[BRLTTY] [Semi-OT] Converting .brf file to unicode braille or mapping to another chosen braille table

[Dave Mielke]

[quoted lines by Jeanette C. on 2025/11/05 at 23:17 +0100]

>I'm sorry, since this doesn't strictly belong here, but I didn't know where
>else to turn.

You are hereby commanded to stop worrying if you can ask here! Yes, this is a perfectly good place to ask and, yes, we even have tool - brltty-trtxt - that can do exactly what you want. Now, really, if you hadn't asked here then you'd never have found that out. :-)

The syntax you want is:

   brltty-trtxt -i brf input-file ... >output-file

You can use its -h option for more  details. Output is written to standard output, hence the > redirection above.

Specify your input file as the first positional argument. You can actually specify as many input files as you'd like. If you specify a minus sign then input is read from standard input.

The -i option specifies the kind of braille that's in the input file, i.e. which text table defines it. That's why, above, it says -i brf.

Likewise, the -o option specifies the text table to use for output. If you want German braille for the output then specify -o de. If, however, you want Unicode braille patterns then don't specify the -o option as that's the default.

If your distribution doesn't provide brltty-trtxt, and if you know how to build brltty, then just do it that way. When you're in brltty's Programs/ directory you can do make brltty-trtxt. Doing it this way means that you'll need to also specify -T../Tables (that's an uppercase -T) to tell it to get the text tables from your build tree.

Feel free, as always, to ask further questions, especially if the above explanation is lacking any details that you need.

-- 
I believe the Bible to be the very Word of God: http://Mielke.cc/bible/
Dave Mielke            | 2213 Fox Crescent | WebHome: http://Mielke.cc/
EMail: Dave at Mielke.cc  | Ottawa, Ontario   | Twitter: @Dave_Mielke
Phone: +1 613 726 0014 | Canada  K2A 1H7   |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
http://mielke.cc/xmother.html (Letter from a Feminist ex-Mother)