[Nfbf-l] Braille Displays Promise to Deliver the Web to the Blind

Wed Apr 7 14:43:39 UTC 2010

Hi Tara,
Thanks for posting this.  It's very interesting, though we probably won't be
seeing this innovation for several years.  But at last a group is seriously
working on a new and improved, and hopefully less  costly method of
producing electronic Braille.
Sherrill

-----Original Message-----
From: nfbf-l-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfbf-l-bounces at nfbnet.org]On
Behalf Of TaraPrakash
Sent: Wednesday, April 07, 2010 10:14 AM
To: NFB of Florida Internet Mailing List
Subject: [Nfbf-l] Braille Displays Promise to Deliver the Web to the
Blind

Forwarding from another list.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Don Moore" <don.moore48 at comcast.net>
To: "Computer List" <VICUG-L at LISTSERV.ICORS.ORG>
Sent: Wednesday, April 07, 2010 8:52 AM
Subject: [gui-talk] Braille Displays Promise to Deliver the Web to the Blind

> News -  April 5, 2010
>
> Braille Displays Promise to Deliver the Web to the Blind
> North Carolina State University researchers take the first steps toward
> making an affordable and more dynamic Braille display
> By
> Larry Greenemeier
>
> The Web's wealth of information would lose some of its luster if you read
> it
> only one line at a time. Yet this is exactly how blind and other
> vision-impaired people today must experience the Web when they use
> electronic Braille displays connected to their computers.
>
> Braille displays use electromechanically controlled pins, as opposed to
> the
> lights in a conventional computer monitor, to convey information. Here is
> how: Software gathers a Web page's content from the computer's operating
> system, converts the words and images into a digital version of Braille
> and
> then represents that via a touchable row of finger-sized rectangular cells
> lined up side by side like dominoes. Each cell has six or eight small
> holes
> through which rounded pins can extend and retract with the help of
> piezoelectric ceramic actuators to represent various Braille characters.
> Each time a person reads the row of Braille with his fingers (left to
> right), the pin configurations refresh to represent the next line of a Web
> page's text, and so on.
>
> Breaking Braille barriers Efforts to improve Web pages translated into
> Braille have progressed slowly because of the cost and complexity of
> Braille
> displays, but a team of North Carolina State University researchers in
> Raleigh has taken the first steps toward developing a device that would
> allow the blind to take better advantage of the Web and other computer
> applications. Instead of presenting electronic content one line at a time,
> this display would translate words and images into tactile displays
> consisting of up to 25 rows, each with 40 cells side by side. Braille
> readers would have multiple lines of text and numbers at their fingertips,
> enabling them to backtrack and review content more easily. Another
> possibility might be to present in Braille equations and other information
> that take up more than one line at a time.
>
> "It's difficult to achieve any spatial recognition with just a single
> line,"
> says Neil Di Spigna, a research assistant professor in N.C. State's
> Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering who is working on the
> project.
>
> The use of piezoelectric ceramic to make a Braille display with multiple
> rows would make already pricey displays even more expensive-low-end models
> with a single row already cost upwards of $1,000. In addition, the amount
> of
> energy needed to power multiple rows would make these displays bigger,
> heavier and less portable.
>
> Touch and go The N.C. State researchers are experimenting with two
> different
> approaches they hope will cut the costs and energy requirements of Braille
> displays in the future, and presented their latest research at the
> International Conference on Electroactive Polymer Actuators and Devices in
> San Diego last month.
>
> The first approach would rely on hydraulic pressure to raise and lower
> each
> of the pins in a cell. In this scenario, each pin would sit in a
> fluid-filled plastic case. A window would be cut into the case and covered
> with a polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) film. When electricity is applied to
> the cell the PVDF would bend in and squeeze the case through that window,
> raising the level of the fluid and the pin along with it. The researchers
> say they have demonstrated a proof-of-concept prototype that, when less
> than
> 1,000 volts were applied, got the case to contract and push a fluid
> consisting of deionized water and food dye up so that a pin would rise
> more
> than 0.5 millimeters-the standard height of a Braille dot-in less than 100
> milliseconds (initial experiments have been done without a pin in the
> case).
>
> This is the kind of speed performance a Braille user would expect, says
> Peichun Yang, a postdoctoral research associate in N.C. State's Department
> of Electrical and Computer Engineering who is also working on the project.
> Yang, who is blind, adds that he and his colleagues, including project
> director Paul Franzon, have gotten the fluid to move in 30 milliseconds in
> some trials. Their next step is to create a latching mechanism within the
> case that would hold a pin in place until it needs to be lowered.
>
> The second approach being considered would place each pin in a cylindrical
> silicon tube that raises the pin up when the tube is filled with a
> conductive solution of calcium chloride and 8.75 kilovolts are applied.
>
> The standard piezoelectric approach to making a Braille display costs
> about
> $35 per cell, according to Yang, who adds that this cost needs to be
> brought
> down to $5 per cell for the displays to be affordable to a greater number
> of
> consumers. The researchers say that more widespread adoption of Braille
> displays will depend largely on cost, which was an important factor behind
> their research.
>
> Currently, Freedom Scientific, Inc., in Saint Petersburg, Fla., makes
> several different computer Braille displays whose cells are laid out in
> the
> standard single-row configuration. The company's portable PAC Mate Braille
> display is offered in a single row consisting of 20 or 40 cells, with
> displays costing about $1,600 and $3,600, respectively. Freedom
> Scientific's
> larger Focus displays include 40- and 80-cell single-row models, which
> cost
> about $3,900 and $7,800, respectively.
>
> Other approaches The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
> recognized the cost problem a decade ago, when an 80-cell Braille display
> cost about $15,000. Since then, NIST has for several years been working on
> a
> display with a much different design, putting the Braille text on the
> outside of a spinning cylinder like the tread on a tire (pdf). The
> actuators
> that move the pins in and out are located inside the cylinder. Instead of
> moving fingers over a motionless line of text, the NIST design has the
> user
> put one or more fingers against the wheel, with the Braille text moving
> underneath the finger, producing a sensation of motion, which the agency
> claimed provided stimulus for the sensors in the fingertips and allowed
> the
> user to construct a mental model of the geometric layout of the text. The
> user could also adjust the speed of the wheel's rotation.
>
> Speech synthesizer software that can read the contents of the Web or other
> computer text to the blind is an alternative and has the advantage of
> being
> easier to learn than Braille. Still, as NIST notes in its research,
> Braille
> has other advantages, enabling "high-precision communication" and the
> ability to read in noisy surroundings.
>
> Speech synthesizers do have a role in helping the blind experience the
> Web,
> Yang agrees, but the ability to read Braille is essential. "Reading
> Braille
> is still very important for [blind people] who wish to work-90 percent of
> blind people who hold a job are able to read Braille," he says, adding
> that
> synthesizer technology is one of the reasons why only 10 percent of blind
> children are learning to read Braille.
>
> N.C. State's work is still in its early days, so do not expect to see
> their
> Braille display technology at the local computer story in the immediate
> future. It could take the researchers as long as a year just to develop a
> reliable latching system to keep the pins in place. Only then would they
> be
> able to make an actual Braille display. After that, it could be at least
> four years to make a commercial product, Di Spigna says.
>
>
>
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=braille-display-web&print=t
rue
>
>
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