Duxbury Systems -- Duxbury Newsletter #20
"Professional Braille Production Products Since 1975"
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Duxbury Systems, Inc.
435 King Street, P.O. Box 1504
Littleton, MA 01460 U.S.A.
Tel. (508) 486-9766
Fax. (508) 486-9712
BBS: (617) 767-5964
Internet: duxbury@world.std.com
AppleLink: DUXBURY
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August 1994
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Whither the Dollar Codes?
by Joe Sullivan

As we wrap up our work on the long-awaited new version of the Translator,
the most frequently heard questions are: "Can I still use dollarcodes?"
and "What happens to my old files?".

Partly by way of reassurance, and partly to fulfill an old promise, I have
written a document entitled "Duxbury Dollar Codes and Style Guide." It
incorporates the older documents that describe the dollar codes in detail,
and goes beyond that to tell you how to use the codes to produce certain
formats. It takes the "text element" approach to the latter, and points
out how even users of our older versions can use styles to organize their
work. The Guide is free to registered users of the Translator. It can be
downloaded from the BBS or mailed on a 3-1/2 inch, high density, DOS
formatted disk. As a WordPerfect 5 .1 or 6.0 file, it can be printed by
WordPerfect itself, or brailled with the Translator. We may soon, for a
charge, make the document available in hard copy print or braille.

As you can imagine, I would not have gone through the trouble of writing
the Guide if we were planning to phase out the dollar codes. On the
contrary, we will expand upon the codes, and add a style library to make
it easy to apply them. The concept is essentially identical to
WordPerfect's, which is why you'll be able to nest styles, combine styles
with direct dollar codes, and choose between coded and WYSIWYG views.

All of the dollar codes from the older Translator, save one, are available
in the new version. The lone exception is the $pi command, which imports
braille graphic files. This means that all of your old dollarcoded files
(excluding those rare files with embedded graphics) will import cleanly
into the new system. We may reintroduce the $pi command in a later
release, but first we would like to consider alternative ways to deal with
braille graphics. For now, if you need $pi, we suggest keeping an old
version of the Translator on your computer.
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A Duxbury On-Ramp
by Don Breda

Sorry, I couldn't resist the title. Don't worry, the superhighway theme
exits here.

Our Bulletin Board System (BBS), described in Newsletter 18, is busy. Our
Internet mailbox is even busier. Meanwhile, regulations have eased up on
the Internet to the point where it's now okay to use it for certain
commercial purposes. Accordingly, we have set up a "Duxbury User's Group
Forum" on the Internet.

This forum, dubbed "Duxuser," is a mailing list that anyone with access to
the Internet can join. If you use CompuServe or another on-line service,
chances are you can access the Internet. For more information about the
list, including how to join or leave the list, simply send a message
containing the single line:

         info duxuser

to the Internet address:

         majordomo@world.std.com

The forum will serve many user-oriented purposes, one of which is to post
notices of all updates, including minor releases, to the electronic
mailboxes of everyone on the list. This will eliminate any need to keep
making long-distance calls to our BBS just to see if there's anything new.
We will also post this Newsletter to help us save some postage, and maybe
a tree or two. Finally, we'll encourage users to share their "Duxbury
experiences" with each other, including general-interest solutions to
problems. Please note that this forum is not designed for technical
support; the established telephone, fax and electronic mailbox
<duxbury@world.std.com> are available for this purpose.

Eventually, it may be possible to obtain product updates through the
duxuser facility. However, the GET command listed for Majordomo (the
software that manages the list) is not yet enabled. For now, the BBS
remains the best mechanism for downloading software. We're eagerly waiting
for Majordomo's GET command, and we will inform all duxusers when it's
available!
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Progress on the New Duxbury Translator
by Peter Sullivan

Rhetoric: "Real progress doesn't always come easily, or quickly."
Interpreted rhetoric: "I'm sorry to report to you that the release dates
announced in Newsletter 19 are being pushed back by a few months." The DOS
upgrade is now scheduled for a September release. Matt is working on a new
product catalog with product details and system requirements. You will
know the new version is ready when you receive a copy of the new catalog.

We're frequently asked about special pricing for the new DOS Translator for
those who have other DOS based Duxbury products. We are offering generous
tradeup prices. If you are a registered user of Edgar or DUXWP, please
give us a call for a quote.
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Contracted News
by Matt Sullivan

** On Wednesday, July 6, at the NFB convention in Detroit, Joe Sullivan was
honored with the "1994 Golden Keys Award" by the National Association to
Promote the Use of Braille (NAPUB). Congratulations dad, and thank you
Betty Nicely, president of NAPUB, for stating so eloquently, what his
children have been thinking right along.

** Edgar's price has been reduced to $195. Edgar is perfect for the
transcriber who does not need a translator. Ask us for a demo disk.

** Attention Mac Users: Virtually all embossers with a serial port will
work with our Mac Translator if you have the right cable; that is, a "Mac
to Imagewriter I" cable. Though it looks identical, a modem cable will not
work. The Imagewriter cable is available from most Apple dealers and
should cost around $10.

** We recently learned that a customer built a Duxbury add-on named
"Bridgin" to select and remove contractions from BRF files. This may come
in handy, especially in teaching braille. The product is available from
Marie Knowlton. You can reach her at 612-624-1859.

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