On Thu, 15 Apr 2004 10:00:12 -0400
Alan Bowen
Thank you very much for the suggestions. I will explore pdftotext and the Acrobat _Save As_ options.
Another issue with these methods is that the header and footer information on each page will be included, which could be irritating or helpful, depending on the application.
One of the problems for all_and perhaps it is insuperable_is the ability of such reading software to present phrases in foreign languages and mathematical expressions.
I haven't done any XML writing, but I think that would be the superior approach. If special elements of the text are tagged, then they could be translated appropriately for the blind reader. I use a text-to-speech program for proofing some of my documents and have found it helpful to filter the original text and emit a coded version which makes it easy for the speech program to read, and easier for me to understand. I'll have it say "quote", "endquote", "italics", etc. I'm working from the Context source directly, but XML sources could be used similarly, and there are lots of XML tools in the world. -Bill -- Sattre Press History of Astronomy http://sattre-press.com/ During the 19th Century info@sattre-press.com by Agnes M. Clerke http://sattre-press.com/han.html