@raymaccarthy It's not usually easy to learn braille for an adult, and getting braille printed books is complicated (they take up considerably more space). Braille displays are devices which plug into computers and can produce a line or two of braille on demand, dynamically. the problem is they're very expensive for complicated reasons involving scale of manufacture.
I hope the best for your friend; whether braille ends up being a part of it or not.
@modulux
Yes, I know what a Braille display is. I considered designing one in 1990s based on dotmatrix print head ideas.
I assume, maybe wrongly, that a embossed label maker like a Dymo, exists, using wider tape, to print Braille labels by hand. Maybe there are computer based ones too.
It's increasingly hard to learn new alphabets, Morse code and languages as you get older. So I'd assumed this was true of Braille.
He has macular degeneration & got him a video camera some years ago. No use.
@raymaccarthy Right, there are braille dymo printers, I've never heard of computer-based ones, but manual ones, sure. The tape is thicker and wider and the printer is bigger.
And yes, with braille it's not just the normal mental plasticity issues of learning a new script, but also the sensorial issues of learning to read with a sense you haven't used for that before; and for some people even being able to tell the dots apart can be a challenge.
@modulux
Hacking a manual one to work off a PC wouldn't be hard. Geared stepper motor to turn dial (if it's like a dymo), solenoid to punch and a sensor for one position (such as cut).
No driver needed. Emulate USB serial with €5 PIC micro.
Or make from scratch. You only need one column of punches and advance tape small amount in character and several times for character space.
Is it really only 2 columns and 3 rows? I guess once it was invented only the tiniest changes were possible.
@raymaccarthy In general yes, 2 columns, 3 rows, 6 dots altogether. Though there's computer braille which has 8 dots (2 columns, 4 rows). Most characters are the same but the lowest row is typically used for special characters and such.
