International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Issue 12, December 2015)

Text to Braille Converter Anusha Chacko1, Jipsa P Devasia2, Reshma Clement3 1,2,3

Vimal Jyothi Engineering College, Kannur, Kerala As per the output of ADC values of the flex sensor; the connected six servo motor shows its variations as the output .

Abstract- Visually impaired people face difficulties in interacting and gaining full advantage of computers. Recently, and with the fast evolution in technology, researchers proposed to give the blinds the ability to take advantage of these advancements. Accordingly, designers and engineers started working on projects that relate input and output devices to the computers in order for the blind individual to have full control of the hi-tech machines. However, investments in these kinds of hardware presented complexity in the design, in addition to the high cost imposed by the devices used. The project’s objective is to design and develop a Braille System. Output Device for the visually impaired individuals that enable them to interact and communicate.

II. WHAT IS BRAILLE? Braille is a means of reading and writing for blind people. It was devised by Louis Braille in 1821 and consists of raised dots arranged in "cells." A cell is made up of six dots that fit under the fingertips, arranged in two columns of three dots each. Each cell represents a letter, a word, a combination of letters, a numeral or a punctuation mark. In Braille, an alphabet is made up by a combination of six dots. Each character in Braille consists of one or more (to a maximum of six) raised dots. The position of the different dots represents the different letters of the alphabet.

Keywords- Braille Converter, Braille System Code, Braille Cell

I. INTRODUCTION Braille is the language used by the blind to interact and communicate. It is a system of writing that uses patterns of raised dots to inscribe characters on paper. It therefore allows visually – impaired people to read and write using touch instead of vision. All over the world, persons who are visually impaired have used Braille as the primary means of accessing information. This paper aims to develop a low cost gesture controlled device for the blind. The need for devices for aiding the physically challenged has been on demand. A text to Braille converter is intended to aid the blind to interact with others at workplaces and homes. Facilities for the sightless have been organized in different places for providing reading facilities to the blind in the form of Braille coded texts. However, such centers suffer from a number of practical difficulties such as severely constrained economic resource. Here we can implement this idea by the use of an embedded based system on PIC 16F877A micro controller which is the main part of the system. We make use of Flex sensors. . Flex sensors are sensors that changes resistance depending on the amount of bend on the sensor. They convert the change in bent to electrical resistance. The more the bend, more the resistance value. There are transmitter as well as receiver section. In the transmitter side flex sensor output signal is fed to the controller. From controller section this corresponding value is fed to the input of servo motor by microcontroller.

The first ten letters of the alphabet are formed using the top four dots (1, 2, 4, 5). Adding a dot 3 makes the next ten letters, and adding a dot 6 to that makes the last six letters (except "w" because it was not used very much in the French language) III. BRAILLE REPRESENTATIONS

Fig. 1Braille Alphabet

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Issue 12, December 2015) V. OVERVIEW This block diagram contains the blocks: 1) Microcontroller PIC16F877A 2) Flex Sensor 3) Servo Motor 4) 16x2 Line Display 5) Power Supply A. Microcontroller PIC16F877A: Microcontroller is its CPU. The PIC 16F877A is a lowpower, high performance CMOS 8-bit microcomputer with 8K words of Flash Programmable and Erasable Read Only Memory (PEROM). This is a software controlled system, and it makes use of an 8 bit microcontroller PIC16F877A, is a 40 pin IC having 5 I/O ports (33 I/O pins). It has 14 interrupts, 8 A/D input channel, USART with 9 bit address detection, 8K x14 words Flash Program Memory, 368 x 8 bytes of Data Memory (RAM), and 256 x 8 bytes of EEPROM Data Memory.

Fig.2 Braille Numbers

Fig.3 Braille Punctuations

Six dot Braille can only produce 63 different Braille cells. In 6 dot Braille an unused Braille cell or a blank Braille cell is used as a space. Some 6 dot Braille cells have numerous meanings. Numbers, capital letters, and many symbols require more than one cell to produce 6 dot Braille data. There are four Braille codes currently used in the United States. The four U.S. Braille codes are the Literary Braille Code, the Nemeth Braille Code, Computer Braille Code (CBC), and the Music Braille Code. There are differences in the Braille codes used in various Englishspeaking countries, which prevent the exchange of Braille materials. Other Braille codes are presently under development, some which require the use of 8 dots or other raised symbols.

