Processing Braille

Collection of braille experiments with processing, using an ancient (2004) HIMS Braille Sense.

• can be used as braille terminal via serial port or USB
• modern versions of Braille Sense still use the same protocol, but connect via bluetooth.

Sketches

• braillekeyboard — simulation of a perkins keyboard with an on-screen braille line
• brailleascii — translating keyboard input to braille using Braille ASCII
• braillesense_input — simple demo of receiving input from a braille-sense device
• braillesense – controlling the braillesense braille line from processing

Hardware

• Braille Sense H-200

  • Portable Braille Computer
  • Perkins style keyboard, i.e. 8 keys for braille input
  • space, function and cursor routing keys
  • Braille line with 32 braille chars

• Serial to USB Adapter (FTDI)

• Make sure to start terminal mode on the braille sense and select the serial port:
  utilies > terminal for screenreader > serial port

Braille Sense Protocol

• Reverse-engineered the incoming packages using HTerm
• Discovered the structure of outgoing packages in the sourcecode of brlltty (See here)

License

MIT licensed