The text telephone, known in the deaf community as the TTY, was developed by a deaf physicist in the mid-1960s from existing teletype technology. The TTY network grew in the deaf community because the technology, although old and slow, is dependable and works well in a voice environment. Unfortunately, the TTY uses a code, frequencies, and data transmission speed that are different from those used by computers.
In Europe, text telephony was addressed later than in the U.S. Unlike the U.S., text telephony tended to develop through design and decree by central authorities of the various European countries. As a result, there are several different and incompatible communication protocols used for TTYs in Europe. People who use TTYs do not have the same high level of connectivity that people who use voice communications have: They cannot call text telephones in most other countries.
Dick Brandt, a data communications expert and member of several standards bodies, became interested in these problems when he began consulting with the Technology Assessment Program on how to improve American TTY standards in such a way as to improve interworking between TTYs and computers. Brandt immediately recognized the need for an international specification that could lead to inclusion of TTY protocols in conventional data modems.
Brandt developed an interworking scheme to permit a conventional modem to communicate with several TTY protocols, and this scheme--now standardized as V.18--was studied and ultimately approved by Study Group 14 of the International Telecommunication Union/Telecommunication Standards Bureau (formerly called CCITT).
The development of V.18 was assisted with design specification from Gallaudet's Technology Assessment Program, with input from U.S. TTY manufacturers, and with the assistance of European researchers. The consumer group Telecommunications for the Deaf, Inc. co-sponsored American meetings to discuss V.18 development. Gallaludet's work was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education/NIDRR through a Rehabilitation Engineering and Research Center on Hearing Enhancement and Assistive Devices.
ITU Recommendation V.18 specifies interworking with the following TTY protocols:
Baudot @ 45.45 baud (U.S. TTYs) Baudot @ 50 baud (used in England, Australia, and some other countries; also known as "international" Baudot) V.21/text telephone version (used in Sweden, Norway, and Finland). DTMF (used in Denmark, Holland, and some other countries) EDT ("European Deaf Telephone," used in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and several other countries)
8 bit
No Parity
1 Stop Bit
Full Duplex
When calling at a rate of 300 BPS or below, follow the above settings using Half Duplex. (Note: It may be helpful to set your "time out" to 100 seconds). Consult your communications software manual for additional information.
Manufacturer: Innovation Management Group
21550 Oxnard St. Suite 300
Woodland Hills
California, 91367 USA
Phone: 1-800-889-0987 Fax: 1-818-346-3973 or E-mail IMG with your request. Please mention the ACSP when you write.
SoftKBD is no longer shareware. It is now a commercial product called SofType and is being distributed by:
Origin Instruments Corporation
854 Greenview Drive
Grand Prairie, TX 75050
Voice: 214-606-8740
Fax: 214-606-8741
There is a Windows 95 version called SofType 4.0, and a Windows 3.x version called SofType 3.0. Both versions will ship together. We're hoping to ship within two weeks. I will forward your message onto Origin Instruments and ask them to contact you. If they don't contact you within a reasonable amount of time you can contact them at:
support@orin.com (or possibly info@orin.com, if that is set up yet)
They are working on a web site and hope to have a SofType page, with
downloadable demos, this week.
I am sorry that I do not have a Mac machine to run any of these programs but I can make another suggestion that could help. My friend Denise Lance has a site with some free Mac software including Low Vision and Speech software.
I downloaded AccessDOS and attempted to set it up by starting it without any /switches. At first, when I started ADOS.COM the MouseKeys option was disabled. I exited AccessDOS and loaded the Microsoft v9.01 mouse drivers and installed for both DOS and Windows from the DOS prompt. I retried ADOS.COM and the MouseKeys option was enabled. I accepted the default options except for the first (to enable MouseKeys), went to the File menu, Saved Settings and then ran AccessDOS with the saved options. It seems to work as the documentation suggested. I could move the mouse cursor, click with the "5" key or double click with the "+" key. The mouse cursor moved in a stepwise fashion but got where I wanted it. I tested it with the built-in DOS program "EDIT.COM" which uses QBASIC.EXE also I discovered.
I have asked and I am awaiting responses from some others who are looking into this to see if they have problems. So far I have not been able to duplicate the problem.
Is there anything specific you would like for me to try to further test AccessDOS or can you provide me with a detailed test setup that you have tried like your hardware configuration, Mouse Driver and type of mouse, keyboard type and manufacturer, etc... to help me duplicate your problem?