B. LCD Display: LCD display unit helps user to manage operation very easily. It is a 16X2 lines alpha numeric display unit displays all events which lead this as menu driven operation.

IV. BLOCK DIAGRAM

Fig. 5 LCD

C. Flex Sensor Flex sensor is simply a resistor which its resistance depending on bend radius. Features: - Angle Displacement Measurement Possible Uses  Robotics   Gaming (Virtual Motion)   Medical Devices   Computer Peripherals   Musical Instruments  Fig.4 Block Diagram

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Issue 12, December 2015)  

Physical Therapy  Simple Construction 

Fig.8 Servo Motor

Fig.6 Flex Sensor

Fig. 7 Working of Flex Sensor

D. Servo Motor Servo Motor uses error sensing negative feedback to control the precise angular position. Servos are used for precise positioning in robotic arms, legs, RC Aero planes, Helicopters etc. Please read the article Servo Motor for more information about its working and construction. Hobby Servo Motors have three wires, two of them (RED and BLACK) are used to given power and the third one is used to give control signals. Servo can be easily being controlled using microcontrollers using Pulse Width Modulated (PWM) signals on the control wire. Here we are using a servo whose angular rotation is limited to 0 – 180°. We can control the exact angular position by using a pulse, whose width varying from 1 millisecond to 2 millisecond on the control wire.

Fig.9 Working of Servo Motor

E. Power Supply The power supply is the most indispensable part of any project. IC regulators are versatile and relatively inexpensive and are available with features such as current/voltage boosting, internal short circuit current limiting, thermal shutdown and floating operation for high voltage applications. The regulated circuit is used to maintain constant output level. The integrated circuit regulator, sometimes called the three terminal regulators contains the circuitry for reference source error amplitude control device and overload protection all in a single IC chip. The regulator IC used here is L7805. It provides regulated 5V to the controller. Its maximum input voltage is 35V and minimum voltage is 8V. Output is constant 5V.

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Issue 12, December 2015) VI. FLOW CHART

Fig.10 IC 7805

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Issue 12, December 2015) This can be a useful for aiding the physically challenged has been on demand. A text to Braille converter is intended to aid the blind to interact with computers at workplaces and homes. Though several such devices are available, the cost is a limiting factor. Blind people face a great difficulty in receiving computer education due to the lack of low cost technological support. Facilities for the sightless have been organized in different places for providing reading facilities to the blind. These centers maintain archives of reading materials (literature, science, etc.) in the form of Braille coded texts. However, such centers suffer from a number of practical difficulties such as severely constrained economic resource. We had used PIC 16F877A micro controller which is the main part of the system. We make use of Flex sensors .For each finger flex sensors are connected.

VII. ADVANTAGES      

Usually fewer components.  Light weight and flexible.  Requires less power.  Easy to operate.  Many languages can be used.  Compactable, can place hardware easily. VIII. APPLICATION

 This device is useful for physically challenged people.   This serve as a communication link between physically challenged such as blind people and normal people.  IX. FUTURE SCOPE

REFERENCES

This device can be further modified to improve the vocabulary by using more no of flex sensors and by making servomotor arrangement capable of producing all the Braille characters. By using digital signal processor we can also provide speech to Braille and vice versa

[1] [2] [3]

[4] [5]

X. CONCLUSION In order to help the blind and the visually impaired individuals read and communicate; this device satisfies the needs of the visually impaired individuals since it enables the translation of English and text into their Braille representations. We had developed a low cost gesture controlled device for the blind.

[6] [7]

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Design with PIC Microcontrollers: J.B. Peat man An Introduction to PIC Microcontrollers: R.A. Pen fold Louis Braille, 1829, Method of Writing Words, Music, and Plain Songs by Means of Dots, for Use by the Blind and Arranged for Them "What is Braille".www.afb.org. Madeleine Loomis, 1942, the Braille Reference Book [for Grades I, I½, and II]. Peter Daniels, 1996, "Analog and Digital Writing", in The World’s Writing Systems 886 Daniels& Bright, 1996,The World's Writing Systems, p 817–818