Hi Elf, I play numerous games, and often pick up indie games. In truth, most indie games are accessible, but when they're not, most publishers are willing to work with me to get copies in alternative formats.
So, the primary offenders are: Just about everything from White Wolf. I'd love to read their books, new and old, but PDF conversions are absolutely, positively terrible. One example, Promethean, has a whole chapter that JAWS and other PDF interpreters (like the one on the Braille Sense) cannot see at all. Most books, like the Exalted series, jumble everything together, or don't read the text in a logical flow. Dresden Files: This is a small press game. They did some cool layout stuff, with numerous comments interspersed throughout the text that are meant to provide levity and insight, but which simply confuse JAWS and other PDF processes. Amaranthine: Another small press book. This author didn't respond, and the text is simply disorganized, with the thread of the text being lost at least once per page. Traveller: The tables are not presented logically, and Traveller has tons and tons of tables. Pathfinder: Mostly just text being presented out of order. Can you help with any of these? I believe in all cases Acrobat Reader says that these documents are untagged. I've been told that tagging is a time-consuming, tedious process. Nancy -----Original Message----- From: jaws-users-list-boun...@jaws-users.com [mailto:jaws-users-list-boun...@jaws-users.com] On Behalf Of inthane Sent: Monday, September 19, 2011 2:00 PM To: jaws-users-list@jaws-users.com Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] PDF Files being an avid gamer myself, may I ask what system your attempting to find useable .pdf books of? I have translations of several systems here, and have openbook which many times does a fair job of translating them to text. elf . Moderator, Blind Access Help. . Owner: Alacorn Computer Enterprises "own the might and majesty of an alacorn" www.alacorncomputer.com . proprietor: Inthane's Grab Bag for blind computer users and Programmers! http://grabbag.alacorncomputer.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Nancy Feldman" <nancy_feld...@comcast.net> To: <jaws-users-list@jaws-users.com> Sent: Saturday, September 17, 2011 4:46 AM Subject: [JAWS-Users] PDF Files > Good Morning, > > I am at my wit's end with PDF files, so I thought I'd inquire for help > here. > If there's a better forum for this, or we should be discussing it off > list, > I'd be happy to do that. > > I've used JAWS to read basic PDF files, ones with practically no > formatting. > For instance, a novel in PDF format tends to read pretty well. > > But I purchase a lot of PDF documents from www.drivethrurpg.com, and most > of > them aren't read very well by JAWS. I've seen many of the following > errors. > > No spaces between words > > On two-column pages, the columns being smashed together and read as one > nonsensical block of text > > With tables, the left hand column being presented first, and then the > right > hand column, not side by side, but all the left hand column entries first, > and then the right. > Whole sections of books that JAWS cannot see at all, even though I am > assured there is text there > > One pair of files where the author used lots of notes in the text and JAWS > had no idea where to put them, so it just reads them mixed up with the > rest > of the text. > > Because of all of these difficulties, I've concluded that I may need new > strategies for dealing with PDF files. Perhaps I'm doing something wrong? > > What are the optimal settings to use when opening a PDF file? Is there > anything I can do to improve the conversion of PDF documents to text? I > seem to recall that there's a place that we can Email PDF documents to, > and > it'll convert them. Is it any good? The problem with that approach is most > of these documents are larger than 10 MB, which I believe exceeds the > largest Email attachment I can send. > > I welcome all suggestions and insights. Failing that, I will contact the > publishers and ask if I can get copies of the documents I've purchased in > an > alternate electronic format. It's just very frustrating to know that the > information is there and available, but still inaccessible to me. Before > I > contact the publishers, though, I want to make certain that I'm not doing > anything wrong. > > Many thanks. > > Nancy > > I've tried saving files to text, and the > > > For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: > http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/
