Braille Cells for Blinds

Quick Statistics

There exist about 285 million visually impaired worldwide, of whom more than 36 million are blind. Due to the low level of awareness of the health and social the percentage of blind and visually impaired in the east is higher by about 7% of the total population, and in some countries it is as high as 11%, while the minimum percentage of the blind and visually impaired in the United States and European countries should not exceed in any way 3% of the inhabitants of those countries.

How do Blinds Learn Reading/Writing?

Several methods of communication languages have been tried in the early 1200’s  that developed over time to help blinds learn and communicate. The most common one is the Braille code. Braille is a system where raised dots, on paper, form letters and words readable by the blind using their fingertips. The basic Braille “cell” consists of 2-columns of 3-dots. The dots are numbered 1-2-3 from top to bottom on the left side of the cell and 4-5-6 from top to bottom on the right side of the cell. Each Braille letter, word, punctuation mark, number, or musical note can be made up using different combinations of these dots. In short “Braille is like a pen-and-paper for sighted people”. Since the various Braille alphabets originated as transcription codes of printed writing systems, the mappings (sets of character designations) vary from language to language.

Furthermore, in English Braille there are three levels of encoding: Grade 1, a letter-by-letter transcription used for basic literacy; Grade 2, an addition of abbreviations and contractions; and Grade 3, various non-standardized personal shorthands . Braille cells are not the only thing to appear in embossed text. There may be embossed illustrations and graphs, with the lines either solid or made of series of dots, arrows, bullets that are larger than Braille dots, etc. .

Although Braille writing is available and blind people can read but there still exist a lot of unsolved problems: – May be Braille writing is suitable for a blind to read but doesn’t suit him to write. – Most of the blind in Arabic world and developing countries are Braille illiterates. – Braille on paper is bulky, heavy, expensive and one-time usable because of using special paper for printing. To imagine this you have to know that holy books like the Braille copy of the Qur’an, for example, is printed in 6 volumes * (200 pages each). The bible is printed on 38 volumes that weight about 40 Kg and cost about $630. – Finally, the blinds are in need to use modern technology like computers and smart phones for reading and editing via Braille writing and decrease their reliance on paper usage.

A refreshable Braille display is a device depending on electronic and mechanical approach that contains Braille cells whose dots can be lowered or raised to show information on computer screens, hard disks, memory sticks, or any other media storage alternative.

This means that a refreshable Braille display shows Braille without the need for paper and/or plastic sheets. The blind can benefit of all advantages of digital information like creating, editing, spreading, saving, multiple access, etc.