Hi Paul,
I think the navigation tools you referred to might be how you find a
particular chapter and page in a text. RFB&D is working toward a digital
machine that will have narration and computer text with features allowing
the student to skip quickly through the text, even spelling specific words.
Sharon

----- Original Message -----
From: Jim Rebman <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, December 21, 2001 7:02 PM
Subject: Re: Books on Tape


> Paul,
>
> You are correct about RFB&D -- their tapes do require a special player but
> they are the same ones as used by the Library of Congress.  There are many
> alternative sources for these players and they come in all sizes from
> walkman size to large desktop machines.  My favorite is the Handi-Cassette
> II from the braille printing house in Louisville, Kentucky.  It s a bit
> larger than a walkman (about twice the size) but has very good controls,
> decent battery life, tone indexing and speech compression built-in.
Speech
> compression allows you to listen to the material at faster than usual
> speeds while it corrects the pitch to closer to normal instead of "Alvin
> and the chipmunks".  You probably really wanted to know about the
materials
> and, so far, I have been able to get most of my textbooks through them.
> The exceptions being the more recent ones in technical areas (computer
> science) and other technically oreinted books that one can usually buy in
> bookstores and computer stores.  Generally, I want these books in ASCII
and
> not on tape anyway.  The materials range from popular fiction and
> non-fiction to textbooks for every level from secondary through graduate
> studies.
>
> As far as LOC is concerned, I have only used that service for pleasure
> reading, and not too much of it at that.
>
> Beware of the tapes you can buy in the bookstores -- many of them are
> abridged or otherwise "interpreted" from the original paper versions, yet
> they don't always disclose that in an obvious way -- you often have to
read
> the fine print.
>
> While not exactly on tape, two other sources are Project Gutenberg which
> has many classics available in ASCII and which can often be very useful in
> certain english lit, philosophy, and history classes, and bookshare.org
> which is about to come online soon and which looks to be a very promising
> source for digital texts of all types.
>
> http://www.bookshare.org
>
> Hope this helps,
>
> Jim
>
> ------------------------------
> James A. Rebman
>
> Cognitive Levers Project
> Center for Life-Long Learning and Design
> Department of Computer Science
> University of Colorado, Boulder
>
> "In times of change, the learners will inherit the earth while the learned
> will find themselves beautifully equipped for a world that no longer
exists."
>
> - Eric Hoffer
>