[liblouis-liblouisxml] Re: Proposal for capital and emphasis in UEB
- From: "John J. Boyer" <john.boyer@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: liblouis-liblouisxml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2015 17:37:10 -0600
Hi Christo,
Thanks. A lot of people on the list should be interested in the
attachment.
John
On Sun, Feb 01, 2015 at 08:59:01PM +0200, Christo de Klerk wrote:
> Hi John
>
> As promised, here is an example of technical material in UEB, specifically
> geometry, produced in South Africa. See how elegantly UEB handles it.
>
> I am in the process of getting you example of programming material. I
> managed to get some, but it is in the Afrikaans language, so you wouldn't
> make heads or tails of it. I'll send it along as soon as I have something
> suitable.
>
> Kind regards
>
> Christo
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John J.
> Boyer
> Sent: 28 January 2015 2:27 PM
> To: liblouis-liblouisxml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [liblouis-liblouisxml] Re: Proposal for capital and emphasis in UEB
>
> Technical Braille is precisely what I am most interested in. I lost most of
> my hearing at age eight, so I could not use readers. Shortly thereafter I
> discovered my interest in sciencee. To my dismay, there was very little good
> scientific material in Braille. This was in the 40s.
> When I got to high school I found that my physics book was older than I was.
> These early experiences made me determined to do what I could so that others
> would not have them. Things have improved now, but the amount of good
> technical material in Braille is still woefully inadequate.
>
> I designed liblouis and liblouisutdml from the start with special features
> for mathematics. When it came to translating mMathML to Braille, I was
> surprised at how easy it was to produce a Nemeth translation. Producing a
> translation into UKMaths was much more difficult and required the creation
> of a lot of new programmming code.
>
> It would be nice to see some technical material in UEB, especially part of a
> programming manual. So far, I have seen only the UEB rule book.
>
> Now, on emphasis, liblouis certainly needs to handle emphasis in UEB.
> That will also help with languages other than English, which have similar
> rules. It is truly great that APH has assigned a programmer to implement
> these rules.
>
> I don't have a quarrel with the literary aspects of UEB. Many of the
> contractions that have ben dropped shouldn't have been there in the first
> place. Examples are the contractions for ble and o'clock. However, Nemeth is
> a far superior method of representing mathematics than the traditional
> method on which UEB math is based. Many programmers will continue to use
> 8-dot Braille. It will probably remain one of the choices in screenreaders.
>
> Well, these are my opinions, based on my experience.
>
> John
>
> On Wed, Jan 28, 2015 at 10:23:39AM +0200, Christo de Klerk wrote:
> > Hello John
> >
> > I will deal with some issues raised by you and also by Joseph.
> >
> > ICEB has a Braille Technology Committee of which I am the convenor and
> > certainly we believe that it is always good, essential for an
> > authority and users and software developers to communicate on an
> > ongoing basis and we would be happy to establish such a channel.
> >
> > All English speaking countries which have adopted the UEB except for
> > the US, use the integrated maths symbols and do not need to switch to
> > Nemeth, so there is no need for any code transition. It works
> > extremely well for those countries and we can only hope that the US will
> see the light soon.
> >
> > There is no need for what used to be "computer braille" in UEB. The
> > code is comprehensive enough to represent any characters previously
> > represented in computer braille. It would be no problem producing a
> > complex computer manual in UEB and users actually find it much simpler
> > to read technical material in UEB, because it is not necessary to
> > learn different symbols for the different codes. There is thus no need
> > for code switching to represent a piece of programming code. Things
> > like e-mail addresses and URLs are written in UEB just as they come, no
> need to switch into another code.
> >
> > It is true that the UEB does not include an 8 dot code and the
> > currently 8 dot code can therefore still be used where it is required.
> >
> > When we developed the UEB, our brief was to develop a code which would
> > be unified (in other words, no separate codes for different types of
> > material), a code that would not tolerate any ambiguity and a code
> > which would have as little as possible impact of readers of literary
> > (non-technical) braille. I believe that we achieved all three those aims.
> >
> > The fact that the UEB does not tolerate ambiguity, means that back
> > translation is actually simpler and more reliable than is the case
> > with pre-unified braille. If you apply the principles of the UEB,
> > neither man, nor machine could be in doubt as to the meaning. Because
> > we focused on readability, understandability and ease of use, our
> > approach has been that we would rather have machines and software
> > adapt to the needs of users and have users adapt to the needs of machines.
