Braille is a writing system that uses tactile dots in apredetermined order which, in relation to each other, representdifferent letters in the alphabet. This writing systemmakes it possible for people with visual impairmentsto take part of the written media. But the availability ofhome based braille printers is limited and these printers areoften expensive. The purpose of this project is to investigateif it is possible to build a home based braille printerfor a low cost using microcontrollers, and thereby making itmore accessible to people with visual impairment. In orderto achieve this, a prototype was built using an microcontrollertogether with stepper motors and a solenoid. Thesecomponents were then controlled by code through user inputand translated to required movements. Each switchcase then calls a set of functions that activates the steppersand the solenoid in the order needed to get the desiredcharacter. In the time frame given, the project resulted ina prototype able to print out the input it was given. Asfor the cost of building your own Braille printer in comparisonto buying one on the market highly depends on whatprocessing machines are accessible. / Braille är ett skrivsystem som använder taktila prickari en förbestämd ordning i förhållande till varandra som representerarolika bokstäver i alfabetet. Detta skrivssystemgör det möjligt för personer med nedsatt syn att ta delav de skriftliga medierna. Men tillgången av hembaseradebraille-skrivare är begränsad och dessa skrivare är oftadyra. Syftet med detta projekt är att undersöka om detär möjligt att bygga en hembaserad braille-skrivare till enlåg kostnad med hjälp av mikrokontroller och därmed underlätta för personer med nedsatt syn. För att uppnå dettabyggdes en prototyp med en mikrokontroll tillsammansmed stegmotorer och en solenoid. För att styra dessa komponenterskrevs en kod som tar in information från vad somskrivits i Arduinos serial monitor och kopplar sedan dettatill specifika switch cases. Varje switch case anropar sedanen uppsättning funktioner som aktiverar stegmotorerna ochsolenoiden i den ordning som behövs för att få önskad bokstav.Med den givna tidsramen resulterade projektet i enprototyp som kunde skriva ut det input den var given. Vaddet gäller kostnaden för att bygga en Braille-skrivare påegen hand jämfört med att köpa en på marknaden berormycket på vilka bearbetningsmaskiner som är tillgängliga.

The resonance of a knock on a door uncovers its density. The smell of a wall describes its materiality. The texture of a floor may invite us to sit or lay down. The smoothness of a handrail comforts our ascent. Human skin is a powerful material that enables us to perceive and understand our surroundings. Skin is highly expressive; based on its color, texture, wear and plasticity we can read it, gathering information concerning culture, ethnic background, age, abuse, health and the tasks it performs on specific body parts. Skin itself reads as it is readable. Our skin can gather data through tactile perception and read our spatial surroundings. Architecture is an expressive act and the only discipline that stimulates all of our senses. An architect designs spaces that foresee and celebrate the bodily interaction of the inhabitant. The architecture of the 21st century seems to be geared toward a more optic experience, an influence of the digital world and its widespread effect. The architectural body of modern construction is made up of skins that convey no intentions of interaction between human skin, delivering a concoction of low quality materials that time and again are layered the same way and only aim to be cost efficient. The result is a bland, empty and "flat" experience. In a culture dominated by visual stimulation, can the design of architectural skins aid in the reading and understanding through touch of an architectural body's spatial sequence? / Master of Architecture

O presente trabalho investiga as diculdades enfrentadas por decientes visuais ao ingressarem em um curso de nvel superior em Música, onde a troca de informacão musical escrita é frequente e se dá por meio de partituras impressas em tinta, e a conversão deste material para braille demanda conhecimentos específicos e disponibilidade de recursos. Igualmente problemática, a produção musical do aluno cego é feita em braille, seja para tomar nota de aulas como para realizar tarefas de disciplinas como Contraponto, Harmonia e Análise Musical, ou mesmo para a realização de exames. Claramente, esse material deve passar por um processo de conversão para que o professor possa avaliar o aluno, entre outros motivos. O foco principal da pesquisa realizada é a analise da musicografia braille sob a ótica das possibilidades de se produzir transcrições automáticas entre partituras em braille e tinta, a fim de prover recursos tecnológicos direcionados a solução deste problema. Para tanto, foi desenvolvido um aplicativo capaz de receber informação musical em braille e converê-la para o formato MusicXML, adequado para a leitura a partir de outros aplicativos de notação musical e, consequentemente, a impressão deste material em tinta. Este programa esta sendo distribudo como software livre sob licenca LGPL, contrapondo-se as suas alternativas hoje existentes no mercado. O aplicativo desenvolvido foi utilizado e avaliado por usuarios decientes visuais e com visão normal por meio de um questionário. Os dados foram então analisados, buscando mapear as diferenças nas experiências de uso e verificar necessidades de melhorias e novas funcionalidades, buscando com isso o aprofundamento nas questões pertinentes ao problema e dando suporte a novas pesquisas relativas ao assunto. / This work researches visually-impaired person\'s dificulties when studying music as a university career, where musical information is usually forwarded as ink-printed sheet music and the translation of this material to braille involves specic skills and resource availability. In that sense, the musical production demanded from a blind student is accomplished by using braille notation, for taking notes or producing homework for disciplines like Harmony, Musical Analysis, or even to take tests. Clearly the information produced has to be submitted to a conversion process, and finally it can be reviewed by the professor or other students. The main focus of this research is the understanding of braille music aspects and the problem of generating automatic ink-printed sheet music transcriptions, providing assistive resource for music students. For attaining this goal, an application was developed in order to receive braille music input and translate it to MusicXML format, which can be read by any of the widely MusicXML compatible softwares available for reading, editing and printing music. The program is distributed as free software under LGPL license, as opposed to currently available alternatives. The resulting application was tested by visually-impaired and non-visually impaired users, and reviewed trough the application of a survey. The collected data was analyzed, in search for variations on user experience and checking for software improvement needs, as well as uncovering further relevant matters on this subject.

