[gui-talk] the BARD shuffle- Maybe I'm not so dumb, after all

Mon Aug 17 16:28:28 UTC 2009

Gerald,

Well, you've got the numbers. I didn't know the numbers. That's dramatic, 
though. So now I'm in the hated elite, as Americans seem to feel about that 
word these days? Damn, you're right. there are a couple of wine bottles 
lying on a shelf over in the kitchen, some Italian cheese in the fridge, and 
I'm sure if I looked around the vegetable crisper I could come up with some 
arrugula leaves. Maybe the bag of fresh basil would do?

Well, no more time to dawdle at the computer. I've been chosen by my elitist 
government to be their token disability guy on a local death squad. Or death 
panel. I keep forgetting, keep getting it confused with the Nazi SS 
sonderkommando squads on the Eastern Front in 1941 or so, if you get the 
reference.

Sorry to digress and be silly. Just enjoying not having a migraine-level 
headache for the first few hours of my day.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gerald Levy" <bwaylimited at verizon.net>
To: "NFBnet GUI Talk Mailing List" <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2009 4:07 AM
Subject: Re: [gui-talk] the BARD shuffle- Maybe I'm not so dumb, after all

The fact is that the digital player was designed for the overwhelming
majority of blind consumers who lack computer access and are not tech savvy.
To put things in perspective, there are an estimated 1.2 million people in
this country classified as legally blind.  Yet,there are fewer than 1000
people on each of these blindness oriented mailing lists.  So the NLS
designed its new player for the masses, not the elite like us.

Gerald

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joel Deutsch" <jdeutsch at dslextreme.com>
To: "NFBnet GUI Talk Mailing List" <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Sunday, August 16, 2009 10:30 PM
Subject: Re: [gui-talk] the BARD shuffle- Maybe I'm not so dumb, after all

> Dave,
>
> I understand that part about the cartridge being the central idea in the
> design. But I've heard that the firmware is intended to be updated in the
> future, also, although I lack more specific information about just when
> and
> how that's going to be done. But I know they know about the download issue
> and are keeping it in mind. Frustrated about this as I may be for the
> moment, I think the changes are going to come around in the not too
> distant
> future. If they didn't, and left the digital player so awkward to use with
> their own download system, that would just be silly. I am certain they're
> not satisfied with this situation. They may have expected most of the
> users
> to be content with their prerecorded cartridges, the idea being that they
> expect patrons to be mostly technophobic and be happy to have something
> that
> they can pretend is sort of like the old audiocassette idea, complete with
> mailers and everything. But I think in their hearts they also realize that
> in fact there's a sizable body of more tech-savvy people who'd rather
> download files to begin with, and would have done this for years if it had
> been possible. I'm among them, and you know I'm no super-tecchie or
> something.
>
> So I think it'll be improved. Just don't know quite when.
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "David Andrews" <dandrews at visi.com>
> To: "NFBnet GUI Talk Mailing List" <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Sunday, August 16, 2009 5:25 PM
> Subject: Re: [gui-talk] the BARD shuffle- Maybe I'm not so dumb, after all
>
>
> No, the player firmware was frozen some time ago.  It is possible
> that multiple books could be made possible some time in the future,
> but not soon.  You should remember that the player was designed to
> play books from the NLS cartridges, and it is one book per cartridge.
>
> Dave
>
> At 05:36 PM 8/16/2009, you wrote:
>>No, this is the straight skinny. You think I could make up something like
>>that? It's not very cool, but it's reality. Believe it or not. As I say,
>>they made noises a few months ago about maybe geting some programmers to
>>fix
>>that and recall the players to have them upgraded, but I ain't heard
>>nothing
>>about that and I'm sure it just ain't happening. they're gonna start
>>distributing a new wave of players soon, and maybe this will be fixed on
>>them. As I should have said, they consider the player thing to be in its
>>beta stage, and so I'm one of the lucky few who gets to play with the
>>device
>>and answer telephone interrogations about my opinion of it. Blah blah.
>>teelphone th th
>>----- Original Message -----
>>From: "albert griffith" <albertgriffith at sbcglobal.net>
>>To: "'NFBnet GUI Talk Mailing List'" <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>
>>Sent: Sunday, August 16, 2009 2:54 PM
>>Subject: Re: [gui-talk] the BARD shufffle- Maybe I'm not so dumb, after
>>all
>>
>>
>>I can't imagine only being able to store one book on a drive or they won't
>>play.  I'd aask on the list about that or contact  your local NLS
>>librarian.
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: gui-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:gui-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
>>Behalf Of Joel Deutsch
>>Sent: Sunday, August 16, 2009 4:49 PM
>>To: GUI-Talk
>>Subject: [gui-talk] the BARD shufffle- Maybe I'm not so dumb, after all
>>
>>I figured out a method (refer to my earlier post):
>>
>>I of course downloaded Smart computing to a folder where I wanted it and
>>unzipped it. But then of course I had to put it onto that thumb drive I
>>stick into the NLS digital Player, and I had to clear that thumb drive of
>>a
>>BARD-downloaded novel I'm in the middle of reading. Because the software
>>of
>>the player can't deal with anything more complicated. Like having two
>>books
>>in two folders on that thumb drive.
>>
>>So herein created a second folder for the novel I'm listening to and moved
>>the files from my thumb drive into that folder. I kept the original
>>downloaded stuff, too, just in case, but in another subfolder under the
>>author's name. My hope is that when the time comes, if I copy the new
>>stuff
>>onto the thumb drive again, the player will be able to remember where I
>>left
>>
>>off, rather than my having to navigate to that point.
>>
>>And then of course I unzipped and copied the Smart Computing  files  onto
>>the thumb drive, and of course it's playing fine on the player.
>>
>>Now I won't find out until later whether my updated cluster of files for
>>that novel, if I copy them to the thumb drive, will clue in the player's
>>firmware as to where I left off listening, but everything is backed up, as
>>we say, so it's a worthy experiment.
>>
>>Ah, the gymnastics. They really should have made that download/player deal
>>a
>>
>>little more sophisticated and flexible, in terms of programming. Even just
>>a
>>
>>little. Oh, well.
>>
>>
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>
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