> >
> > But we always did keep computability in mind. Throughout the
> > development of the UEB Joe Sullivan of Duxbury played a leading role.
> > Some of the new aspects of the code required substantial changes to
> > the Duxbury system in order to handle them and now it does handle them
> > perfectly. Because of the completely different way the UEB deals with
> > capitalisation and typeform indicators, similar fundamental code
> > changes will no doubt required from LibLouis also. It will be a major
> > undertaking, but it can be done, just like it has been done in Duxbury.
> >
> > Just some background information about myself, so that you can
> > understand the position from which I am talking: I have worked as a
> > computer programmer for over 30 years. I have been doing Duxbury table
> > development and maintenance since 1986. In my opinion the UEB lends
> > itself much more readily to automated translation and back translation
> > than does pre-unified code, but it will require substantial work to
> > LibLouis to accommodate these new developments. I believe these new
> > ways of doing things have come to stay, as they have been embraced
> > with enthusiasm and implemented already in many countries. In South
> > Africa we have applied the principles of the UEB to all
> > 11 our official languages. In New Zealand they have done likewise with
> > the Maori language. Many code manuals have already been written about the
> UEB.
> > The bottom line is that I believe the position is that the software
> > should be adapted to accommodate the code and not the other way
> > around. Having just implemented the code across the world it would be
> > a major disruption for users if fundamental changes were to be made to
> > it again. We have just overcome a wave of major resistance; we don't need
> another <smile>.
> >
> > But please, let us keep in regular touch. From ICEB's side we strongly
> > encourage the LibLouis project. There is a worldwide need for it,
> > especially so in developing countries.
> >
> > Kind regards
> >
> > Christo de Klerk
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > [mailto:liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John J.
> > Boyer
> > Sent: 28 January 2015 4:28 AM
> > To: liblouis-liblouisxml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > Subject: [liblouis-liblouisxml] Re: Proposal for capital and emphasis
> > in UEB
> >
> > One thing I've been wondering about is that UEB has no computer Braille.
> > How are programs supposed to be dshown? What about 8-dot Braille?
> > That is very convenient for viewing programs on a Braille display. I
> > also thought that UEB would get rid of some things that made
> > back-translation dificult.
> >
> > John
> >
> > On Wed, Jan 28, 2015 at 12:37:43AM +0000, Keith Creasy wrote:
> > > Thank you Joseph. I just want to say that I agree that close dialog
> > between braille authorities and software developers would be very
> > beneficial to the future of braille and UEB in particular. That has
> > been on my mind a lot lately.
> > >
> > > Keith
> > >
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > [mailto:liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
> > > Joseph Lee
> > > Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2015 3:28 PM
> > > To: liblouis-liblouisxml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > Subject: [liblouis-liblouisxml] Re: Proposal for capital and
> > > emphasis in UEB
> > >
> > > Hi Christo,
> > > As one of the LibLouis table maintainers for Unified English
> > > Braille, I do
> > know how rewarding it is to introduce UEB to LibLouis users and
> > developers around the world. However, throughout the course of UEB
> > table development, I and others here felt that there are certain
> > things in UEB itself that may need to be modified for programs such as
> LibLouis to take advantage of it.
> > > Some of my own concerns include smoother transition between literary
> > > and math, certain rules that causes back translation problems and so
> > > on. In short, some of us here felt that UEB's emphasis in heuristic
> > > transcription practices (that is, human transcribers deciding what
> > > to do with forward and back translation issues based on formal
> > > rules) may have caused issues when computer programs are tasked to
> "transcribe"
> > > (forward and back translate) text into UEB. Thus I and others
> > > (especially those of us with programming
> > > background) would like to suggest having a regular dialogue between
> > > us and
> > ICEB/UEB committee in hopes of making UEB friendly towards both humans
> > and computers.
> > > Thanks, and I hope best of luck to you and ICEB.
> > > Cheers,
> > > Joseph
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > [mailto:liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
> > > Christo de Klerk
> > > Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2015 9:15 AM
> > > To: liblouis-liblouisxml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > Subject: [liblouis-liblouisxml] Re: Proposal for capital and
> > > emphasis in UEB
> > >
> > > Hello all
> > >
> > > On behalf of the International Council on English Braille (ICEB) I
> > > wish to
> > say that we are extremely pleased about this development. It is
> > essential that LibLouis must make provision for these aspects of the UEB.
> > >
> > > We wish the developer every success with this endeavour.