Doctorat en sciences psychologiques / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

O presente trabalho investiga as diculdades enfrentadas por decientes visuais ao ingressarem em um curso de nvel superior em Música, onde a troca de informacão musical escrita é frequente e se dá por meio de partituras impressas em tinta, e a conversão deste material para braille demanda conhecimentos específicos e disponibilidade de recursos. Igualmente problemática, a produção musical do aluno cego é feita em braille, seja para tomar nota de aulas como para realizar tarefas de disciplinas como Contraponto, Harmonia e Análise Musical, ou mesmo para a realização de exames. Claramente, esse material deve passar por um processo de conversão para que o professor possa avaliar o aluno, entre outros motivos. O foco principal da pesquisa realizada é a analise da musicografia braille sob a ótica das possibilidades de se produzir transcrições automáticas entre partituras em braille e tinta, a fim de prover recursos tecnológicos direcionados a solução deste problema. Para tanto, foi desenvolvido um aplicativo capaz de receber informação musical em braille e converê-la para o formato MusicXML, adequado para a leitura a partir de outros aplicativos de notação musical e, consequentemente, a impressão deste material em tinta. Este programa esta sendo distribudo como software livre sob licenca LGPL, contrapondo-se as suas alternativas hoje existentes no mercado. O aplicativo desenvolvido foi utilizado e avaliado por usuarios decientes visuais e com visão normal por meio de um questionário. Os dados foram então analisados, buscando mapear as diferenças nas experiências de uso e verificar necessidades de melhorias e novas funcionalidades, buscando com isso o aprofundamento nas questões pertinentes ao problema e dando suporte a novas pesquisas relativas ao assunto. / This work researches visually-impaired person\'s dificulties when studying music as a university career, where musical information is usually forwarded as ink-printed sheet music and the translation of this material to braille involves specic skills and resource availability. In that sense, the musical production demanded from a blind student is accomplished by using braille notation, for taking notes or producing homework for disciplines like Harmony, Musical Analysis, or even to take tests. Clearly the information produced has to be submitted to a conversion process, and finally it can be reviewed by the professor or other students. The main focus of this research is the understanding of braille music aspects and the problem of generating automatic ink-printed sheet music transcriptions, providing assistive resource for music students. For attaining this goal, an application was developed in order to receive braille music input and translate it to MusicXML format, which can be read by any of the widely MusicXML compatible softwares available for reading, editing and printing music. The program is distributed as free software under LGPL license, as opposed to currently available alternatives. The resulting application was tested by visually-impaired and non-visually impaired users, and reviewed trough the application of a survey. The collected data was analyzed, in search for variations on user experience and checking for software improvement needs, as well as uncovering further relevant matters on this subject.

