling below a threshold.  Obviously, the brightness
>>>> sensitivity can also matter.  I would think that an instructor in such
>>>> a course would have very specific recommendations, though, or perhaps
>>>> Hadley itself.  This does not seem like it would be an unusual problem.
>>>> 
>>>> I, for one, would be interested to hear what you find out.  I don't
>>>> remember, are you an Optacon user?
>>>> 
>>>> Best regards,
>>>> 
>>>> Steve Jacobson
>>>> 
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: BlindMath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of John
>>> G.
>>>> Heim via BlindMath
>>>> Sent: Wednesday, July 26, 2017 7:12 AM
>>>> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
>>>> <blindmath at nfbnet.org>
>>>> Cc: John G. Heim <jheim at math.wisc.edu>
>>>> Subject: Re: [BlindMath] Scanning braille for sight reading
>>>> 
>>>> My instructor is sighted. She can sight-read the braille if the dots
>>>> come up clearly enough in the scanned document. I guess I wouldn't be
>>>> taking the course if I could see but if I could, all I'd have to do is
>>>> to keep tweaking the scanner settings until it worked. I think the
>>>> first thing I am going to do is increase the DPI. There is a lot of
>>>> info out there that says 300 DPI is best for OCR and my own
>>>> experiments have confirmed that.  But a higher DPI might be better
>>>> just to get braille dots to show up on a scanner.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>>> On 07/26/2017 04:43 AM, George Bell wrote:
>>>>> Hi John,
>>>>> 
>>>>> Scanning embossed braille is not an easy task.  Indeed there was once
>>>>> a program called "OBR" (Optical Braille Recognition).  But even that
>>>> required
>>>>> that specific makes and models of scanner be used, which allowed
>>>>> control
>>>> of
>>>>> lighting during the scan.
>>>>> 
>>>>> You instructor should know this.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Do I get the impression you are using a Perkins type braille writer
>>>>> as opposed to say 6 key entry into PC braille software such as Duxbury?
>>>>> 
>>>>> George
>>>>> 
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: BlindMath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
>>>>> John G Heim via BlindMath
>>>>> Sent: 25 July 2017 15:02
>>>>> To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
>>>>> Cc: John G Heim
>>>>> Subject: [BlindMath] Scanning braille for sight reading
>>>>> 
>>>>> I'm taking a braille class through Hadley School for the Blind. I am
>>>> trying
>>>>> to submit my homework assignments as scanned images of braille pages
>>>>> for
>>>> the
>>>>> instructor to sight-read. The instructor asked me to scan them as
>>>>> photos
>>>> but
>>>>> I don't know what that means. Does anybody have experience scanning
>>>>> in braille and can tell me the best format, mode, and dpi settings? I
>>>>> sent my instructor tif line-art at 300 dpi which works well for OCR
>>>>> but that
>>>> didn't
>>>>> work for sight-reading braille.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> --
>>>>> --
>>>>> John G. Heim; jheim at math.wisc.edu; sip://jheim@sip.linphone.org
>>>>> 
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