I've tried both of those. You are right that sometimes it corrects the problems, but with a few stubborn files, it's still just gibberish.
And in some cases, JAWS can't see the text at all, even though it's real text, not an image, and even though sighted readers see it just fine. -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of [email protected] Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2011 4:03 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] PDF Files try reading the document by using the "left to right top to bottom" or "raw print stream" settings. This will generally correct the spacing and running issues that frequently occur when using the"infer reading order from document" setting. I do this quite often when there is a problem with the document and it usually corrects the problem. Chuck ----- Original Message ----- From: "Nancy Feldman" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> 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/
