Products & Services  |  Purchase  |   Downloads  |  Support   News  |  Distributors |  Corporate Info  |  Contact Us  |  Search

A Conversation About PAC Mate™ with James Gashel of the NFB James Gashel, Executive Director for Strategic Initiatives for the National Federation of the Blind (NFB), says he seldom goes anywhere without his PAC Mate. Recently, we asked him to talk about his experience with the PAC Mate. Interviewer: What work is involved in your position on a day-to-day basis as Executive Director for Strategic Initiatives for the National Federation of the Blind? James Gashel: I am responsible for supervising and overseeing our work and the development and dissemination of technology that the NFB is involved in creating. One of the things I do, for instance, is to oversee the NFB-NEWSLINE®, which, very basically, is newspapers and magazines read over the telephone. The service contains almost 200 newsletters and magazines that are updated daily. I also oversee the Jobline, which is a voice version of America’s Job Bank. America's Job Bank is an Internet site providing job orders submitted by employers to public job service agencies in all the states. I also am responsible for NFB’s part in developing a portable text-to-speech reader that uses a digital camera and a small PC. My position also entails supervision of governmental affairs – that is legislative as well as funding programs - and public relations work. Interviewer: We know you use a PAC Mate. What model PAC Mate do you have? James Gashel: I have a BX440 PAC Mate with a 40-cell braille display. Interviewer: When did you get your PAC Mate? James Gashel: I got my PAC Mate in June of 2004 … so it’s been about 14 months that I’ve had it. Interviewer: What other accessibility solutions have you used to assist you in the functions that the PAC Mate now performs? James Gashel: Going way back, I started using Braille ’n Speak when it first became available in 1987. I used it for many years until I started using the Braille Lite in about 1999. Then I switched over and used a BrailleNote for about 13 months. That’s when I switched to the PAC Mate. Interviewer: Why did you switch to the PAC Mate? James Gashel: A couple of considerations led me to switch to the PAC Mate. One was, at least at that time and it still could be true, the advantages of synchronization with a computer, in particular being able to access my e-mail. I use the PAC Mate very often for my e-mail and for accessing information from the Internet and from my office PC when I'm away from the office. It’s more convenient for me to use ActiveSync and use the PAC Mate as an extension of my PC. With the BrailleNote, I had to enter my e-mail addresses, contacts, etc. into several different systems or pieces of equipment. With the PAC Mate, I can synchronize with my PC for my addresses, contacts, and information, so I only have to enter information once, and I can get at it whenever I want, whether I’m in the office or away. The PAC Mate also appeared to me to provide a close replication of the Windows® system, more of a natural extension of Windows and the PC desktop. The BrailleNote did what it was supposed to do, but it was not totally preferable for what I wanted to do. Interviewer: How did you learn about the PAC Mate? James Gashel: I heard about the PAC Mate through involvement in my work at the NFB headquarters. Others in the NFB knew about the PAC Mate, and we talked about it. To be honest, I was not an early adopter (of the PAC Mate), and I’m not usually an early adopter of technology. I usually like to wait for new technology to stabilize and get all the kinks out of it. So you might say that I’m a little bit of a Johnny Come Lately to the PAC Mate, although I definitely was an early adopter of the Braille ‘n Speak. Now, I find the PAC Mate to be very stable. Interviewer: What exactly do you mean by stable? James Gashel: What I mean by stability is, do I have my data when I need it? Do I lose information, and is there a lot of downtime in recovering things I have lost? The PAC Mate is very stable in this way. Even though I don’t recall any significant loss of data with the PAC Mate I have, I do recognize that it is a Pocket PC, and the way to protect yourself from losing information, as with any Pocket PC, is by doing ordinary, day-to-day back ups. I have Sprite Backup, and that has been very helpful. Normally, I have a Flash card with two or three days of back up, so I can always go back and recover anything that I might lose, even though I’ve never really experienced a loss of data with this PAC Mate. Interviewer: What are the main features that sold you on the PAC Mate? James Gashel: I think at that time, the ability to be wireless on the Internet with the PAC Mate was certainly a consideration for me. I move around a lot. One of the things I looked for is that the PAC Mate could be equipped with a wireless card, so I could be many, many places where there is a wireless hub, and I could get on the Internet when I needed to, look at my e-mail, and get to my work files. One of the things that PAC Mate has going for it that I especially like is that you can go from a hyperlink within an e-mail message right to a Web site. The PAC Mate will do that. Many times in my job, e-mail messages are sent to me as a guide to something for me to look at on a particular Web site. I use this information as a legislative research tool. Also, with the PAC Mate, I have acquired technology that allows me to use the PAC Mate with a cell phone and be totally mobile. Whether I am riding in a car, sitting in an airport, or whatever, I simply use the PAC Mate combined with a cell phone, and I’m on