> > >
> > > Kind regards
> > >
> > > Christo de Klerk - President: International Council on English
> > > Braille
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > [mailto:liblouis-liblouisxml-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John J.
> > > Boyer
> > > Sent: 27 January 2015 6:49 PM
> > > To: liblouis-liblouisxml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > > Subject: [liblouis-liblouisxml] Re: Proposal for capital and
> > > emphasis in UEB
> > >
> > > Hi Keith,
> > >
> > > This sounds good. I will give whatever help I can.
> > >
> > > John
> > >
> > > On Tue, Jan 27, 2015 at 03:41:16PM +0000, Keith Creasy wrote:
> > > > Dear all.
> > > >
> > > > We at APH are working on a project to create high-quality braille
> > > > from
> > > publisher's files to be embossed using the new BANA UEB specifications.
> > > LibLouis currently has a few shortcomings that need to be addressed
> > > before
> > we can achieve the quality output we need. A couple of these have
> > already been partially implemented by us or others.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > 1. Capitalization of phrases. Addition of cap-phrase sign and
> end
> > > cap-phrase sign along with implementation to support it.
> > > >
> > > > 2. Correct UEB capitalization within words with mixed case.
> > > >
> > > > 3. Correct application of symbols to begin and end emphasis
> > > (typeforms).
> > > >
> > > > 4. Support for additional, custom, typeforms provided by UEB.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > We are proposing doing this coding ourselves. Along with some
> > > > corrections
> > > to the tables, with deference to the work Joseph and Ken are doing
> > > on UEB
> > tables.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > One of the main changes we'd like to make is to change the way
> > > capitalization is handled so that internally LibLouis simply treats
> > > it as
> > another form of emphasis. The only differences being that the
> > attributes used for the capitalization is inherent in the text and
> > does not need to be passed in as an argument when translating, and of
> > course LibLouis handles capitalization in reverse as well as forward
> translation.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Internally there is actually even less difference between emphasis
> > > (typeforms) and how we hope to handle capitalization. Our plan is to
> > expand the values used in the array that indicates emphasis and, on
> > the first pass LibLouis makes through the text, set the array for
> > capital emphasis at that time. Then handle it along with all other
> > forms of emphasis.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > In order to handle cases where we have multiple emphasis or
> > > > typeforms the
> > > current implementation needs to be enhanced so that it not only
> > > knows when
> > the emphasis flags change but exactly how they change. This is in fact
> > the only way to make capitalization as a form of emphasis work. An
> > additional benefit of this is of course handling mixed bold, italics,
> > and underlined text even if they are irregularly mixed.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > I know it is usually preferable to make changes in very small
> > > > increments
> > > but we don't see a way to do this for our purposes. We plan to fork
> > LibLouis, work on and test it while keeping in sync with the master
> > LibLouis code as we can, and then at some point work on merging our
> > work back to the master repository if that is desirable.
> > > >
> > > > Mike Gray mgray@xxxxxxx<mailto:mgray@xxxxxxx> is the programmer we
> > > > have tasked with accomplishing this work. We welcome any feedback.
> > > > It is our hope to improve LibLouis for eve
> > > >
> > > > Regards,
> > > > Keith Creasy
> > > > ryone
> > >
> > > --
> > > John J. Boyer; President,
> > > Abilitiessoft, Inc.
> > > http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> > > Madison, Wisconsin USA
> > > Developing software for people with disabilities
> > >
> > > For a description of the software, to download it and links to
> > > project pages go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> > >
> > > For a description of the software, to download it and links to
> > > project pages go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> > >
> > > For a description of the software, to download it and links to
> > > project pages go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com For a description
> > > of the software, to download it and links to project pages go to
> > > http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> >
> > --
> > John J. Boyer; President,
> > Abilitiessoft, Inc.
> > http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> > Madison, Wisconsin USA
> > Developing software for people with disabilities
> >
> > For a description of the software, to download it and links to project
> > pages go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> >
> > For a description of the software, to download it and links to project
> > pages go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com
>
> --
> John J. Boyer; President,
> Abilitiessoft, Inc.
> http://www.abilitiessoft.com
> Madison, Wisconsin USA
> Developing software for people with disabilities
>
> For a description of the software, to download it and links to project pages
> go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com
--
John J. Boyer; President,
Abilitiessoft, Inc.
http://www.abilitiessoft.com
Madison, Wisconsin USA
Developing software for people with disabilities
For a description of the software, to download it and links to
project pages go to http://www.abilitiessoft.com
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