At 09:20 AM 4/26/2003 -0400, Buddy Brannan wrote: >I'll dig up a couple Once I discovered it's "PAC Mate" and not Packmate I learned a lot more than I wanted to know about the unit. Anyway it's original issue price of $2595 (+over $100 for a modem) although it strikes one as pricey, probably isn't at all out of line considering the "nicheness" of the market and the aggravation of having had to reverse engineer a bunch of M$ stuff. Of course one could make an embedded system using some of the currently available machinery and either undertaking (scratch or retrofit) would be a lot more major than anyone going into it would care to admit to. Since I think that this would be a good idea I'll try to get something started. Politically, I think I will start from a point of view that this is a project for the future and will opt for a one hand chording keyboard instead of a two hand braille approach. The learning curve to become proficient with such a device is more like a month than a year and then it can fit in a pocket and potentially have tactile feedback as well. It could also dramatically widen the market for true miniaturization because the size bottlenecks of QWERTY keyboard (you can shrink the keys but not the fingers!) and visual display (although retinal projection will become tiny shortly) are addressed by a seven-button chording input and tactile output. I'll report back in a couple months on my feasibility study about getting the project started - I already know it can be done and firmly believe that Linux is the way to go. If that sounds like too slow I apologize, but that's how things work - get backing, get tech support, get hardware, build it and they will come. -- Love. It's Bad Luck to be Superstitious!