Ce mémoire s’intéresse aux usages des modalités braille et vocale pour la lecture tactile et auditive de journaux par des personnes aveugles. Plus spécifiquement, il expose une recherche qualitative visant à l’identification, à la caractérisation et à l’analyse du ou des choix de modalité(s) faits par ces personnes lors d’une lecture de journal adapté en texte électronique, ceci, dans une perspective d’évaluation des facteurs d’influence desdits choix. Afin de répondre aux objectifs fixés, une collecte de données a été réalisée auprès de six participants aveugles, notamment sélectionnés sur la base de leur double aptitude à la lecture tactile et auditive des textes. Chacun a eu à lire un corpus d’articles de journaux en texte électronique avec la ou les modalités de leur choix (braille et/ou vocal), lesquelles pouvaient être employées seules ou en combinaison. L’exercice, se déroulant à l’individuel, s’est tenu à l’aide des technologies adaptées de chacun (afficheur braille, synthèse vocale) et par l’entremise d’un site Web hébergeant le corpus. Les données recueillies proviennent d’une observation de comportements et de verbalisations émises par les participants après chaque lecture. Tous les participants ont à la fois choisi de recourir à la synthèse vocale et à l’afficheur braille dans le cadre des lectures du corpus. Ceci tend à appuyer notre principale hypothèse de recherche, à savoir que certaines personnes aveugles capables d’une lecture braille et placées en présence d’un choix de modalité(s) pourraient faire un emploi combiné du braille et du vocal pour le décodage de journaux en texte électronique. De façon générale, l’approche adoptée par les participants consistait à recourir « par défaut » à la synthèse vocale, pour des motifs comme la rapidité et le confort de lecture, ainsi que la simplicité d’usage. L’afficheur a plutôt été employé en complément, dans le cadre de stratégies de lecture telles que les vérifications orthographiques et la navigation dans les contenus. Toutefois, d’autres usages potentiels du braille en contexte de lecture d’un journal ont aussi été relevés. Notamment, chez certains participants, l’afficheur peut être mis à profit pour la lecture de contenus d’articles que l’on souhaite prendre en note ou rapporter à quelqu’un d’autre. Tous ces usages, exprimés ou observés, ont été rattachés à un certain nombre d’apports du braille décrits et contextualisés dans ce mémoire. Enfin, les données recueillies suggèrent certains liens entre les usages de modalité(s) et des variables telles que les objectifs de lecture et les caractéristiques du texte.

Braille, as a special written method of communication for the blind, has been globally accepted for years. It gives blind people another chance to learn and communicate more efficiently with the rest of the world. It also makes possible the translation of printed languages into a written language which is recognisable for blind people. Recently, Braille is experiencing a decreasing popularity due to the use of alternative technologies, like speech synthesis. However, as a form of literacy, Braille is still playing a significant role in the education of people with visual impairments. With the development of electronic technology, Braille turned out to be well suited to computer-aided production because of its coded forms. Software based text-to-Braille translation has been proved to be a successful solution in Assistive Technology (AT). However, the feasibility and advantages of the algorithm reconfiguration based on hardware implementation have rarely been substantially discussed. A hardware-based translation system with algorithm reconfiguration is able to supply greater throughput than a software-based system. Further, it is also expected as a single component integrated in a multi-functional Braille system on a chip. / Therefore, this thesis presents the development of a system for text-to-Braille translation implemented in hardware. Differing from most commercial methods, this translator is able to carry out the translation in hardware instead of using software. To find a particular translation algorithm which is suitable for a hardware-based solution, the history of, and previous contributions to Braille translation are introduced and discussed. It is concluded that Markov systems, a formal language theory, were highly suitable for application to hardware based Braille translation. Furthermore, the text-to-Braille algorithm is reconfigured to achieve parallel processing to accelerate the translation speed. Characteristics and advantages of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs), and application of Very High Speed Integrated Circuit Hardware Description Language (VHDL) are introduced to explain how the translating algorithm can be transformed to hardware. Using a Xilinx hardware development platform, the algorithm for text-to-Braille translation is implemented and the structure of the translator is described hierarchically.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 38-42). Also available in print.

