Puzzles and Games
The Tablet PC makes is easy to spend some time relaxing on the sofa with some games or puzzles. If you have ideas for puzzles and games that you think would be great fun by using the pen directly on the Tablet PC screen, send your ideas to Barker@Herbi.org.
For example, you can download a simple puzzle called "Sorter" which is fun to play on the Tablet PC. The idea of the game is to see how quickly you can sort a grid of numbered squares. It's the same idea as the handheld puzzles where little squares can be slid around the puzzle until the numbers on the squares are all in order.
To give sighted people a feel for playing the puzzle without seeing the squares or the numbers, you can set the puzzle options to have nothing displayed on the screen, and to have computer read out the numbers on the squares underneath the pen.
Can you complete the four-by-four puzzle in less than four minutes, with nothing showing on the screen?
Playing the Sorter puzzle
To run the Sorter puzzle, click the icon on you desktop after downloading the program.
When Sorter runs, it always fill the entire screen. This means the squares are always centered in the screen. When the program starts, it uses a three-by-three grid of squares, so there are eight squares and one hole in the grid where a nearby square can be moved into.
The following image shows what the puzzle looks like when it's run:
To aim of the game is to arrange all the squares in the right order. So the three-by-three grid of squares will look like this when you've completed the puzzle:
To move a square, tap on one of the squares next to the hole in the grid. The square you tapped on will move into the hole. But doing this many times, you can move each square to the place it needs to go. When all the squares are in the right order, a message appears telling you how long it took to complete the puzzle. Once you've clicked the button on the message window to close the message, you can press the "Start" button to get all the squares mixed up again.
Controlling the game
At the top of the window are 3 buttons:
Start - This mixes up all the squares on the grid.
Close - This closes the Sorter program.
Options - This shows the options window.
The options window looks like this:
The program always starts with a three-by-three grid of squares, but you can also choose a four-by-four or eight-by-eight grid. If you select a different size grid and click OK, then the grid will change to use the new number of squares.
By clearing the "Show squares" checkbox, the entire contents of the Sorter window will become black. So there's no indication of where the buttons and squares are, though the grid of squares is always centered on the screen.
By checking the "Speak squares" checkbox, the Sorter program will speak the text on the button or square beneath the pen whenever the pen moves over the button or square. If the pen moves of the hole in the grid, the program will say the work "blank". The program speech is independent of any screen reader which may be running.