Braille ASCII

Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Use American English Braille ASCII (or more formally The North American Braille ASCII Code, also known as SimBraille) is a subset of the ASCII character set which uses 64 of the printable ASCII characters to represent all possible dot combinations in six-dot braille. It was developed around 1969 and, despite originally being known as North American Braille ASCII, it is now used internationally.

Overview

Braille ASCII uses the 64 ASCII characters between 32 and 95 inclusive. All capital letters in ASCII correspond to their equivalent values in uncontracted English Braille. Note however that, unlike standard print, there is only one braille symbol for each letter of the alphabet. Therefore, in Braille, all letters are lower-case by default, unless preceded by a capitalization sign (Template:Braille cell dot 6).

The numbers 1 through 9 and 0 correspond to the letters a through j, except that they are lowered or shifted lower in the Braille cell. For example, Template:Braille cell dots 1-4 represents c, and Template:Braille cell dots 2-5 is 3. The other symbols may or may not correspond to their Braille values. For example, Template:Braille cell dots 3-4 represents / in Braille ASCII, and this is the Braille slash, but Template:Braille cell dots 1-2-3-4-5-6 represents =, and this is not the equals sign in Braille.

Braille ASCII more closely corresponds to the Nemeth Braille Code for mathematics than it does to the English Literary Braille Code, as the Nemeth Braille code is what it was originally based upon.

If Braille ASCII is viewed in a word processor, it will look like a jumbled mix of letters, numbers, and punctuation. However, there are several fonts available, many of them free, which allow the user to view and print Braille ASCII as simulated braille, i.e. a graphical representation of braille characters.

Uses

Braille ASCII was originally designed to be a means for storing and transmitting six-dot Braille in a digital format, and this continues to be its primary usage today. Because it uses standard characters available on computer keyboards, it can be easily typed and edited with a standard word processor. Many Braille embossers receive their input in Braille ASCII, and nearly all Braille translation software can import and export this format.

Most institutions which produce Braille materials distribute BRF files. BRF is a file that can represent contracted or uncontracted (i.e. grade 1 or grade 2) Unified English Braille, English Braille and non-English languages. BRF files contain plain Braille ASCII plus spaces, Carriage Return, Line Feed, and Form Feed ASCII control characters. The spaces, Carriage Returns, Line Feeds, and Form feeds are sufficient to specify how the Braille is formatted. Previously BRF contained some additional specialized formatting instructions, but now BRF is formatted exactly like Web-Braille/BARD. BRF files can be embossed with a braille embosser or printed, read on a refreshable braille display, or imperfectly back-translated into standard text which can then be read by a screen reader or other similar program. Many find BRF files to be a more convenient way to receive brailled content, and it has increasing use as a distribution format. If a SimBraille font is downloaded and installed a BRF file can be opened in WordPad, Apache OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, Apple Pages, etc., and the Braille will appear correctly rendered as 2 dimensional, non-tactile, visual 6 dot braille characters when the font is set to SimBraille.

Unicode includes a means for encoding eight-dot braille; however, Braille ASCII continues to be the preferred format for encoding six-dot braille.

Braille ASCII values

File:Braille cell.svg

Standard Braille 6-dot order.

The following table shows the arrangement of characters, with the hexadecimal value, corresponding ASCII character, binary notation matching the standard dot numbers (see the image on the left), Braille Unicode glyph, and general meaning for English (the actual meaning may change depending on context).

ASCII hex ASCII glyph Braille dots (1 to 6) Braille glyph Unicode Braille glyph English Braille meaning 20 (space) 000000 Template:Braille cell ⠀ (space) 21 ! 011101 Template:Braille cell ⠮ the 22 " 000010 Template:Braille cell ⠐ (contraction) 23 # 001111 Template:Braille cell ⠼ (number prefix) 24 $ 110101 Template:Braille cell ⠫ ed 25 % 100101 Template:Braille cell ⠩ sh 26 & 111101 Template:Braille cell ⠯ and 27 ' 001000 Template:Braille cell ⠄ ' 28 ( 111011 Template:Braille cell ⠷ of 29 ) 011111 Template:Braille cell ⠾ with 2A * 100001 Template:Braille cell ⠡ ch 2B + 001101 Template:Braille cell ⠬ ing 2C , 000001 Template:Braille cell ⠠ (uppercase prefix) 2D - 001001 Template:Braille cell ⠤ - 2E . 000101 Template:Braille cell ⠨ (italic prefix) 2F / 001100 Template:Braille cell ⠌ st or / 30 0 001011 Template:Braille cell ⠴ ” 31 1 010000 Template:Braille cell ⠂ , 32 2 011000 Template:Braille cell ⠆ ; 33 3 010010 Template:Braille cell ⠒ : 34 4 010011 Template:Braille cell ⠲ . 35 5 010001 Template:Braille cell ⠢ en 36 6 011010 Template:Braille cell ⠖ ! 37 7 011011 Template:Braille cell ⠶ ( or ) 38 8 011001 Template:Braille cell ⠦ “ or ? 39 9 001010 Template:Braille cell ⠔ in 3A : 100011 Template:Braille cell ⠱ wh 3B ; 000011 Template:Braille cell ⠰ (letter prefix) 3C < 110001 Template:Braille cell ⠣ gh 3D = 111111 Template:Braille cell ⠿ for 3E > 001110 Template:Braille cell ⠜ ar 3F ? 100111 Template:Braille cell ⠹ th