the Internet. With the combination of WiFi and Bluetooth, the PAC Mate was the choice to make. Interviewer: Can you give me an example of how PAC Mate’s dependability has served you? James Gashel: Obviously, you have to have access to data when you need it, and I get that with the PAC Mate. If I have to spend time after time recovering information that I have lost, I am not going to use that piece of equipment. Dependability is critical to me. I say that, but I also want to emphasize that the most important part of dependability is for the user to take responsibility for protecting the data and backing it up. Interviewer: Before using the PAC Mate, did you consider yourself to be technologically well versed? James Gashel: I don’t believe I am technologically well versed as far as understanding what’s under the hood. Certainly, I have learned some of the terminology used in computer speak, but I am a consumer in this technology, not a technology expert. I rely on technology whether it’s a cell phone or PAC Mate. Having access to both written and oral communication wherever I go is essential for me to do my job. If I’m out of the office or have a day traveling on business, I can read and respond to e-mail even if I’m not at the office, and that is critical to me. Interviewer: Given that you’re not a technology “expert,” tell us about your PAC Mate learning experience. James Gashel: Learning the PAC Mate was not too hard for me. I had used the Braille ’n Speak and Braille Lite, so I was certainly familiar with using this kind of technology, and that contributed to me learning the PAC Mate fairly quickly. I spent a little time reading the Quick Start Guide as I recall, just to sort of know how this system was different and how to get it set up. I think I may have used the Help files one or two times for questions about how it operates. I also had wonderful tech support from Freedom Scientific to answer my questions. For the first month or so, just in setting things up and making them work right, I had a fair amount of interaction with Freedom Scientific, looking for help to teach me all the different things I would need to know. As with any computer, you need to know how to set it up if you want to get the full value out of it. You need to invest effort and time up front to find out what it does, and how to get the most power out of the technology. I will say that the support I received from Freedom Scientific was excellent. Interviewer: On a typical day, how might you put your PAC Mate to work for you? James Gashel: My PAC Mate is constantly synced up to the PC at my work, so that when I leave my office at the end of the day and I carry the PAC Mate out, it has all the e-mail I have not addressed during the day and is a replica of all the things I have on my PC at work. I use it to look up addresses of contacts, for instance, or finish something up from work. Also, I find it more convenient to read a contact or address in braille than listen to it on the PC, so in that way I guess I use my PAC Mate as a braille display, too. Interviewer: What other ways does the PAC Mate enrich your daily life, both in your work and personal life? Do you play games on it, listen to music, or read books? James Gashel: I use it some for containing personal data, but I don’t do that very much. My wife says my work is my personal life, so maybe that’s why. I do not do games on the PAC Mate, and I have not used the FSReader at all for reading books. I do understand that it is a very powerful and effective tool. Someone sent me an e-mail on that last week, and said it is a great way to read newspapers from the NFB-NEWSLINE. I think I’ve read one book in Windows Media Player. I might listen to music occasionally. The PAC Mate is a very hard working machine, and mostly, I use it for work. I don’t want to say it’s not a pleasure to use the PAC Mate. I do enjoy using it … and I enjoy my work, too. Interviewer: What one or more PAC Mate features could you not live without? James Gashel: Portability is the PAC Mate feature that is of most value to me, that and the wireless and Bluetooth® capabilities. And I wouldn’t see a reason for having a PAC Mate without the capability to synchronize it with the PC, so I don’t have to re-enter information over an over on several different systems. Interviewer: As you think about the future of the PAC Mate, what kind of functions would expand your use of the PAC Mate for work and leisure? James Gashel: One thing that I think the PAC Mate should be able to do, once the technology is completely developed, is to have a hand-held reader to record text digitally, and I would like the PAC Mate to be able to read it. Interviewer: If you were asked to recommend a notetaker/accessible Pocket PC to other professionals, would you recommend the PAC Mate? What benefits would you especially emphasize? James Gashel: I would certainly recommend the PAC Mate. I do think people should check out whatever is out there and see what they like. For some people, size is an important consideration. The PAC Mate may be on the larger end of the size scale, and some people might like something smaller, but there are sacrifices to make to the end of choosing on size. PAC Mate is certainly portable, and plus it has the factor of being a replication of the PC, and having the capability of having wireless and Bluetooth - all the things I consider to make the PAC Mate the PDA for the blind and that put the user closest to the experience that sighted people have with their PCs.		Product Overview   Product FAQ   Tech Support Notes   Related Documentation   Related Accessories Hardware Software Training Tutorials Accessories Documentation