Microsoft has released a plug-in for Office that converts Office documents into the DAISY (Digital Accessible Information SYstem) XML format, reports Computerworld. DAISY is a XML format designed for the vision impaired that allows files to be easily converted into Braille or large print or audio. Its claim to fame is that it also converts the metadata parts of a document -- noting paragraph breaks, tables and so on -- so that a document's actual formatting is made accessible and searchable -- not just the words.

The Computerworld story is an interesting look at the technology challenge of supporting vision-impaired users. (Using DAISY is only one fraction of the battle.) It also points out issues with OOXML -- the basic format used by Office upon which the new plugin is based.

However, Microsoft should be applauded for putting its resources into such a project. The DAISY community has been prodding Adobe to also add support, but, so far, to no avail, the story reports.

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