[Arm-netbook] Housing idea: screenless laptop

[Matt Campbell]

On 9/12/2016 1:06 AM, Vincent Legoll wrote:
 > All that is also assuming that the laptop won't be shared with someone
 > able to use a display

That's a valid point. And for organizations that purchase several 
laptops, such as schools providing laptops to their students or 
businesses providing them to employees, it's probably more economical to 
purchase just one model.

Your point brings to my mind a subject of some controversy within the 
blind community itself. If you all will pardon a digression, I think 
this will serve as yet another minor demonstration of the potential 
benefits of a modular computer over the typical monolithic approach:

For about three decades now, there have been PDAs designed specifically 
for blind people. These usually have braille keyboards, though some have 
QWERTY keyboards, and some models also have a refreshable braille 
display (using pins that move up and down as the braille dots). These 
devices have been especially useful for blind students in the classroom; 
in fact, they're often called "note-takers" because of this killer 
application.

As you might expect, these devices have been monolithic designs, and 
they have tended to fall behind mainstream technology. They're also 
expensive, as in $1000 or more. One semi-recent example with which I'm 
particularly familiar was the LevelStar Icon, first released in 2007 and 
discontinued around 2011. It was based on a ~500 MHz ARM processor 
(using the ARMv5 instruction set with no hardware floating point). Just 
two and a half years after the original release (judging by the hardware 
in the iPhone 3GS in mid-2009), that processor was thoroughly obsolete. 
But what could be done? The device wasn't upgradeable, and it was 
expensive to boot (around $1400 for the base unit), because of the 
relatively small target user base. It didn't help that the software 
platform was completely proprietary (albeit built on embedded Linux), 
and the web browser in particular didn't keep up. The company moved on 
to a new product based on Android (ultimately brought to market as the 
APH Braille Plus second generation), which was eventually discontinued 
in 2015.

In the past 8 years or so, in response to the cost of these specialized 
devices and their tendency to fall behind the mainstream, there has been 
a backlash against these devices in the blind community. Some people 
refer to these devices as "blind ghetto" products. For an explanation of 
the controversy (in the context of an opinion piece opposing the use of 
that phrase), see this blog post:

http://mosen.org/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-blind-ghetto-product/

Today, there are several braille displays (that category of device also 
typically includes a braille keyboard) which can pair with a PC or 
mobile device via Bluetooth. But that kind of setup requires two 
devices, one of which is defined largely by a screen that is useless to 
the target user. Yes, in theory, one can pair such a braille device to 
the phone that they probably already have in their pocket, and use that 
for note-taking, document preparation, etc. But Mr. Mosen pointed out in 
the blog post referenced above that iOS isn't really suitable as a 
replacement for the PC for typical office tasks. And I'm quite sure that 
Android is no better. Several months ago, I heard about an interesting 
product called the ElitaBraille (no official English-language web page 
that I'm aware of), which is basically an Atom-based PC that is designed 
to house a specific model of braille display/keyboard.

BUT, all of this assumes the typical monolithic approach to designing a 
portable computer, whatever one chooses to call it and whatever form 
factor it takes. What if one of the vendors in this space could be 
persuaded to design an EOMA68 computer housing with a braille keyboard 
and display, and a less expensive one with just a braille keyboard? Some 
of these vendors are still making and selling complete portable 
computers, still even calling them note-takers; one current example is 
the BrailleNote Touch 
(http://www.humanware.com/microsite/bntouch/index.php). So they might 
not be keen on the open, modular approach. But at least one prominent 
braille display vendor seems to have given up on the note-taker category 
of products.

Anyway, it seems to me that if sighted people can have their 7-inch 
tablets for content consumption, it's not totally unreasonable to want a 
computer housing that's optimized for the way blind people work. A 
housing with a braille keyboard would probably be optimal, but even just 
removing the screen from the 15.6" laptop housing, which is where this 
thread started, would be a modest improvement.

I suspect, though, that this wish is currently rather quixotic on my 
part. The reality is that, as I understand it, even the most accessible 
GNU/Linux desktop environment for a blind person (probably GNOME 3 on a 
machine with 3D acceleration, or MATE on one without) leaves much to be 
desired in comparison to Windows or Mac. One of my friends is a blind 
programmer who runs GNU/Linux as his primary desktop OS. He told me that 
while it works for him, he thinks it wouldn't be the best choice for 
most blind people wanting to use their computers for everyday tasks. I 
don't know what the specific problems are; I'll have to spend some time 
using GNOME or MATE with the Orca screen reader myself and find out. 
Anyway, I'm guessing most blind computer users wouldn't be interested in 
a computer that can only run GNU/Linux, even if the form factor, 
keyboard, and display (or lack thereof) are perfectly optimized for 
them. The appeal of a 15.6" laptop housing with the screen removed would 
probably be even less, unless the extended battery life turns out to be 
a killer feature and someone can put in the time to make the software 
adequately usable for common tasks.

Now, having written that rather long-winded message, that's probably all 
I'll say on this subject, unless I eventually put in the time to improve 
GNU/Linux desktop accessibility. Anyway, I hope this was of some 
interest to some people on this list.

Matt

P.S. In case anyone is wondering, I'm legally blind myself, but with 
enough sight to read a desktop display up close. I use a screen reader 
some of the time on my desktop and all the time on my smartphone. I 
think I would use a screenless laptop myself for some tasks, but not for 
my real work.