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Dynamic Braille Scaling: Jumbo and Other Sizes
Graphics,High Resolution
Graphics,Troubleshooting
Macintosh Serial
Macintosh USB
Manuals on Disk
Margins, Troubleshooting
Megadots Conversions to Duxbury
MultiCopy Made Easy
Page Missing at the End?
Paper Flow and "Paper Out"
Using a PC/USB Port with our Embossers
"Where Are the Windows Drivers?"
Over the years, customers needed special Braille sizes for special purposes. This once meant getting a specially built embosser for each Braille size. No more! With Dynamic Braille Scaling, one software command from the keypad selects your choice of Library of Congress Braille, Library of Congress with relaxed spacing between lines, California ADA sign Braille, Jumbo Braille and Petite Braille. (Your embosser has DBS if you go into the menu you usually use, enter parameter 35, and hear a "good" confirmation tone.)
To use DBS, enter 35.0E for Library of Congress (the default), 35.1E for California sign Braille, 35.2E for Jumbo, 35.3E for Library of Congress with extra line spacing, 35.4E for Petite Braille, and 35.5E for Petite with interlining/interpoint. Save the setting change and exit the menu with 1.1E. Remember to adjust line width and lines per page in your translator--California and Jumbo are bigger, of course, while Petite is smaller. For more details on using DBS (including changing sizes within a document) e-mail us here and ask for a quick summary.
All new Romeo 25, Romeo Pro 50, Thomas, ET, Juliet Classic, Juliet PRO, Juliet PRO 60, BookMaker, and Braille Express embossers have a high-resolution graphics mode, which improves Braille images by squeezing the dots a little closer together. On embossers with this feature, change just one character in any of your existing graphic files to activate high resolution. Type a "6" over the "1" in the ESCAPE 1 line at the very top of your graphics file. When you emboss the graphic, you'll see the difference immediately.
You made the Braille graphics file the way you always do, but once you emboss it, there are huge gaps between the dots. To tighten it up, you need to turn on a setting called "Escape Sequences On" in the menu you're using by changing parameter 23 to 23.1E. Reset and try again. You should see miraculous shrinkage.
Luckily, Duxbury Systems makes a Macintosh version of DBT. You'll also need a Mac serial cable (available from us). Install your DBT for Mac software, connect the printer port on the Mac to the embosser with the serial cable, and set the embosser so that Menu #2 is the default. Then open your DBT for Mac software and tell Duxbury the embosser is connected to the printer port.
Your DBT for Mac software must be version 10.2f or higher. You'll also need a Belkin Macintosh USB-to-serial adapter (Belkin #F5U103-MAC ), available online at www.belkin.com or at a local computer store and a four-way serial cable, available from us. Plug the adapter into one of your Mac's open USB ports and install the software that came with the Belkin adapter on your iMac's hard drive, so the iMac knows that the port is active.
Then connect the serial cable we sent on the "out" side of the USB adapter. (It will be obvious which one is which: The connectors are all different). Finally, plug one of the other ends of the Mac serial cable into the embosser's serial port and turn on the embosser. Depending on which embosser you have, you may have a small--9 pin--or a large--25-pin serial port. On the embosser keypad, choose Menu #2, and set it as the default. (That's OL, 0.2E, 1.0E, 1.1E)
Open your DBT on your iMac software and make sure you choose to emboss from the port where the adapter is installed.
These steps are also shown in our downloadable PDF cheatsheet on iMac/USB connections.
Getting a strange message about a "PICS rule file" when you try to open one of the manual files on disk? You must have a recent release of Microsoft's Internet Explorer!
Unfortunately, Microsoft recently chose PRF as a file extension for a new file type of their own. In the Braille field for at least 15 years, Duxbury System's Braille translation software has been using the PRF suffix to mean "print formatted" files. PRFs (to us) are simply plain text files with the original print margins and page numbers still in the file.
Duxbury's PRF has been a very handy format for distributing manuals because virtually ANY computer can read it, even a 10-year-old 286--no upgrades required. Since we ship embossers all over the world, this flexibility was very important to us. These manuals were literally designed to "spill" down a plain computer screen without software and still be readable--or dumped from a DOS prompt to any printer.
However, times change, and we bow to Microsoft might. As the manuals are revised, we'll change the ".PRF" to ".TXT" to make sure they work correctly on new systems. In the meantime, you can do the same: Just rename README.PRF to README.TXT and REFMAN.PRF to REFMAN.TXT. REFMAN.BRF should be OK, because that is a Braille file extension no one else (so far) has expropriated for another function.
.PRF and .TXT open your file in your favorite text file reader or word processor. For best results in full featured word processors like Word or WordPerfect, roll the document margins in Page Setup or Format back to zero, as the white space comprising the "margins" is already inside the file. (You'll see what we mean if the page layouts seem even goofier than usual when you first open the file). The good news is, you can use the power features of your word processor or text file reader, such as the "Find" command, to locate information quickly.
You can't get the front and back of the interpoint to line up OR you get an error tone when you try to enter a right margin number on the keypad OR you can't get the Braille to start far enough to the right to bind the copies.
