The Science Access Project at Oregon State University is pleased to
announce the availability of the TRIANGLE program in a beta release.
TRIANGLE is a speech- and braille-friendly DOS program intended for
use by print-impaired students and professionals in science,
engineering, and math.
TRIANGLE is so named because it is a triple triangle:
1. It is tri-modally accessible.
2. It permits access to the 3 R's, reading, writing, and 'rithmetic.
3. It permits access to equations, tables, and figures.
TRIANGLE includes:
- a math/science word processor,
- a graphing calculator,
- a viewer for y-versus-x plots,
- a table viewer,
- the Touch-and-Tell Program for audio and/or braille-assisted reading
of tactile figures on an external digitizing pad.
The keyboard or any assistive device/software that emulates a keyboard
may be used for input. TRIANGLE output may be viewed:
- Visually on the DOS text screen,
- Audibly using a screen-reading program and external voice synthesizer
for text and the PC speaker or an SB16 compatible sound output for other
audio,
- Tactilely using a braille screen access program and external
refreshable braille display,
- Any or all of the above simultaneously.
The primary purpose of TRIANGLE is to provide a workspace for reading,
writing, and manipulating mathematics. The GS linear notation is used for
scientific expressions. GS symbols that are not on the standard keyboard
may be entered using a braille keyboard option or several menu selection
options.
The word processor has five different document buffers that provide
basic editing capabilities, including search and cut and paste operations.
The calculator permits evaluation of most standard math expressions.
Results are returned to the scratchpad buffer and may be cut and pasted
to other documents. The calculator will also evaluate functions y-versus-
x that can be viewed in a plot window. A tone graph with a number of options
provides a blind user with a quick semi-quantitative overview. A moving
icon on the bottom line provides similar information for a deaf blind user.
The table reader program allows two options for reading tables. One
option, useful for reading tables with large cells, allows tables to be
read cell by cell. The second option formats tables to be read line by
line. The latter option is useful for small tables being read in braille,
but the first is usually preferable when speech synthesis is used or when
tables are large.
The Touch-and-Tell program provides alternate-mode display for information
presented visually in figures. The user selects an object or region on
a figure that is mounted on a digitizing tablet. The touch-and-tell program
then displays textual information about that object or region that can
be read visually, audibly, or in braille. TRIANGLE supports the Nomad tablet
and the Edmark Touch Window.
Some simple figures such as tree diagrams, flow charts, and function
diagrams can be read by an experienced braille user on a standard refreshable
display. TRIANGLE includes a special viewer for such "Braille Diagrams."
These are presently not accessible by voice, so non-braille readers can
read these only with the Touch-and-Tell viewer.
TRIANGLE permits hyperlink access to tables, figures, braille diagrams,
xy data plots, footnotes, and references provided the files are named and
marked up using the TRIANGLE conventions. All files are standard DOS ASCII
format.
TRIANGLE.zip may be downloaded from the Science Access Project
anonymous ftp site dots.physics.orst.edu/pub/triangle/ or from a
button on our web site http://dots.physics.orst.edu in the description
of TRIANGLE. At present, we have full support only for the TSI 8-dot
braille displays and TSI Versabraille printer and for the Vocal-Eyes
screenreader. Instructions are included that allow knowledgeable
users of most other braille displays and voice screenreaders to
construct tables and profiles necessary for using TRIANGLE. Blazie
Engineering is presently constructing the GS Table that can be
downloaded into their Braille Lite and Braille 40 notetaker/displays.
Authoring tools are still being written. Alpha release versions of
programs for making figures and braille diagrams are available in the
same ftp directory as TRIANGLE. We also have a table conversion from
formatted ASCII, LaTeX, or Lotus 123 format to the TRIANGLE format.
For further information please see the web site address given above.
TRIANGLE was written by the Science Access Project at Oregon State University.
It is Copyrighted and all rights are reserved. TRIANGLE may be freely distributed
as long as no fee is charged and all of the files are kept together and
intact.
Primary funding for the Science Access Project comes from the National
Science Foundation.
Contact information:
WWW: http://dots.physics.orst.edu
e-mail: triangle@dots.physics.orst.edu
John Gardner
Director, Science Access Project
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