[brailleblaster] Re: Importing Files

  • From: Chris von See <chris@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: brailleblaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Tue, 7 Jun 2011 07:58:01 -0700

The TechAdapt Accessible Media Center (TAMC) is a free product I built back in 2006, when the NIMAS standard was first being rolled out. It is used by many state and local education agencies in the US to convert NIMAS and DAISY file sets into DAISY, HTML and RTF files. Most clients use it to convert Bookshare DAISY files and NIMAS files from the NIMAC into HTML and RTF - the HTML has features to facilitate use of the material by students who are blind or low vision, and the RTF files are used by braille transcribers to import content into DBT, Braille 2000 or other braille translation programs. Aside from ongoing maintenance TAMC has not been actively developed because I've been occupied with other parts of our business that make money :) but I've recently performed a complete rewrite of the application and am planning to actively develop new conversions from more source and target formats. In addition to the complete rewrite, the new version is completely accessible and adds support for Microsoft Word input files; future versions will add support for audio output, braille output, and other features. You can find more info about TAMC at http://www.accessiblemediacenter.com
A NIMAS file set is essentially the same thing as a text-only DAISY file set. It has the same XML and almost the same OPF but it does not contain SMIL or NCX files. 


Cheers
Chris



On Jun 6, 2011, at 10:13 PM, John J. Boyer wrote:


A couple of questions. What is TAMC? How does NiMAS differ from DAISY?
I've never seen a NIMAS file. they seem to be under wraps for only
students.
You are lucky to have survived the combinatorial explosion of trying to convert various file formats to various others. Converting them first to 
a canonical form makes a lot more sense.

Thanks,
John

On Mon, Jun 06, 2011 at 09:25:30PM -0700, Chris von See wrote:

Yes, I'm very familiar with XSLT, XPath and related XML technologies.
I co-authored a book on XSLT with a friend of mine back in 2002, and
have been working with XML in various ways ever since.

For what it's worth: The early versions of TAMC converted DAISY and
NIMAS into various other formats without converting first to a
canonical format, and it was admittedly kind of a mess.  The new file
import libraries I've written as part of the foundation for the new
version of TAMC convert to a canonical format first and then performs
all operations on that standardized model - much, much cleaner.


Cheers
Chris


On Jun 6, 2011, at 8:39 PM, John J. Boyer wrote:


I have considered leaving all Daisy and html files as is and using
semantic-action files as liblouisutdml does. However, i think this
would
be inadequate for what BrailleBlaster is to do. liblouisutdml doesn['t 
manipulate the files, except for adding utdml when requested.
BrailleBlaster will have the capability to manipulate files. The
semantic-action-file approach is probably inadequate. Manipulation
will
be much easier if all files are converted to a common format. This is 
probably not hard to do, if we have someone who really knows xslt. I
wouldn't be surprised if Chris does. The flavor of the xml or html
document can be detected while it is being read in as soon as xom gets 
the root element. The flavor can also be specified by other means if
the
root element is ambiguous.

John B.

On Mon, Jun 06, 2011 at 06:49:11PM -0700, John Gardner wrote:

I agree, but should we convert them all to a common format?  My
understanding of UTDML is that it is not necessary.  If so then
maybe we
should just leave all DAISY flavors as is.  The idea of UTDML is
that the
DAISY file is still there but with lots of other content included.
In fact,
maybe we should leave all standard HTML and XML imports "as is".
John B, is
this a stupid idea?

John G


John G


-----Original Message-----
From: brailleblaster-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:brailleblaster-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John J.
Boyer
Sent: Monday, June 06, 2011 6:43 PM
To: brailleblaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [brailleblaster] Re: Importing Files

So what flavor of DAISY will BrailleBlaster use as its native
format? I
suppose the latest. Earlier versions can be converted easily, so we
should import all of them.

John B.

On Mon, Jun 06, 2011 at 06:04:16PM -0700, John Gardner wrote:

Chris, I understand the new DAISY format, at least to some
extent.  We

must

certainly be able to import EPUB 3 into BrailleBlaster.  That's
not a big
problem, since it is, after all, HTML.  But HTML5 does include
MathML and
SVG, which we already intend to use.  No problem there I trust.

It is not quite so clear that we should also import DAISY 4.
However if
DAISY 4 will be used to author DAISY with braille information,
then we
should support it.  It is my understanding that it will be used
for that
purpose, but I not 100% certain I am right.

John G
-----Original Message-----
From: brailleblaster-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:brailleblaster-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Chris
von See
Sent: Monday, June 06, 2011 3:50 PM
To: brailleblaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [brailleblaster] Re: Importing Files
The link that Susan references is for the Authoring and Interchange format. The next version of DAISY uses ePub 3.0 (aka DAISY 4.0 Part B) as its distribution format, which is what most end users will end 
up with.
There's a brief blurb about this in the DAISY Consortium 2010 Annual 
Report:
"The convergence of the DAISY 4 distribution format with EPUB 3 will 
open up great opportunities for readers with print disabilities.
It is
our responsibility to continue our involvement in and influence on
the
implementation of fully accessible EPUB 3 in commercial e-books as
well as in non-commercial information such as public information,
information necessary for political decision making, and disaster
preparedness information. The DAISY Consortium's endorsement of
accessible EPUB 3 content will require an even greater effort by the Consortium in collaboration with print disability communities around 
the world, to influence the accessibility of mainstream e-book
publications."



http://data.daisy.org/publications/docs//ann_report_2010/AnnualReport2010.ht

ml?q=publications/docs/ann_report_2010/AnnualReport2010.html


On Jun 6, 2011, at 2:59 PM, Susan Jolly wrote:


With a growing number of apps adding "Save as DAISY" options, I'd
focus first on getting BrailleBlaster to work with DAISY files. If 
BrailleBlaster provides unique features that users need and can't
easily obtain elsewhere then that should motivate them to find some 
method to convert any non-DAISY files to DAISY so they can use
BrailleBlaster.
Another important consideration is that the next-generation DAISY 
XML format known as ZedAI has already been developed and is
currently under review. So this is not a good time to be investing 
a lot of resources in the old DAISY format.

You can read more here:
http://www.daisy.org/zw/ZedAI_UserDocumentation

SusanJ







--
John J. Boyer; President, Chief Software Developer
Abilitiessoft, Inc.
http://www.abilitiessoft.com
Madison, Wisconsin USA
Developing software for people with disabilities





--
John J. Boyer; President, Chief Software Developer
Abilitiessoft, Inc.
http://www.abilitiessoft.com
Madison, Wisconsin USA
Developing software for people with disabilities







--
My websites:
GodTouches Digital Ministry, Inc. http://www.godtouches.org
Abilitiessoft, Inc. http://www.abilitiessoft.com
BrailleBlaster http://www.brailleblaster.org
Location: Madison, WI, USA

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