-=> Quoting Jasen Betts to Leonard Erickson <=-

 JB> * Replying to a message in : SAVEAREA

 JB> Hi Leonard.

 JB> 02-Jun-03 18:50:12, Leonard Erickson wrote to Jasen Betts
 
 JB>> yeah, 6 per character cell. presuably with a solenoid underneath
 JB>> driving each one of them
 
 LE>> And they need to be able to handle being on all the time.
 
 JB>> make 'em bigger, or use permanent magnets to make them stick in
 JB>> position.
 
 LE> Permanent magnets that'll fit in the space available and *not*
 LE> intefere with adjacent rods aren't apt to be workable.

 JB> the solenoids (and magnets) needn't all be on the same plane,
 JB> also they're making some real strong magnets in tiny sizes these
 JB> days... 

Yeah, but the displays have *thickness* limitations. To be usable, they
have to be only about 1/2" thick. otherwise they stick too far above
everything else on the desk.

And it gets worsein portable units where they fit in just below the keyboard.

 LE>> Then add in the fact that there's a lot of decoding going on, as
 LE>> Braille is *not* mappable to ASCII.
 
 JB>> in what way?  it's got letters and digits...
 
 LE> BRL IS H1VILY 8OV]LOAD$01 6USE A PROGRAMM+ T]M4

Mind you, some of that is was due to the fact that Braille printers use
a modified version of Braille that maps all 64 possible braille
patterns to the ASCII values from 32 to 95. 

Some of the characters there (like "]") aren't part of the standard
Braille "set".

--- FMailX 1.60