Count the number of characters in your widest translated line (look in your translator) and when you enter the margin coordinates, subtract one.
Example: You have wide Braille paper and have translated your document to be 40 characters wide. Your margin settings on the embosser should be 1 and 40--not 41--because the 40 characters include the last cell on the line.
If you have narrow Braille paper and have translated your document to a 30-character line, therefore, your embosser margin settings should be 1 and 30 for best results.
Romeo, Thomas, Marathon, ET & Juliet PRO 60 have a 40-character maximum line width. As a result, entering (for example) 14.42E will produce an error tone. Choose a right margin value of 40 or less.
On 40-character-line machines, you can gain a character or two just by positioning the paper a little further to the left. Just be sure not to move it far enough to cause the paper to drag as it travels into the embosser, or paper jams will definitely result. Of course, you could always translate your documents a few characters less per line if increased binding width is extremely important--say, 38 characters per line for standard paper. Then set your 40 character embosser for 15.03E and 14.40E and position the paper so the end of the line is as close as feasible to the right edge.
On wider machines, you have more latitude. The maximum possible characters per line on a classic Juliet or Juliet PRO are actually 56--but this would run completely off the right edge of standard paper. (To get that full 56 character line, you need 15-inch-wide paper.)
Still, you can tweak the binding margin much more easily when you can use settings like 15.03E and 14.42E without incurring the dreaded error tone. These settings will work on BookMaker and Braille Express machines, too, because they have a 44-character line.
Need to convert MegaDots files to Duxbury? Save them before they leave Megadots as either ICADD or HTML, then open them in Duxbury. Veteran transcriptionists report excellent success retaining formatting with this method.
The ET, Juliet Pro 60, Juliet Classic, Juliet Pro, BookMaker, Braille Express 100 and Braille Express 150 think about text in two-page increments. If your last page happens to be an odd-numbered one, your embosser is waiting patiently for the "back" of the page--the even-numbered part.
Hit OL, then FF to finish your document (you'll get an embossed front page with a blank back page).
Avoid this problem in the future by setting your translator for an interpoint embosser. You'll automatically get "double" page break characters when your document ends on an odd-numbered page.
Since you can't make lots of Braille handouts on the office photocopier, this is the next best thing--all our embossers can make multiple copies automatically with a few keystrokes.
--Proof your file and run a test copy to check layout, page breaks, etc. Then make any necessary changes to the menu you'll be using.
--Remember that documents that will be produced on an interpoint embosser need to either (1) end on an even-numbered page or (2) have two page-break characters at the end of the file. You don't want page 93 backed with page 1 of the next copy!
--Next, go on-line,stay there and enter 3.0E on embosser's keypad.
--Go back to your computer and copy your file to the embosser, using whatever software or copy commands you've successfully used for the test copy.
--Back at the embosser's keypad, enter 3.1E, which tells the the embosser the file is completely copied. Next (still on the embosser's keypad) enter 4.NNE ("NN" is how many copies you want and can be any number from 1 to 99). The copies will start pouring forth--so make sure that paper path is clear.
Multi-Copy can do a lot more, like pause for another job and resume, and the commands for that are in your manual. But this brief summary can get you started.
There's nothing more important to the smooth operation of your embosser.
Remember to allow enough room behind the embosser for outgoing paper to exit the machine and stack neatly. Paper that does not pass smoothly under the paper guide in, through, and out of the embosser can cause it to jam and even overheat in extreme cases--not to mention wasting your time and your entire paper supply!
So when you first load, reposition, or change paper brands or types, please take just a moment to confirm that the first few sheets are passing smoothly under the paper guide, then in, through, and out of the machine to a spot with sufficient stacking space at the rear.
For some reason, the paper is not blocking light from entering the paper-out sensor, causing the embosser to think you're still out of paper. Try moving the leftmost paper edge in small increments to the left, especially if you just loaded a new box of pre-punched paper. The spot you want is where the "solid" part of the paper blocks the sensor, silencing the paper-out tone, yet leaving you sufficient binding margin on the left.
Our embossers have parallel and serial ports but by using an adapter from Belkin or from us, you can easily connect your computer's USB port to the parallel port. (Serial, too, for that matter, but the parallel adapter is more common and easy to locate.) See how to do this with our PDF cheatsheet on how to use these adapters.
You probably already have them--or rather, it. Formatted Braille files are extremely simple compared to the graphical complexity you may be accustomed to with print printers, so the Generic Text Printer driver on your Windows installation disk can support all our embossers!
Install and select the "Generic/Text Printer" driver which comes free on your original installation disks for Win 3.11, Win 95, and Win 98.
Need an even quicker emergency fix? Just go to the DOS prompt and COPY your translated Braille files to the port where the embosser is connected, like this example:
c:\copy testfile.brf lpt1:
Thank you for your patience while we expand this page. Have a suggestion or a question? Please let us know your location and embosser serial number whenever you contact us about your equipment. We make it easy because you can contact us here.