How would totally blind people validate books if we can't read the original print to validate against? I never really understood this, but was thinking of volunteering for something like this if there was a way I could.
----- Original Message ----- From: <james.homme@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, May 21, 2008 11:58 AM Subject: RE: Scanner/Stuff...
Hi Chris, If you aren't a member, you can sign up to be one. You have to verify your disability by getting a doctor or blindness organization to do that for you. Anyone, sighted or blind, member or not, can be a volunteer. If you are a member and a volunteer, you get credit toward your membership fee if you either scan or validate. You just have to fill out an online form saying that you want to volunteer so that the system knows about you. The rules are that you can't scan and upload, then download and validate the same book. Someone must scan and another person must validate. Looking forward to seeing the book. Jim James D Homme, , Usability Engineering, Highmark Inc., james.homme@xxxxxxxxxxxx, 412-544-1810 "it is only possible to live happily ever after on a day-to-day basis." -- Margaret BonnanoHighmark internal only: Consider Usability Engineering On Your Next Projector release. http://highwire.highmark.com/sites/iwov/hwt093/ "Chris Hofstader" <chris.hofstader@ knology.net> To Sent by: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx programmingblind- cc bounce@freelists. org Subject RE: Scanner/Stuff... 05/21/2008 10:07 AM Please respond to programmingblind@ freelists.org Hi, I'm happy to say that our new scanner arrived yesterday and that we'resetting it up as I type. We'll do a few little experiments and when thingslook happy, we'll scan the Drupal book. I'm sorry it's taken so long to get to this but we'll be faster in the future. We cannot pledge to do more than scan one book per week and Susan will do her best to verify it in the same time period. With that said, this is a fast, scanner with a relatively large duplex sheet feeder so the scanning itself should go very quickly. The scanner came with OmniPage Pro which we'll try to use to avoid the cost of Fine Reader. If the quality is too poor to continue, we'll switch OCR engines. My experience with OpenBook, though, suggests that OmniPage is nearly as good as Fine Reader but thatopinion results from four year old tests run without a framework that wouldeliminate subjectivity. Once we're done scanning this one, I'll send it off to Jamal and Jackie (Iremember someone else had volunteered to do some verification work but I'veforgotten who). Although I contract with BSO, I don't know their procedures for submittingbooks. If one of their volunteers will speak up, I would like to learn theprocedure. What happens if two parties unknown to each other submit the same book at approximately the same time? I'd assume this would happen withHarry Potter and other smash hits and not Drupal tutorials but in the worldof geekdom, one never knows nor can one ever imagine knowing. So, let's start a book club. People can nominate books, we'll have a vote on which comes next and someone will volunteer to pay for it and have it sent to our house. I will pay for some, certainly those I nominate but my choices jump to the head of the line because I'm a selfish bastard and are not likely to have more than a passing interest to most people here as I tend to read a lot about cognitive linguistics and other stuff that simply bores other people to suicidal ideation. Happy Hacking, cdh -----Original Message----- From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of inthaneelf Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 12:33 PM To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: Re: Scanner/Stuff... still, his method seems to be fairly well accepted, a downloadable simple... form, that must be signed by a verifiable person at a qualified and verifiable location, usually accepted are doctors, rehab councilors, and staff of a school for the blind and visually impaired such as the Braille institute in southern California and the like the page should include name of course, title, of what agency, and address phone and such. that should do the trick for you,a question, what does it take to become "authorized" for such distributing?I know I can look it up, but since you brought it up, I am hoping you can give me the "skinny" on it? have a good one, inthane. For Blind Programming assistance, Information, Useful Programs, and Linksto Jamal Mazrui's Text tutorial packages and Applications, visit me at: http://grabbag.alacorncomputer.com . to be able to view a simple programming project in several programming languages, visit the Fruit basket demo site at: http://fruitbasketdemo.alacorncomputer.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris Hofstader" <chris.hofstader@xxxxxxxxxxx> To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 8:14 AM Subject: RE: Scanner/Stuff...The publisher can send the content of a book to whomever they choose, inside our outside the US. People like us, not in the publishing biz, are restricted by all sorts of copyright laws in the US and around the world which complicates the issue terribly. -----Original Message----- From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Octavian Rasnita Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 10:38 AM To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: Re: Scanner/Stuff... I have never read a book from bookshare.org because I think that it costs money, while very many good books can be found for free. But, before bookshare started to give O'Reilly books, O'Reilly had a free service for the blind, and I received books from them. They created an FTP account where I could download the books I wanted,andbefore creating me that FPT account, I needed to send them a scannedpaperthat proves that I am a blind. They accepted my paper, even if I live in Romania, Europe, not USA. They told me that it is not a problem that I live in Romania, becausetheyalso had some romanian employees, and I think they use to accept those papers no matter the country. Octavian ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris Hofstader" <chris.hofstader@xxxxxxxxxxx> To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 2:36 PM Subject: Scanner/Stuff...Hi Guys, My parents are in town so I'm fairly distracted from vocational andotherprogramming related tasks. I did, however, manage to find a scannerwitha document feeder (they used to call these sheet feeders, were consumers stupid enough to think they had something to do with bedding or is using the more sophisticated term a way to hit me up for an additional $25 or sobymaking me think it's a device far more interesting than something that simply scans sheets of paper - which, in fact, is what I want it to do). I bought a new Canon from the low end of their "professional" line which wasn't terribly expensive and only slightly slower than the one thatdiedon us last week. It is expected to arrive by UPS mule by Thursday so Sue can start the Drupal scanning project on Friday while I'm having a tattooputonto my left forearm. Assuming we don't get bogged down in a lot of paper jams and other scanning hell, we should have the book done by sometimeonSaturday. This brings me to a minor conundrum - currently Bookshare.org is my most profitable client (the amount I earn from my different projects variesona monthly basis depending upon how much attention I can devote to a gigandthe project's level of urgency). I want, therefore, to promote BSO subscriptions to help defray the cost of the work they pay me to perform and to help keep the non-profit running smoothly as possible. At the same time, I don't want to exclude our friends outside the USfromhaving access to this and other books on programming and technology that we process. Also, any web site that posts the book without the protections afforded by BSO, NLS and the others runs into a possible copyright problem with the publisher as, although we claim it is intended for blind people only, we have no way of protecting the content to ensure that proof of a print disability has been proffered before we share the book. I'm open to all sorts of ideas, please make suggestions. Yesterday, I spent an additional $250 on a birthday gift for my twin niece and nephew. I got them the Lego robotics starter kit which includes a ton of really neat features (you can read about it at lego.com), there areatleast a half dozen books on Amazon describing projects one can make with the set, loads of add on parts, the ability to write code on a PC and download it to your bot and so many other very cool features that I could write for hours. The kids were first introduced to these Legos as part of their charter school program that brought them to MIT for two hours per week, one hour on robotics using the kit I got for them and the other on crypt-analysisandcode breaking. Where were such programs when I was eleven years old? On a more topic based question, though, if I recall from my own childhood, Lego bricks and other pieces were highly tactile - does anyone know of blind kids using this kit to make their own robots? Does anyone know of any trials with children with vision impairment and such a kit? I'm curious to learn if it could be fit into a middle school course for budding blind hackers. Enjoy, cdh __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind __________ NOD32 3093 (20080512) Information __________ This message was checked by NOD32 antivirus system. http://www.eset.com __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind__________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind __________ NOD32 3091 (20080512) Information __________ This message was checked by NOD32 antivirus system. http://www.eset.com __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind __________ View the list's information and change your settings at //www.freelists.org/list/programmingblind
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