[bksvol-discuss] Re: Bolded words in text
- From: "Monica Willyard" <rhyami@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 7 Nov 2009 01:56:50 -0500
Melissa and Lori, please, please don't do this as a principle on every book.
I don't think you realize that this could do damage to someone's submission.
When I submit books, I work very hard to fix the fonts so that my chapter
headings are detected more easily both by sighted users and the Bookshare
tools. Sighted readers use changes in the font face or font size to tell
when the chapter or scene changes in a book. The current book I'm scanning
uses the Arial font to indicate a chapter name and log entries when the
scene changes. The rest of the text is Times New Roman.
Furthermore, in many books I submit, the page numbers are at the bottom of
the page. Using a larger font for the chapter names or numbers tells the
Bookshare stripper that this is where a new chapter or part begins. If you
change the entire document to 12 point, you would unintentionally undo the
work I spend a couple of hours doing to ensure good daisy navigation for
everyone. Braille and blind speech users wouldn't notice. Our members with
learning disabilities would though, and I'm doing everything I can to make
their reading as easy and pleasurable as ours.
I hope what I'm saying doesn't sound like a lecture. It's not meant that
way. I'm pleading with you to learn about how fonts work and why they
matter. I used to do the same thing as you, changing mine to Times New Roman
as well. Then Judy and Valerie came into my life and opened my eyes and
heart to their needs. Since then I began paying attention to the fonts in my
scans before submitting them. Now I make sure the fonts for chapters are
correct as I strip headers in my books.
This isn't an absolute thing, and it's not a show-stopper in the grand
scheme of things. If you know for sure that the submitter hasn't done any
work with the fonts, changing the font probably won't matter. If your
screenreader won't speak the text in Word, you may have to change it to 12
point as a base. In that case, will you please consider taking the time to
enlarge the font for chapter headings to 14 or 16 point? You can do that
quickly by selecting the chapter name or number and pressing control right
bracket in Kurzweil or shift control right bracket in Word. It will increase
the point size each time you press the keystroke, and you should hear the
font size when it changes. The left bracket makes the font smaller, by the
way.
It does take extra time to do this. I freely admit that. If you are blind
like me, fonts mean very little since we can't see them. Still, I know I'd
want help if something was causing my Braille books to read badly, so I take
time to do it for others who need it.
Monica Willyard
"The best way to predict the future is to create it." -- Peter Drucker
-----Original Message-----
From: bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Melissa Smith
Sent: Friday, November 06, 2009 8:31 PM
To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Re: Bolded words in text
I select the whole document, and set the font to Times New Roman, and 12
Point. I leave alone the box that has the style. This leaves any bold or
italicized text the way it is. I do this in every book I proof.
Melissa
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