From: Richard Webb 
Subject: Re: Has anyone used MEGA
Greetings, Warren, and others.
On 1997-06-15 Warren said to elspider@interl.net
   >MF I beg to differ with you. Although many computer enthusiasts
   >MF envisioned computers as being able to produce good quality
   >Braille MF under a wide variety of circumstances at the touch of a
   >button, in MF practice (except for the simplest of materials), id
   >doesn't work MF that way and will not for quite some time. IMHO it
(deletia)
   >Source disks come in all flavors. It's a joy to receive a set of
   >well-done, logically formatted documents. However, it's a
   >rarity and the typical disk that crosses my desk contains quite a
   >bit that must be cleaned up to get semi-decent braille. I braille
   >quite a bit of administrivia for rehab counselors and teachers so
   >there are lots of tables and charts that must be dealt with.
   >Fortunetly the work is becoming easier as I learn to use macros and
   >complex find and replace features that make cleanup quicker. Years
   >ago, I would plow into a document and fix everything manually. Now
   >I analyze the word processing of the document and tackle
This is where Mike has misunderstood me to some degree, as formatting is a
big problem.  I've done plenty of resturaunt menus and other doccuments
from both scanned text, and transcribed as a whole.
Where transcription starts from scratch, it's a little easier to advise the
transcriber about formatting than it is to teach them the whole six dot
code.  I've used NFBtrans for this, and gotten quite good results embedding
the formatting codes within the doccument.
I've had my mother transcribe things from inkprint to ascii while embedding
same formatting codes, and the braille came out quite fine.  It's a matter
of which is more efficient, educating the transcriber as to the special
considerations of formatting for braille page output, as opposed to
teaching them the entire code before they can start getting out usable
braille.
   >What many braille readers don't realize is that the number of
   >volunteer braillists is decreasing rapidly. Braille production is
   >now a business like everything else.
I do indeed, and were I to start such a business, I'd have folks
transcribing using some kind of regular word processor, paying special
attention to the different formatting needs of braille as they do so.  This
means less time training and more time getting paying work out.
BTw, I've seen plenty of sloppy work and poorly formatted braille that
didn't come off a braille translator .  I had a volunteer do a manual
for a piece of musical equipment a few years ago.   It was all hand
transcribed, but the formatting was quite poor there, and the error rate
was pretty high.  I'm not looking to up quantity without quality, quite the
opposite.
The goal is more readily available braille, but of higher quality.
REgards,
Richard Webb
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