ASCII hex ASCII glyph Braille dots (1 to 6) Braille glyph Unicode Braille glyph English Braille meaning 40 @ 000100 Template:Braille cell ⠈ (accent prefix) 41 A 100000 Template:Braille cell ⠁ a 42 B 110000 Template:Braille cell ⠃ b 43 C 100100 Template:Braille cell ⠉ c 44 D 100110 Template:Braille cell ⠙ d 45 E 100010 Template:Braille cell ⠑ e 46 F 110100 Template:Braille cell ⠋ f 47 G 110110 Template:Braille cell ⠛ g 48 H 110010 Template:Braille cell ⠓ h 49 I 010100 Template:Braille cell ⠊ i 4A J 010110 Template:Braille cell ⠚ j 4B K 101000 Template:Braille cell ⠅ k 4C L 111000 Template:Braille cell ⠇ l 4D M 101100 Template:Braille cell ⠍ m 4E N 101110 Template:Braille cell ⠝ n 4F O 101010 Template:Braille cell ⠕ o 50 P 111100 Template:Braille cell ⠏ p 51 Q 111110 Template:Braille cell ⠟ q 52 R 111010 Template:Braille cell ⠗ r 53 S 011100 Template:Braille cell ⠎ s 54 T 011110 Template:Braille cell ⠞ t 55 U 101001 Template:Braille cell ⠥ u 56 V 111001 Template:Braille cell ⠧ v 57 W 010111 Template:Braille cell ⠺ w 58 X 101101 Template:Braille cell ⠭ x 59 Y 101111 Template:Braille cell ⠽ y 5A Z 101011 Template:Braille cell ⠵ z 5B [ 010101 Template:Braille cell ⠪ ow 5C \ 110011 Template:Braille cell ⠳ ou 5D ] 110111 Template:Braille cell ⠻ er 5E ^ 000110 Template:Braille cell ⠘ (currency prefix) 5F _ 000111 Template:Braille cell ⠸ (contraction)

The following shows the "ASCII glyph" under the associated Braille dots pattern from the table above, sorted according to the reverse lexicographical order of "Braille dots" patterns. It may be used to encode the above table. (Note that Unicode Braille characters are U+2800 through U+283F, with their code points being in reverse lexicographical order of the above table's "Braille dots" column, and that the symbol at top of the first cell is not an ASCII space but the empty Braille symbol U+2800):

⠀
 ⠁
A⠂
1⠃
B⠄
'⠅
K⠆
2⠇
L⠈
@⠉
C⠊
I⠋
F⠌
/⠍
M⠎
S⠏
P⠐
"⠑
E⠒
3⠓
H⠔
9⠕
O⠖
6⠗
R⠘
^⠙
D⠚
J⠛
G⠜
>⠝
N⠞
T⠟
Q⠠
,⠡
*⠢
5⠣
<⠤
-⠥
U⠦
8⠧
V⠨
.⠩
%⠪
[⠫
$⠬
+⠭
X⠮
!⠯
&⠰
;⠱
:⠲
4⠳
\⠴
0⠵
Z⠶
7⠷
(⠸
_⠹
?⠺
W⠻
]⠼
#⠽
Y⠾
)⠿
=

Unused ASCII values

Only 64 characters are needed to represent all possible combinations of 6-dot braille (including space), so not all ASCII values are needed for Braille ASCII.

The 26 Basic Latin lower-case letters (a to (z) are not normally used, but might be interpreted as having the same dot patterns as their 26 upper-case equivalents. The 5 other printable ASCII punctuation characters (`, {, |, }, and ~) are not used and their Braille ASCII rendition is not defined.

Braille ASCII is merely a subset of the ASCII table that can be used to represent all possible combinations of 6-dot braille. It is not to be confused with the Computer Braille Code, which can represent all ASCII values in braille.

See also

• List of binary codes
• Braille Patterns (Unicode)

External links

• Early History of Braille Translators and Embossers
• Representing and Displaying Braille
• What's a BRF? (page on National Braille Bookstore)