Documentation for the handicapped

[Sean Wheller]

On Thursday 21 April 2005 08:48, Luke Yelavich wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 21, 2005 at 04:10:27PM EST, Sean Wheller wrote:
> > On Thursday 21 April 2005 00:58, Luke Yelavich wrote:
> > > As for devices, I think the issue here is more how they appear when
> > > embossed. By embossed I mean printing the Braille out on a braille
> > > printer, known as an embosser.
> >
> > Testing on a plain embosser would be our best first step. At present I am
> > struggling with the difference between Braille 1 and Braille 2. The
> > contractions in braille 2 are the main problem and I have not found many
> > example implimentations for 8 key braille and no standard set for
> > 'moon' [http://www.bsblind.co.uk/full/moon/moontype.htm]
>
> As far as I know, 8 dot Braille is only used with Braille displays,
> using the 7th and 8th dots for a cursor, etc. However I am not a big
> user of Braille, so there are probably many other uses that I don't know
> about.

Yes, my primary focus was to address the reading of braille on braille 
displays. Perhaps for embossers I will need to consider 6 dot.

>
> > I have however found a character set for 8 key.
> >
> > From the readme I quote:
>
> <Snip>
>
> I am not really up on documentation, character sets etc. What does
> unicode have to do with this?

Sorry, you are right I just ahead expecting you to read into my thoughts. 
Let's start at the beginning We store our XML encoded as UTF-8. UTF-8 is 
Unicode, a code table that assigns integer numbers to characters. The Unicode 
Block available for Braille Patterns is from U+2800 to U+28FF a total of 256 
characters. This block is however, 6 dot notation. Good for embossers. Not so 
good for braille displays.

Now we do not type in braille, so we have to first transcribe our characters 
into into braille and then transform to the file format expected by an 
embosser or braille display.  Here is where Unicode comes in since we can 
clearly map braille characters to their European character.

>
> > > I would be happy to try and answer any questions you or anybody else
> > > has regarding Braille. I can also try and help you get in touch with
> > > various people who work with it on a more regular basis if you like.
> >
> > Thanks, I have found a set of DSSSLs dating back to early 1900s. This
> > would require OPENJade. I would like ax XSL 1.0 compliant solution, do
> > you know of any?
>
> Again, you have lost me here. I still don't see what this has to do with
> Braille.

To transform our Docbook XML to a format that is useful under a braille 
display or embosser, we must first transcribe characters and then output a 
file in the format expected by these devices. It is a two step process. XSLT 
can help us to achieve this. I have found DSSSL stylesheets that do a 
reasonable just, but it would be much better if we had XSL stylesheets to 
perfrom both processing steps above.

Hope I made it clearer. 

-- 
Sean Wheller
Technical Author
sean at inwords.co.za
084-854-9408
http://www.inwords.co.za
Registered Linux User #375355
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