[NFB-Braille-Discussion] Opinion about Braille Displays and/or notetakers

[Mike Jolls]

This is going to be a subjective topic, and I’m sure different people will have different opinions.  Here’s the question ….

I’m considering purchasing a new Braille display or notetaker.  The question is … what’s the best unit for using Braille?
I know this will be subjective, and people will probably tell me it all depends on what I want to do with the unit.

Here are some things I’m taking into consideration …
Reading literature, books, publications (and having enough storage to download and save several publications at once on the device … or SD card)
Entering and editing personal notes and saving them
A good file system for organizing your files.
Copying your personal notes to a PC to use the data in some other project
Copying a file from PC back to the display so you can work on it independently from the PC.
The best braille translation … I’ll give some details in a minute
Best compatibility with a PC and screen reader so you can use the display to read what’s on your PC (I think they call this Terminal mode??)  Right now I’m using Jaws.


One thing I do  want to say is that I’m not sure about the Braille Note Touch.  Yes, it has a touch screen, and as a low vision person I might be able to use that for surfing the web.  Do we have any low vision users who have taken advantage of the visual aspect of the Touch so we can say it’s usable?  Or is the screen so small that it’s really intended for a normally sighted person, and if you can see and are low vision, you’d really prefer to surf the internet on a larger PC monitor such as a 26 inch display?

Here’s a subjective question.  What’s better?  Six dot Perkins style entry or a qwerty keyboard as in the Mantis?
I can see advantages in both.  Using a 6-dot input would reinforce Braille knowledge.  But a QWERTY would be easier for someone who knows the standard keyboard.
Me personally, I  currently have a Focus 40 with Perkins 6-dot.  I’m trying to get more proficient with Braille and use the 6-key to force me to know the dot patterns.
I also want to minimize the “switching back and forth” from the display to the standard keyboard, which means I’ll need to learn Windows commands from the display, and I’m OK with learning those Windows commands on the Braille display.
Since I’m trying to reinforce my Braille, is the 6-key Perkins the best approach?  It sounds like that goal would push you toward that type of unit.

Regarding Braille translation, here are some scenarios I’m thinking a display/notetaker should support.
Case 1 - You’ve typed in Grade 1.  Now you want to switch to contracted.  Allowing changing an option so a document in Grade 1 is translated to Grade 2
Case 2 – Retranslation – here’s the scenario
You’re typing in Grade 2, but you make an error.  The word isn’t translated properly because of your error, so you go back and correct it.  When you move off the corrected word, the Braille translation software “back-translates” it and refreshes the display with the correctly translated word.

I cite the “re-translation” case because I was trying to use the Notes application on an iPad with my Focus 40.  Their Braille translation software on the iPad does not “re-translate” properly when you make a correction and move away from the corrected word.  That tells me you can’t count on Apple’s Braille in all cases.

So which units and manufacturers produce the best display that do these types of tasks?

Incidentally, I would be interested in hearing about the 20/40 cell debate.  Right now I have a 40 cell, but I’m curious about any advantages of a 20 cell display.
Certainly with a 20 you’d get less information and you’d have to hit the advance key more often.  But you’d have less hand movement.  Is there any advantage to that?
Or, would you say for hard-core reading and composing, and displaying of formatting information, the 40 is better?

Thanks in advance for the insights.

Mike

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