Susan,There's another issue that's been hinted at, but not explicitly stated. If you're really looking at the screen, you're getting constant visual feedback about how things line up. Those of us who don't actually see the screen have two choices: stop typing long enough to interrogate the screen reader (either through the controls provided for that purpose, or through a braille display), or have some kind of audible feedback when we approach the right edge of the screen. I'm quite lucky to have a braille display, but I have also learned that I can do a lot with formatting if I use the tools I have in Word. Unfortunately, though, doing that involves a steep learning curve because most people don't know much about Word, or word processors in general, mostly because they can just buzz around the screen with a mouse and push the right buttons, or maybe just use the brute force approach to get things to look the way they want them to. I don't mean any of this as a complaint, but rather as an attempt to analyze and explain differences between the methods blind people use to get results from their computers and what their sighted peers do to accomplish the same tasks.
Steve----- Original Message ----- From: "Susan Jolly" <easjolly@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <duxuser@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 16:11 Subject: [duxuser] Re: Margin Bell in Word
OK, great. Thanks for answering. I don't consider this so much a can of worms but trying to communicate better so that we can help each other out better. I understand about the table that looked "awful." I see now where I was having my conceptual problem. When I read things on the computer screen,whether in Word or on a webpage, I don't think in terms of pages but more interms of a fluid window or virtual page which is not fixed in size as a piece of paper is. So if I were looking at a table and it didn't fit right in the window, I would typically just resize the window. However, if your goal is to produce a print table that looks not awful on a real piece ofpaper of a certain size, rather than a virtual one, then of course you haveto know how it is oriented and laid out.If I were forced to produce tables in Word on a frequent basis, I'd probably spend the time to understand exactly what the AutoFit and AutoFormat optionsdo. Thanks again, SusanJ * * * * This message is via list duxuser at freelists.org. * To unsubscribe, send a blank message with * unsubscribe * as the subject to <duxuser-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>. You may also * subscribe, unsubscribe, and set vacation mode and other subscription * options by visiting //www.freelists.org. The list archive * is also located there. * Duxbury Systems' web site is http://www.duxburysystems.com * * *
* * * * This message is via list duxuser at freelists.org. * To unsubscribe, send a blank message with * unsubscribe * as the subject to <duxuser-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>. You may also * subscribe, unsubscribe, and set vacation mode and other subscription * options by visiting //www.freelists.org. The list archive * is also located there. * Duxbury Systems' web site is http://www.duxburysystems.com * * *
