Hello Colleagues and friends:
I would like to suggest the following activities and research project areas:
1. The membership at large should be afforded an opportunity to make
suggestions for devices they would like to see developed. This will help us
to be aware of our member's needs.
2. The Committee should explore the possibility of working with research
laboratories at institutions such as Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This might also give us access
to students who must work on class projects in new technology.
3. The Committee should work with those institutions involved with what is
known as self-driving or autonomous vehicles. CMU has been involved in this
type of research for over 15 years.
4. At least two members should attend the Consumer Electronics Show (CES)
held in Las Vegas every January (in 2003, January 9-12). The CES has
"concept" booths, (As part of the show.) where companies show concepts they
are working on. This show has 1.2 million square feet of exhibit space. One
day, we may want to show what we are working on in our own concept booth.
5. The Committee absolutely must work on opening dialogs with appliance
manufacturers in order to have appliances that we will be able to use. A
subcommittee should be appointed to do this task throughout the year.
6. Three related appliance subprojects should be undertaken. These are:
6.1 A device to do OCR via video signals. This device would be used to
deal with set-top boxes and satellite receivers.
6.2 A device to read both Liquid Crystal Displays (LCD) and television
screens. This is needed in order to access the increasing variety of such
controls on appliances and screen menu systems.
6.3 An accessible universal remote control. Such a device would allow
users to control televisions, VCRs, stereos, and other audio or visual
entertainment devices.
7. Because robotic technology has a great potential to improve our lives,
with everything from robot lawn mowers to a self-driving automobile, the
Committee must stay current with research now being conducted in Artificial
Intelligence (AI).
8. Given the ever-increasing amount of graphics being used in educational
materials, research needs to be done on how to easily produce tactile
graphics. Many, perhaps most, of the pieces that would make this possible
are already available; now some talented inventor needs to bring them
together in one area for further study and development.
9. We need to improve the techniques used to transcribe books. The area
needing the most work is analyzing a book and marking up the data so that
properly formatted textbooks will result when computer programs are used to
transcribe print into Braille. A universal mark-up code will facilitate the
production of files such as those used for WebBraille, and would be
essential to fast production of materials for "Daisy-format" books.
10. The Committee needs to work on or shepherd a related project, which is
the use of OCR technology to read mathematics and science texts.
11. We should find a way to have produced the National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST) Rotating Braille Display. This device, as
demonstrated at our 2001 meeting and at the 2001 National Convention, is a
low cost Braille display. The NIST researchers believe this device could be
produced and sold for between $500 and $1,000. Currently, the most
inexpensive Braille display that could be compared with this device costs
$3,495 (the Braille Lite Millennium 20).
12. Product evaluation is a close cousin of Research and Development.
Projects should be undertaken to evaluate the best scanner, document reading
software, screen reader, embosser, talking watch, Braille watch, cassette
recorder, etc. I recommend that Committee members receive such assignments
which must be reported on, perhaps quarterly, via email to other members.
Sincerely,
Robert S. Jaquiss
Member
NFB Research and Development Committee 2002
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