From: martin@datacomm.ucc.okstate.edu (Martin McCormick)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.speech,comp.unix.aux
Subject: Re: Blind undergraduate needs information
Date: 21 Nov 92 18:30:49 GMT
Article-I.D.: osuunx.1992Nov21.183049.14829
Organization: Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK


> My primary need (in terms of
>high-speed computing), is for a machine which can carry out OCR (optical
>character recognition), quickly and efficiently.
>It appears that my needs may outstrip the quadra
>line of macintoshes (both currently available, and expected in the next six
>months), which suggests to me the need to look toward either an aux-based
>macintosh environment or a straight unix machine such as a small spark station
>or the new DEC machines.
>My questions are:
>1.  What OCR software is available for unix-based computers?

Nothing really that I know of.

>2.  Are there good speech synthesizers available for these machines, and if so,
>are they hardware-or-software based?

That's a tough one.  Yes, there are hardware speech synthesizers which would
work just fine on a Unix box, but that's not really how one usually goes
about getting Unix to talk.
 The easiest way to do that is to get a MSDOS machine and outfit it with
a speech synthesizer, a telecommunications program such as "kermit," "Procomm,"
or something similar, and a TSR software program whose purpose it is to
make the screen display usable for speech.  You, then, connect a serial port
on the Unix system to a serial port on the PC and cause the PC to behave
like a VTxx terminal.  To put a speech synthesizer directly on a Unix box
would be a real trick, especially for a beginner.  It is definitely a
possibility, but it would require the creation of a psudo terminal and device
driver for that purpose.  Why bother when the PC method is more straight-
forward.

>3.  What kind of money am I looking at spending for a computer able to
>outperform the 33 MHZ-68:040-baased quadras currently available?

 This is a perfectly good question, but, again, there is no easy
answer.  Most of the action in the area of OCR for the purpose of allowing
blind people to "read" a book seems to be with MSDOS machines.  OCR is very
CPU intensive so what you really want is the fastest box you can get your
hands on.  If the software is smart enough to take advantage of all available
ram, then you want to do as much with RAM as possible since that is the
fastest way to access data.  There is a fairly decent speech synthesizer
called the Echo which presently sells for less than $200.00, but one can also
buy a gold-plated marval for several thousand Dollars.  You just need to ask
yourself whether it is worth all that for the somewhat better speech quality.
  As for the computer, itself, both it and the scanner are items which
can be shopped for just like any other equipment purchase.  One can probably
do pretty well for $5,000.00, give or take a little.
Be careful.  It is easy to spend tons of money and end up with absolutely
nothing.

>4.  What companies specialize in small unix-capable stations like the new DEC
>Alpha?
>Any information available out there will be *very* much appreciated, as all of
>my work is done on scanned material, so I need to begin trying to make as
>informed a decision as is possible.

 A very good thought.  Unix does loads of wonderful things, but I
don't think it is the answer, here.  The only thing that a Macintosh provides
is an audio output channel which can use DSP to create speech and other
high-quality sounds without external hardware.  One can get a card like the
Sound Blaster for a PC which can do the same type of thing, but I like the
external hardware approach because it does not use CPU resources as hungrily
as does the use of the host system to actually generate the speech.
 Finally, I am only taking up newsgroup space for this reply because
these questions come up more often than one might think.  There is a Usenet
group called  misc.handicap  which is a better forum in which to discuss the
pros and cons of various access methods, but still, the computing community
needs to be aware that there are reasonable solutions to these problems but
the problem is in figuring out exactly what is most suitable for a given
individual.  What do I use?  I use a PC/XT both at home and at work.  I
would just about give my right thumb for a good OCR system, so I am not
defending PC's due to the fact that that is what I just bought.  I have seenm
PC-based systems which really zipped along and they are simply easier for a
blind person to use since they don't require a graphical interface for
everything.

Martin McCormick WB5AGZ   Stillwater, OK
O.S.U. Computer Center Data Communications Group
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions