Hi all, this has been really interesting. thanks all for researching this, and weighing in. Seems like a very complicated system to me at this point, but maybe that's because I'm used to the English system. That said, I'm glad there does in fact exist braille in Chinese. My colleague, who is married to a Chinese man and has spent time in China, said that the blind in China are trained since childhood for a career in massage. Glad to see this isn't their only option. :) Donna Best, Donna On Oct 25, 2010, at 3:11 PM, Esther wrote:
> Hi, > > I was going to reply to Donna off list and suggest that she check the > wikipedia. The more elegant way to do this is to use the Wikipanion app from > your iPhone or iPod Touch (under iOS 4 with language rotor). It will take > you to the regular Wikipedia app entry, but your iPhone will read out the > bits with Chinese characters in Mandarin. (At least, it does on my iPod > Touch). The answer in the Wikipedia entry is that there is a system that is > based on Pinyin entry for initial sound and final sounds, with some ability > to indicate 4 tones. However, there is a section that describes "Ambiguity > and future of Chinese Braille" which addresses the issue of the different > phonetic representations of words. > > The issue of Chinese input methods for VoiceOver users came up on the viphone > list. If you're interested, see my (long) post titled, "Chinese Input with > VoiceOver on the iPhone [was Re: Chinese VO]" that replied to a > question/complaint from an iPhone user about the inability of entering > Chinese text on the iPhone. (This was posted a few days after iOS 4 with > access to the language rotor was released): > > http://www.mail-archive.com/macvisionaries%40googlegroups.com/msg24706.html > > You're actually better off going to the viphone list and searching for the > thread Alvin started and his later followup in another thread, but the issue > of how to input Chinese text with VoiceOver (if we ever get voices for that > work with VoiceOver on the Mac) is a real one for this list. Incidentally, > for U.S. and Canadian iPhone users, it's possible to use the Trippo > VoiceMagix app (or the newer version Trippo Voice Translator Plus, which > gives you a free app and lets you add on the voice recognition and text to > speech features through in-app purchase, to get the same thing). To speak in > English and have the translated text spoken (and written) in Chinese, which > you could then copy and edit. And since I wrote the linked post, Sonico GmbH > has added a Loquendo Chinese text-to-speech voice for in-app purchase in > their iTranslate (free) and iTranslate Plus ($0.99, saves history of previous > entries) apps for $1.99. (Their male Russian voice is also very good.) > > HTH. Cheers, > > Esther > > On Oct 25, 2010, at 08:00, Colin M wrote: > >> Hi all! >> I was a bit curious myself, there is info about Chinese braille on >> wikkipedia! >> So it does indeed exist and has been around a while! >> Just type chinese braille into google and it should be the first option, if >> you want to have an gander! >> Colin >> On 25 Oct 2010, at 18:43, Scott Granados wrote: >> >>> Wow that must be a complex braille implementation. I've seen a Japanese >>> and Chinese typewriter and it's a similar situation with hundreds of keys. >>> >>> On Oct 25, 2010, at 8:42 AM, Donna Goodin wrote: >>> >>>> Sorry for the ot post, but this is such an international list, I figured >>>> someone would know the answer. >>>> >>>> I'm sitting here having a discussion about chinese braille with a >>>> colleague. Does anyone know anything about it? Does it exist? If yes, >>>> how does it work? My colleague--who speaks Chinese was explaining that it >>>> couldn't just rely on a phonetic symbol system, because the same phonetic >>>> writing can represent several different words. >>>> >>>> Since this is not on topic, feel free to respond off-list, >>>> goodi...@msu.edu. >>>> Donna >>>> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "MacVisionaries" group. > To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en.