Dissertação (mestrado)—Universidade de Brasília, Instituto de Psicologia, 2007. / Submitted by Aline Jacob (alinesjacob@hotmail.com) on 2010-01-07T23:30:01Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2007_RaquelMotaMeirelesdoNascimento.pdf: 590319 bytes, checksum: dc3612cd3e19a9156264017f679ff8ad (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Daniel Ribeiro(daniel@bce.unb.br) on 2010-01-07T23:36:01Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2007_RaquelMotaMeirelesdoNascimento.pdf: 590319 bytes, checksum: dc3612cd3e19a9156264017f679ff8ad (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2010-01-07T23:36:01Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2007_RaquelMotaMeirelesdoNascimento.pdf: 590319 bytes, checksum: dc3612cd3e19a9156264017f679ff8ad (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007-04-27 / A formação de classes de estímulos equivalentes tem sido observada principalmente com estímulos auditivos e visuais. O presente trabalho investigou a emergência de relações de equivalência de estímulos auditivos e táteis com deficientes visuais. Os estímulos táteis foram letras em três modalidades – plástico (B), Braille (C) e relevo (D). Seis crianças cegas de 5 a 8 anos foram expostas a treinos de pareamento ao modelo que ensinavam as relações entre o nome da letra ditado e letras de plástico (AB), letras em braile (AC) e letras em relevo (AD). A ordem de exposição às rela ções foi balanceada entre os participantes. Após os treinos foram realizados testes para verificar a emergência das relações não treinadas diretamente - BC/CB, BD/DB e CD/DC. Os resultados mostraram que os participantes aprenderam todas as discriminações condicionais entre estímulos auditivos e táteis com pouco ou nenhum erro. Todos os participantes apresentaram a formação de classes equivalentes das três vogais representadas em Braille, plástico e relevo, estendendo resultados de estudos anteriores para estímulos táteis relevantes para o contexto acadêmico e pode ser importante para o desenvolvimento de nova tecnologia comportamental para ensinar leitura a crianças cegas. O procedimento de pareamento ao modelo foi efetivo para ensinar relações com estímulos táteis a crianças deficientes visuais. Os achados parecem importantes para o desenvolvimento de tecnologia de ensino alternativa para a educação especial. Estudos adicionais que utilizem estímulos mais complexos - sílabas e palavras - são necessários para verificar a generalidade do fenômeno. __________________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACT / The formation of equivalence classes has been documented mainly with auditory and visual stimuli. This study investigated the emergence of equivalence relations with auditory and tactual stimuli with blind children. The stimuli were three vowels represented in three tactual modalities: plastic (B), Braille (C) and raised (D). Six 5-8 years old blind children were exposed to a matching-to-sample procedure to teach relations between dictated letter names and plastic letters (AB), dictated letter names and Braille letters (AC) and dictated letter names and raised letters (AD). The order of exposure to the training relations was counterbalanced between subjects. Tests of emergent relations (BC/CB, BD/DB e CD/DC) were conducted following training. All subjects learned nine relations between dictated letters and their corresponding tactile exemplars with few or no errors. Testing results showed equivalence classes of the three vowels represented in plastic, Braille and raised. These results extend previous findings to tactile stimuli relevant for the academic context and may be important for the development of new behavior technology to teach reading by blind children. Further research using more complex stimuli - syllables and words - is necessary to assess the generality of the present findings.

The purpose of the project was to develop a product that would serve as a support for the learning of Braille. Learning Braille is a time consuming process. People who have recently suffered a visual impairment have a lower sensitivity to touch than those who have been visually impaired for a longer period. According to a study [1], the learning process can lead to depression. At the same time, the technology for support systems for the visually impaired is underdeveloped. The questions examined in the project were partly about the environment’s influence on the accuracy of the instrument’s translation of Braille. Partly, if it was possible to create an instrument that can translate Braille in standard format and at the same time be a suitable aid for a user with a visual impairment. The instrument consisted of four main parts; reading surface, reading head, audio output and keyboard. The purpose of the reading surface was to place the Braille to be translated under the reading head using a stepper motor. The reading head would then interpret the letter, which would then be called out as an audio file using the audio output. All operations of the instrument would be controlled by a keyboard with three push buttons. The resulting product was promising. The analysis showed that it was fully possible to create a functioning Braille translator. However the product requires some further development in order to be used as an effective aid / Syftet med projektet var att ta fram en produkt som skulle fungera som ett stöd för inlärning av punktskrift. Personer som nyligen drabbats av en synskada har sämre känslighet för beröring än de som varit synskadade under en längre period. Enligt en studie [1] kan tidskrävande inlärningsprocessen leda till depression, samtidigt som tekniken för stödsystem åt synskadade är underutvecklad. De frågeställningar som undersöktes i projektet handlade dels om omgivningens påverkan av exaktheten av instrumentets översättning. Dels om det var möjligt att skapa ett instrument som kan översätta punktskrift i standardformat och samtidigt vara ett passande hjälpmedel för en användare med en synskada. Instrumentet bestod av fyra huvudsakliga delar; avläsningsyta, avläsningshuvud, ljudutgång samt tangentbord. Avläsningsytans syfte var att placera punktskriften som skulle översättas under anläsningshuvudet med hjälp av en stegmotor. Avläsningshuvudet skulle därefter tolka bokstaven som sedan skulle utropas som en ljudfil med hjälp av ljudutgången. Instrumentets samtliga operationer skulle styras av ett tangentbord med tre tryckknappar. Resultatet av den framtagna produkten var lovande. Undersökningarna påvisade att det var fullt möjligt att skapa en fungerande översättare. Dock krävs det en vidareutveckling för att produkten skall kunna användas som etteffektivt hjälpmedel.