Heh Curtis, I have to teach the computer to many varied people. On
average though most are old, between 60 and 80 years old and many of
them have never seen a computer or have only seen one in a past
life. So, I'm not trying to force my preferences on any one. I
understand that people are different and that they learn things
differently and have different priorities.
Regarding the book sense handling of it's files, I don't consider it
proprietary to put daisy files in the daisy folder, text and doc
files in the text or ebooks folder and so on. The system needs to
have some way of sorting and handling them,, and most players have
some structure like this for handling their various types. The IPod
now, that is completely proprietary because it stores it's various
files in a locked and proprietary database, meant to be accessed by
one specific piece of software, and if you don't use that software
well too bad. There may be some hacks out there to rip your IPod or
some such, but by and large you're locked in to ITunes. That is
proprietary.
If I understand what files belong where, then I can place them
myself on the player with windows explorer if I use a windows
machine, or finder if I use a mac, which I do, or Presumably I could
use whatever browsing tool came with my distrobution of linux if I
wanted. That's non-proprietary. On the other hand, if the company
releases software to manage your book sense, and you must have
window-eyes in order to run the software, even if you don't strictly
need the software to manage your player, that is still proprietary
and users will avoid the book sense who might otherwise be throwing
out their victor stream to have one. But if the management software
only works with one screen reader it'd be a hard sell.
I've tought it both ways. I can tell you that the people who have
trouble with the consept of files and folders in windows explorer
also generally have a bother with the consept of multi-page dialog
boxes and multitudenous onscreen buttons as in the case of stream
companion. The trick is to pick an approach and then spend as much
time and patience to get it done as needs be. It hasn't hurt my
ability to teach the stream having two approaches I can work with.
I just balk at the idea of one being proprietary, and to be honest I
don't see it happening. Whatever they develop will be stand alone.
Hell, maybe they will make it self-voicing, and that way power users
like me can get paid to come in and put jaws and window-eyes to
sleep while when the booksense manager is turned on, smiles.
As for naming the software, how about the booksense buddy? How
about the book sense librarian? Or maybe? ... no, wait a minute...
How about the super ultra-high-speed one touch copienpastinator?
Best,
erik burggraaf
A+ sertified technician and user support consultant.
Phone: 888-255-5194
Email: [email protected]
On 3-Jul-09, at 2:00 PM, Curtis Delzer wrote:
Well, complainers about programs is always going to happen, it is
those who don't complain, that use the software every day without
issue I am thinking about, particularly those who don't know how or
why such files go in such and such a place because otherwise, the
BS couldn't find it, or recognize it, etc. Proprietary scripts,
you're probably right about that, I was thinking of a quick way to
implement a solution for the end user right away who already runs
window-eyes, but there are thousands who will run the BS with some
other screen reading solution, but why not proprietary? Isn't the
BS, after all, proprietary, and it's interface, since if you put
*.m4A files in the books folder they won't be seen at all, or
*.docs in the DAISY folder? It is an easy mistake and to avoid
frustration, at least some of it, it may be a good idea to look at
the potential since 32Gig cards will become the norm, with much
huger ones right on the horizon.
Remember, Erik, you are a very high end user, but most computer
users are much more casual ones who don't get under the hood as
much as a lot of us on this list do, and they want their solutions
working right now, not after a prolonged study of menus, file
structures as to what goes where, etc. etc. :)
I sure don't mind doing such and such but hey, like many on this
list, been doing it for quite a long time and for me, it is as easy
as turning on my computer to figure out why *.ogg files go in the
media folder, not books, or, is that correct? :)
Take care!
Curtis Delzer.
HS
At 12:38 PM 7/3/2009, Erik burggraaf wrote:
Hum. Well myself I've never found stream companion all that useful,
although I know some people like it. Wouldn't a window-eyes
script to
sort your mp3's and such freeze out jaws users a bit? Seems like
there might be a hue and cry about window-eyes going proprietary and
forcing people into gw products and the unfareness of it all and
so on.
I'm wondering if it might be more stable going through a Stand alone
program anyway. Window-eyes scripts can be wonderful, powerful,
versatile, and so on, but they can also be unstable and cause
crashes
because they rely on a back end that frankly leaves a bit to be
desired in the stability department. I'm wondering if we wouldn't
get
some frustrated users complaining that their microsoft com
automation
server thingy is crashing when they truy to put things on their book
sense.
Best,
erik burggraaf
A+ sertified technician and user support consultant.
Phone: 888-255-5194
Email: [email protected]
On 3-Jul-09, at 12:46 AM, Curtis Delzer wrote:
Hey guys. You all probably know that there is a program which runs
on a computer to help the Victor stream folks get the files into
the
right places on the stream, why not write a script to run from
within Window-Eyes to do similarly?
Putting all the files in the right places on the Book Sense is
going
to be daunting for some, plus unzipping and copying folder(s) from
within those *.zips as such into DAISY folders, NLS, book share,
etc. plus podcasts, and / or other kinds of books and music,
potentially an integration into Window-Eyes scripting could be done
without too much effort since it may not be too hard a task for
those bright scripters out there to tackle.
In that way, a book sense companion script could be doing all and
more than the human ware companion does now, since it can be
daunting for a beginner to do all that is needed easily and not
making a hash of it all. We wish to avoid discouraging those
willing
to do what is necessary, particularly to upload the books onto the
Book Sense, book share or otherwise, and have them all in the right
places without too many hoops to jump through.
Curtis Delzer
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