Braille library / News: Recent posts

This version provides a new driver for Papenmeier USB Braille displays. The Alva and Baum drivers have been rewritten. Compatibility with Mac OS X has been improved a lot. It also features various bug fixes and minor improvements.

Thanks to Sourceforge which now provides subversion hosting, the libbraille repository has been migrated from CVS to subversion.

Some work has started on support of Unicode and International Braille in Libbraille. Before to include that in the library, I am doing some tests with an online translator to check that everything works: http://libbraille.org/translator.php Many languages are already supported including Arabic, Japanese or Vietnamese Braille. You are invited to test it and suggest new Braille tables or report any problem.

People who would like to know more about Libbraille or to dicuss its evolution are invited to join the mailing-list at http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/libbraille-misc

This version provides some RPM packages and a new Debian package including the virtual Gtk+ display. The windows installer now contains a precompiled Python module. Libbraille can be compiled with Mingw32. The HandyTech driver has been updated with autodetection. There are also many small bugs corrections.

This version adds support for the Technibraille braille display. It is now possible to set the level of verbosity of the library in debug mode and to provide different paths for additionnal drivers and tables. An SDK has been added to the windows installer. Many bugs have also been corrected including a refresh problem in the Gtk+ virtual display and a timeout problem in serial drivers.

A Libbraille driver for Brltty has been developed. It means that it is now possible to use additional displays supported by Libbraille with this famous screen reader for the unix console, like the hermes or the technibraille displays.

This version provides a windows installer using NSIS for easier distribution. Configuration in windows is now done through the registry. Finally the Tieman Voyager USB displays are now supported.

The major feature in this new version is some updated Debian packages with support for hotplug so that usb displays are automatically configured. The 'once' driver has also been rewritten with autodetection and timeout handling. On top of that this version corrects many small bugs.

MozBraille is an extension to transform Mozilla or Firefox in an accessible Internet browser designed for blind or partially sighted users. MozBraille uses libbraille for Braille output and contributed an XPCOM libbraille component. More info: http://mozbraille.mozdev.org/

The Braille API has improved to a great state and, with USB, the support of Braille displays is also nicely evolving. The next step for libbraille will be an easier installation system: a NSIS installer for windows and some up-to-date Debian and RPM packages. The documentation also needs to be updated and to provide some complete C and Java sample projects.

This version finally adds support for some USB Braille displays thanks to libusb: the Alva Satellite serie works and the Tieman Voyager should come soon. Some improvements have also been made in the configuration functions so that an application using libbraille can easily incorporate a configuration panel for the Braille settings.

A USB Braille terminal is finally available to libbraille developer for one month. This is a great news, however the development will probably only focus on USB during the coming month.

This new version of libbraille is able to autodetect some of the devices! (6 at this time, more will come). It also features a new eurobraille driver which supports Iris terminals. On top of that, it provides a braille_timeout function to switch between blocking and timeout mode as well as a few bug corrections and extra features.

Many improvements have been done in the configuration behavior so that applications can specify the Braille terminals and parameters. It also includes a Braille table working with win32 and all the linux drivers are available for visual studio as well.