This is a rather long message. I am going to speak about hardware and software as it relates to bookshare books. I may wax a bit philosohical. The underlying path is a matter of philosophy.
Bookshare is adding many many books to our library at a ever more rapid rate. Bookshare could get away with inferior tools like the stripper in its younger days. Kind of like a teenager driving an old car that breaks down a lot.
As bookshare has matured, the quality of some of its underlying software has come up for criticism. That includes the stripper, braille translation program, and other conversion tools. I want to use my human brain to do things machines cannot do. A properly configured hardware and software conbination will translate correctly, and strip elegantly. (pause for fantasy please)
Returning from fantasy to reality. I know the up front expense may be high. I know calculators now do what we used to write out by hand. Let's all work together so humans can do what they do best and let's use technology as well as we can in the process.
Relying on "brute force" human methods is so expense in terms of human energy.I am truly concerned about the learning curve. Maybe if I know more from engineering, it will be easier to understand the underlying philosophy of what seems to me "brute force" methods. I know I can grind coffee beans by hand and save electricity but do I want to?
E. At 07:39 AM 9/10/2008, you wrote:
You are probably right E, but, given our experiences with the bookshare tool, do we really want to go down that road?Maybe if the daisy converter could put the codes in, and we could double check to make sure they are right.Bob ----- Original Message ----- From: "E." <thoth93@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 3:10 AM Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Re: where to download my novelI go to conferences where they have seminars discussing the making of Daisy books.I always thought engineering and software took care of converting files to Daisy format. I am willing to insert tags. Yet I wonder if this can perhaps be automated with conversion software.Asking volunteers to hand insert appropriate Daisy tags instead of creating daisy files with appropriate software confuses me. Perhaps it is because I know little about the software used to create Daisy formatting.E. At 03:15 PM 9/9/2008, you wrote:"An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England" will be on Bookshare... but in the meantime, you can download a PDF of it at<http://www.sendspace.com/file/3fjbxt>http://www.sendspace.com/file/3fjbxtThey only hold it for a few days, so if you don't get to it just let me know and i will upload it again.Can't wait to hear what you think of the book. It's rated R, by the way.. graphic violence and sex. Nan Hawthorne <http://www.nanhawthorne.com>www.nanhawthorne.com __________ NOD32 3429 (20080909) Information __________ This message was checked by NOD32 antivirus system. <http://www.eset.com>http://www.eset.comTo unsubscribe from this list send a blank Email to bksvol-discuss-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxxput the word 'unsubscribe' by itself in the subject line. To get a list of available commands, put the word 'help' by itself in the subject line.To unsubscribe from this list send a blank Email to bksvol-discuss-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxxput the word 'unsubscribe' by itself in the subject line. To get a list of available commands, put the word 'help' by itself in the subject line.__________ NOD32 3432 (20080910) Information __________ This message was checked by NOD32 antivirus system. http://www.eset.com
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