> Barbara McNay wrote to James Bradley, "'Nother One" on
 > 07-05-05 15:52

 >>>>  BM> There is a man who participated in ABLED before, who is
 >>>>  BM> interested in doing so again, if he can figure out how.  He
 >>>>  BM> is blind, has a screen reader, and infrequent help from a
 >>>>  BM> knowledgeable sighted person.  I believe he has had to get
 >>>>  BM> a new computer since ABLED's heyday, so he will likely have
 >>>>  BM> to set up all over again.  He does have email.  Does
 >>>>  BM> anybody have any ideas?

 >>>> Gee... We had a blind diabetic participate locally,
 >>>> but that too was
 >>>> in fido's hay-day. If you turn up nothing, I *might*
 >>>> be able to dig up
 >>>> his number. (Talked over the phone twice.)

 >>>  BM> Yes.  I believe we're talking about the same person.  He
 >>>  BM> has moved to different digs, but his phone number is the
 >>>  BM> same. May I give him your name and number? Email address?

 >>> Somehow, I doubt it is the same guy. But stranger
 >>> things have > happened.

 >>> If you have "NETMAIL", or "MATRIX" access, we can

 >>  BM> I have netmail, all right, and I received yours.  However,
 >>  BM> I can't seem to route netmail out.

 >> I think we can get all the expertise out here anyway.
 >> You know, one
 >> post to a local sysop, and he'll have to start feeding
 >> the guy/gal
 >> until he is wired up, right? Even if your fella does
 >> log in via I-Net,
 >> as long as there's a wealth of knowledge locally, that
 >> will save us
 >> oodles of typing time.

 >  BM> I'm sure it will, as I'm at least a couple of thousand miles away, I'd
 >  BM> guess.

 > My worry, was we would BOTH be a couple of thousands
 > of miles
 > away. What a HOOT!!!

 >>> posted your quest on an echo called BLUEWAVE for more
 >>> voice synthesizer. My sysop *just* wired up an
 >>> emailnetmail 'gateway' so I should have e-mail access there.

 >>>> QUESTIONS:

 >>>> I-net access or dial-up?
 >>>> Voice playback, or Braille?


 >>>> Mr. Brown, with a script and a modem, would call a
 >>>> BBS, and used an
 >>>> OLMR called Blue Wave, which allows any page of text
 >>>> to be
 >>>> synthesized into a robotic voice. (Male or Female!) It
 >>>> was a tack-on program he used, and I KNOW I have a copy

 >>>> He said it worked GREAT, and rarely mispronounced

 >>>> If we know what kind of equipment he has, and where

 >>>  BM> I've no idea what he has, except he does have I-net access.

 >>> That will likely be the route to go. I would like to
 >>> go further
 >>> outside this echo though. I have never run TELNET
 >>> other than locally,
 >>> so unless you have experience there, we should maybe
 >>> spill over to - I
 >>> don't know - TECH, or ELECTRONICS?

 >>>  BM> Let me know, or if you find his number, give him a call
 >>>  BM> yourself.  I don't want to give out his info here, as I


 >>>  BM> mail to bmcnay{at}bigfoot.com, and I will forward it.

 >> I will try to contact you there from this board. It
 >> might skip my mind
 >> though, and it's pretty convoluted for me to use it,
 >> but it'll give us
 >> a direct route to communications.

 >  BM> You made it!

 > We got the hop and the skip to work, but we're working
 > on the
 > troublesome jump now. Those intermittent problems are
 > the *worst!*

 >>> LORD no! Why do you think my guy is called Mr. Brown?


 >>  BM> Did, as I said.  I'll do some more looking and
 >>  BM> experimenting to see why Irex won't pick it up.

 >> Like I say, if we can find someone that is about to
 >> run an errand in
 >> his neighbourhood, we're done. If we can get the our
 >> two guys to talk
 >> together, we're done. Even if we forward this to
 >> another echo we are
 >> expanding our expertise.

 >> He has little else to do, than what we are doing now,
 >> plus his
 >> input/output methods. He'll login, or point. I-net or
 >> dialup. IExporer
 >> (Don't ask me!) or text reader.... We have more
 >> questions than we have
 >> experts at this time, but this should give us a good
 >> start.

 >> I would have to cold call eleven numbers here to
 >> contact
 >> Mr. Brown, (His name is *actually* Brown!) should he
 >> still be with us,
 >> AND posted in the book. If your assistant can start
 >> talking with us

 >  BM> Uhhh ... "my assistant"?

 > Ya... I'll have my girl call your girl, and we'll do
 > lunch
 > sometime. 

 >> here, or in TECH, we've shortened the root immensely.
 >> Can you get to
 >> him, to set up 'his and her' accounts?

 >> I'll just bet you can set up accounts for them
 >> remotely, right? Just
 >> inform them of their login names, and a generic simple
 >> password,
 >> streamline his input/output, and we're done. 

 >  BM> Ah, OK, doesn't your tongue hurt when you talk while it's
 >  BM> stuck there in your cheek?

 > That last step was the doosie. I'll have to learn to
 > stop talking when
 > I trip oven my feet. 

 >> So, I can see a sysop near him being the best possible
 >> route.
 >> Next, if your guy, and my guy talk on-on-one.
 >> If your guys' assistant can work a BBS in his area, or
 >> one that
 >> operates in I-net, we can start typing to her
 >> directly.

 >> Any other ideas?

 >  BM> No, local to him, and knowledgeable, seems to be most practical.

 >  Ah, shoot... Looks like I
 > volunteered *again!*

 > I've e-mail hopefully off to Wally right now, and plan
 > on calling him
 > in four and a half hours. From there, I'm pretty

Let's hope you've made contact. :)

 > confident we should
 > be able - with *his* assistant - work things out
 > online.

 > What a relief!

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