Allow more than just letters

[willwade]

We need to teach people how to use a TandemMaster or other morse->Keyboard solutions. With these - you can have more than just letters/numbers in morse. You can use all the keys of the computer and even mouse commands. So we need a way for a client to adapt and extend the morse set they are learning.

e.g.

right arrow (--..-.) left arrow (..-.----) enter (.-.-) AA space (-..-.) escape (---.) backspace (----) full stop (.-.-.-) AAA

Then more application specific shortcuts for things like this for Dolphin Guide: F2 (Actions menu in Guide) (--..---) F5 (Read All) (--.....) Ctrl (pause / resume reading)

This means we need to :

• Add in a way of editing or importing a morse-character set that extends the built-in letters (or overwrites existing ones)
• Add these and use local storage to remember the list and location of where you are up to

[willwade]

Some questions

• In the top we do A -Z. It looks neat. If we have "Right, Left etc.." it looks cluttered. Do we use icons e.g. right arrow
• What about verbal mnemoics? My guess is that we load them if they have been created - but if not we just do the morse sound "Dah dah dit dit dit"
• What order should this list be in? In the normal alpha list the shortest sequence is first. In this we need to double check heirarchy. So space strikes me as important (you need that to spell a word) - but I can see enter being high up. Arrow keys for command functions. Any particular order?
• A suggestion is we do a different learning set for these different programs. Which makes sense. So we can have a dolphin guide set - or a Sentence building set - or a Numbers set. Make sense? any others?

[michaelritson]

Some first thoughts

• As the description of the arrow keys take up the most space - maybe the 'inverted T' shape arrow key icons with the relevant one reversed out could work? Would also reinforce for an observer the 'move forward' / 'move backwards' meaning in the context of non-sighted keyboard navigation as the icon would only be for the benefit of someone who could see it.
• Think it would be more useful for a sighted person supporting a Morse learner with VI to have a visual representation of the dits and dahs - could the text be 'underlined' with them?
• Verbal Mnemonics; as any user reaching the stage of needing different key functions will presumably have a solid grasp of Morse letters and numbers, if the morse code for a key is a compound of known letters and numbers - just verbalise those letters / numbers? For example - 'Esc' in the TandemMaster2 config uses ---. so the code could be verbalised as 'O E'. Keep the Morse sound though!
• As to the hierarchy, initial thoughts are basic navigation initially (right arrow, enter, left arrow, escape) will give a user 'forward', 'go', 'back' and 'exit' functionality. Then 'space', 'backspace', 'full stop / period' next, followed by 'comma', '?' and '!'. Other functions will then follow - function keys / Ctrl / Tab etc - does this make sense? One thing worth considering is the more limited usefulness of the 'delete' key for a non-sighted user compared to 'backspace' until they become very proficient at text navigating and editing (based on previous experience teaching students with VI, as the 'spoken delete' function of most accessible software can make more sense when deleting from right to left)
• Great idea on the different learning sets - could also pair up each specific learning set with program / app specific shortcut key bindings for the TandemMaster etc as a package?

[willwade]

Thanks @michaelritson

So initial sets

• alphabet (the current set)
• numbers
• Dolphin Guide (your list above )
• GBoard morse (space, enter, backspace, and I think word prediction 1,2,3 etc. But note this is really only for sighted users)

We should pull together these sets for this idea.

So great point that for some commands it may be a macro/abbreviation. I totally haven’t thought about that so in these sets I guess we may have the option for a mp3 or a way of referencing letter combinations. Eg mnemonics : O,E

Re: underlining letters. We shouldn’t need to do this because we can create visuals for these codes. If you turn on the images you’d then see the codes. Think that’s the easy answer to that.