From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from smtp-out1.bellatlantic.net([199.45.39.156]) (2644 bytes) by braille.uwo.ca via smail with P:esmtp/D:aliases/T:pipe (sender: ) id for ; Fri, 10 Mar 2000 21:36:32 -0500 (EST) (Smail-3.2.0.102 1998-Aug-2 #2 built 1999-Sep-5) Received: from sajka.bellatlantic.net (adsl-151-200-20-29.bellatlantic.net [151.200.20.29]) by smtp-out1.bellatlantic.net (8.9.1/8.9.1) with ESMTP id VAA27561; Fri, 10 Mar 2000 21:36:29 -0500 (EST) Received: from localhost (janina@localhost) by sajka.bellatlantic.net (8.9.3/8.8.7) with ESMTP id VAA04083; Fri, 10 Mar 2000 21:36:44 -0500 X-Authentication-Warning: sajka.bellatlantic.net: janina owned process doing -bs Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 21:36:44 -0500 (EST) From: Janina Sajka X-Sender: janina@sajka.bellatlantic.net To: Buddy Brannan cc: speakup@braille.uwo.ca Subject: Re: braille input In-Reply-To: <3.0.5.32.20000310183804.007ca3f0@ycardz.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII List-Id: It comes down to software almost more than hardware, imho. What's the difference between yesterday and today on this subject? What got us so jazzed? PDA's have been around for awhile, so what was different this time. I think it was the notion of Linux as the OS. Why is that exciting? Because it is quickly repurposed to our needs, whereas something like Palm OS -- or WinCE isn't. I think a touch screen would make a good cheap test. The trick is to build the reliable daemon to grab the jabs and convert them accuratly to keyboard input. The rest -- well it isn't exactly trivial -- but it would be much much a bigger job under these other OS's. All of this would be a bigger job. Janina Sajka, Director Information Systems Research & Development American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) janina@afb.net On Fri, 10 Mar 2000, Buddy Brannan wrote: > Hey, > > Just a thought, but, well, here's a thought. If we wanna explore the whole > touch screen using braille input idea, why not schnag one of those tablet > PC's? I think Computer Geeks has one lately, but of course no HDD > installed. 8MB RAM though and a 486. Once we actually get some software > written to do braille input on a touch screen, I wonder if we might do a > first prototype on one of those? Well, it's a thought anyway. Specially if > we can find refurbs or lower-end ones to mess with. > > -- > Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV > Email: davros@ycardz.com > Voice mail: 877-791-5298 > All opinions are all mine! > > _______________________________________________ > Speakup mailing list > Speakup@braille.uwo.ca > http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup >