Before I paste this article, I held this article until some fixes were out which 2.275 fixed.
Since I failed the course, the information here may help transcribe a book, but is in no way deemed correct by standards. My understanding of transcribing a book was good, but I just had too many mistakes. With that said, let’s talk about how you might transcribe a book using percent codes for the majority of the work.
Transcribing books, it doesn’t have to be difficult with Braille2000
percent codes, and B2K itself make it very easy for a blind person
Welcome to another article here on the blog, where this article will talk about transcribing a book using Braille2000 and the percent codes.
You can, of course, use Braille2000 to do all the work within it by changing the style, spacing, and the like, but why do that? The only thing you need to do is the special symbols page in B2K as it is very simple to do and you can remove symbols based on the reading level of the student. For example, if they were brand new, maybe leaving all the symbols would be helpful to the reader, where adults need the minimum discussed in assignment 19.
Remember, assignment 19 is not complete. I may still have things to fix, and I’m not going to give the entire transcription of the assignment either. Rather, I’ll give you portions, and talk about codes as necessary.
The Title Page
The Braille title page is quite interesting in its development. Braille2000 has a code called page fill which will fill the page with the content. In another example I saw, preserving blank lines was used instead of spacing commands like I did. No matter the method you choose, you should always check to make sure it did what you wanted.
For the title page, the assignment mentions the 5 different parts of the page, and how it needs to be done. Sample title pages are given based on different criteria but the concept should be learned. I found that doing the title page took some work, as the simulated print gave a bunch of information about the book that is to be transcribed in part and the student needs to take the concepts learned and put it in to a proper title page.
I had the concept down, but questions arose because I am not affiliated with an organization and it said that it needed to be a certain way. I’m not giving any answers, and again, I’m not even graded, but I hope that the info given may be of value.
What does it look like?
Let’s take the concept of the title page and put it in to practice. The following is the way I decided to do the title page for this assignment.
%pagef %bn=t1
%list
THE HOUSE
The History of the House of Representatives
%space
Robert V. Remini
%space
Published by Smithsonian Books in association with HarperCollins Publishers.
New York, NY
Copyright © 2006 Robert V. Remini and the Library of Congress.
Further reproduction or distribution in other than a specialized format is prohibited.
Transcription of:
ISBN-10: 0-06-088434-7
ISBN-13: 978-06-088434-5
%space
Transcribed 2020 into Unified English Braille by Jared Rimer
Woodland Hills, CA
%space
In 16 volumes
Volume 1
Braille pages t1-t2, p1-p8, and 1-13
Print pages i-vi and 1-b5
Some of the information you will need like the number of print and braille pages may be unknown. When I first created the title page, I created it this way.
%pagef %bn=t1
%list
THE HOUSE
The History of the House of Representatives
%space
Robert V. Remini
%space
Published by Smithsonian Books in association with HarperCollins Publishers.
New York, NY
Copyright © 2006 Robert V. Remini and the Library of Congress.
Further reproduction or distribution in other than a specialized format is prohibited.
Transcription of:
ISBN-10: 0-06-088434-7
ISBN-13: 978-06-088434-5
%space
Transcribed 2020 into Unified English Braille by Jared Rimer
Woodland Hills, CA
%space
In 16 volumes
Volume 1
Braille pages t1-x, p1-x, and 1-x
Print pages i-vi and 1-5
I may not remember exactly how I did it, but this sample will illustrate what it may be done like if you were to do it. Note also that I used the list percent code, as it needs to be in 1-3 format or first list format. I also learned from Bob that I can put multiple percent codes on a line, but when I did it, I had the percent codes on each line. Some codes like %space I would put on one line, but others seem to be OK.
You’re welcome to play around with these types of examples and see what works for you, each person is going to be different. Remember, if you used preserve blank lines (pbl) you can press enter for your blank line and enter again to type and your line will be kept. After the title page, turn off PBL with pbl=off so that you can have your formatting preserved. In the RTF, I pressed enter when typing so that I had a blank line so I can find paragraphs easier when proofing. Remember that you can also format your file based on structure, but as a blind person, I find percent codes much easier like the above for the title page.
Special Symbols Page and Transcribers Notes
Some transcriptions need a special symbols page and a Transcribers Notes page. This assignment does not have a transcribers notes page, but has a special symbols page. In RTF, the Special Symbols page was created by putting a mark in place on a page so that the page was in place. I simply typed that this is a mark for special symbols. Remember! You want to remove that text before inserting the special symbols at the end of your project. If you were to do the transcribers notes, insert a page for that, and you can even fill that in using RTF if you know what you’re going to do. For example, if the transcription removes photos, it needs to be put on the transcribers notes page. More information is available in lesson 19 about formatting the transcribers notations page, so I won’t cover it here except to say you can put a page in place for that.
On the special symbols page, I also set the running head for the book for this assignment. This is important, because then you don’t have to worry about that later.
What does this look like?
Below, I set the running header for the book, and put my place marker in place for the Special Symbols list to be done in B2K at the end of all of the proofing.
%page
%runhead
THE HOUSE
%space
This page will be reserved for the special symbols page.
%page
%page tells B2K to creat a new page. %runhead on a line of its own is very important. The following paragraph is used for the header, so if I wanted the running head to say The History of the House of Representatives, I’d have to put that on its own line. You can learn more about setting a running head and appropriate measures to take in assignments 17-18 of the Transcription Course. The %page at the end of my text is used to tell B2K to move on to the next page. Because I didn’t put any page number indication, it assumes T2. If I needed a Transcribers Notations page, the %page would have it go to t3.
Changing Pages
In this portion of the book, we already established the new page, but we switch from Transcribers pages to Preliminary pages. We also establish print page numbers. This is simple to do in Braille2000 using percent codes in this portion, because the next section is more books by the Author.
%h4> How is this done?
%hr>
%pn=i-ii
%bn=p1
%hr>
That’s it! I set the print page number for the roman numeral pages and the preliminary page numbers. That is as simple as it goes. Until its changed again, this format will stay in place.
Dedication page
The dedication page is simple. You can put it in paragraph or list, and I chose to do this in paragraph.
What does it look like?
There are two aspects to this portion. First I need to tell Braille2000 to move to the next page, then set the next page.
%page
%np
%space
%indent
For my children: Elizabeth, Joan and Bob
I use %indent here, but you could use %3-1 to do the same thing. %space told B2K to leave the necessary blank line between the running head and the paragraph.
Table of Contents
This is the fun part of B2K because this whole thing can be automated. Because the lesson requires this very lengthy table of contents to be done in 16 volumes, even though you’re essentially transcribing only 5 pages of the entire book, I really had fun learning the intricacies of doing this. If you were wanting to type this out, its easy to do.
First of all, we have another print page, because there is a page change roman numeral 7 within the table of contents, and the rules indicate that all back pages should be accounted for even though they don’t appear in print. That is OK, we did the print page setup before, so I just set the new page set instead of %np as shown above.
What does this look like?
Let’s show you the print page change before we talk more about the contents itself.
%page
%pn=iv-v
This code indicates that we’re skipping roman 4 and going to 5, and the next sequence I.E. a5 will be used when it changes pages automatically. We didn’t change braille page numbers, so whatever preliminary page we’re on will continue.
The Table of Contents
This is the exciting part. There is a code you need to set called table of contents otherwise known as TOC for short. After that, you need to use the tab key to discern the text from the page numbers. Whether you space the last word or you just tab, it should be fine. As long as the Table of Contents tag is there you’ll be set. Braille2000 can be used to do this by doing some other settings, but as long as you check your work afterword to make sure you have what you need set correctly, you’ll be fine.
Make sure you review the rules on Table of Contents pages, as it stipulates you need to use listing format based on the headings of the book. Heading 1 is 1-3, heading 2 3-5, etc. The way I’ve learned how to do this is the %list tag which is shown above for the title page.
For illustration purposes, we’re only going to give you the first volume. Remember, you can use the center tag where appropriate for volume numbers and the like, and I would assume that PBL would be useful as there are spots where blank lines are necessary. Look at assignment 19 for complete details.
What does this look like?
%toc
%list
%center %tnl Volume 1 %tnr
Prologue 1
%space
1. Inaugurating a New Government, March-April 1789 9
2. The First Session of the 1st Congress, March-September 1789 24
New rules introduced recently indicate that transcribers notes (%tnl %tnr) need to be in place for volume numbers since it is text not in the print copy. Honestly, I’d rather have it the old way, its more cells and is completely unnecessary! Be that as it may, I’m learning this for the first time, and so to pass, I must include these. In the print, there is a tab between the prologue and page 1, the first chapter and page 9, and the final chapter of the volume set on page 24.
Let us show you what volume 16 looks like as this is very important to do at this point. Because the table of contents rules indicate that if you have a page number on the right side, it could be confused with the braille number, so B2K will move things down automatically. There are other things I’ve learned that are necessary too, but I’m not going to give you everything, just the understanding that this is capable of being done. Let’s show you volume 16 as I understand it.
%center %tnl Volume 16 %tnr
Index 593
%toc=off
Notice the %toc=off command? It should be used to indicate that you’re not dealing with table of contents entries in cases where you may press the tab key and type a number which is part of the regular text. This completes the preliminary pages, lets move on!
Text pages
The text pages are pretty simple. There are codes for indention like %indent and if lists come up like %list to tell Braille2000 how to handle certain things. Things like bullets, font attributes, and the like are handled with the processing of the file, but you can use %center for centering or %head for a heading. If subheadings are used, use %subhead for a cell-5 or %subhead7 for a cell 7. These are level 2 or 3 headings. While these are the typical, there are times to do other specific like %7-7 when doing attributes for example.
%pager
Remember that we had set a running head for all these pages? %pager suppresses the running head and it appears on the next braille page. We also need to change page numbering altogether, as numeric page numbers are used throughout the book.
%h5> How is this done?
This is done with several codes. First, we set the new page with no running head, then the page numbering as shown below.
%pager
%pn=1
%bn=1
I then decided to use a heading for the Prologue which runs for many pages but we are only transcribing the first 5 pages of print. We also by rule, need to rewrite the title of the book as required for the first page of any volume of braille.
%center THE HOUSE
The History of the House of Representatives
%head
Prologue
%indent
The indent tag is basically telling B2K that I want indented paragraphs. From now on, I hit two returns, and it has the knowledge unless otherwise stated, this is normal braille paragraphs.
The United States House of Representatives is regarded by many as the finest deliberative body in human history. A grand conceit, to be sure. But one that is not far from the mark. It is an extraordinary instrument for legislating the will of the American people. Through an electoral process it regularly absorbs fresh blood and fresh ideas so that it can reflect popular needs and demands. Every one of its members from 1789 to the present–over ten thousand individuals!–has been elected. Not one has been appointed. It has been said many times that the United States House of Representatives is the “people’s House,” and as such it has endured for more than two centuries.
Any history of this institution should begin with a reminder that many of the traditions and practices of the American system of government originated in Great Britain, a country ruled by a monarch and a two-house Parliament: the House of Lords and the House of Commons. As England expanded its empire into the New World in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and colonies of transplanted settlers were established, the king, or corporate or individual entrepreneurs who subsidized the colonization, appointed governors to represent their will and execute their instructions. To assist them in their responsibilities, these governors chose advisory councils of distinguished residents and over time allowed them to offer suggestions by which the colonies could be administered.
As you can see, if I put those paragraphsin place, it would both be indented based on the above tag. Since we have a page turn within the text, in several places, we can easily add the next page code (%np) anywhere I want a new page. If its in the middle of a paragraph, I can put it right in the text, and if needed, a separator line for the page is put in place. If not, it puts it in the appropriate place without you having to count pages. Where the page change happened to start a new paragraph, I put the tag on a line of its own.
More particularly, in 1619, the stockholders of the company that maintained settlers in what was the colony of Virginia in North America %np ordered the governor to summon two landowning representatives from each of the small settlements in the colony to meet in Jamestown. These representatives were told to provide advice only. Twenty-two men gathered in a tiny church and forthwith ignored the company’s instructions and enacted a series of laws for the colony against gambling, drunkenness, idleness and the breaking of the Sabbath. The House of Burgesses, as it came to be called, then adjourned. But, by its action, this house gave notice that it was prepared to go its own way and assume authority to legislate on matters that it regarded as beneficial for the community. It demonstrated a degree of independence that would be repeated many times in the future by other colonial legislative bodies. When, in 1639, the king instructed the Virginia governor to summon the Burgesses together each year, he was simply acknowledging what had been going on for quite some time. Nonetheless, final authority in the colony still rested with the governor and his council of prominent planters.
In that paragraph, you see that we have the %np right after a word, and we just kept on writing.
… funded and governed by a proprietor or by stockholders in a company, but ultimately most of them evolved into colonies under royal control with a governor and one or two houses of appointed and elected officials. Legislative assemblies, representing the people, became an integral part of the governmental operation.
%np
As the number of immigrants to the New World increased and the frontier moved steadily westward, the colonists became increasingly detached from the Mother Country. Far from England, they lacked regular direction from a ruling body in London, and they needed laws by which they could thrive in a hostile environment–where Native Americans regularly thwarted their efforts to obtain additional land. Thus, the settlers relied on their local assemblies to address their concerns. The colonies had no real representation …
In this subtext, I took a portion of a prior paragraph, and the beginning of the next paragraph with its page change. I didn’t complete the paragraph, but you can see how easy it is with these examples that it can be pretty easy to do your own book There are plenty of codes to help you, and we’re always available to answer any questions about this, or any other aspects of Braille2000 as it can be very complex at first glance.