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Thread: how to handle line numbers in legal documents
Number of posts in this thread: 5 (In chronological order)
From: Langum, Michael J
Date: Tue, Feb 22 2011 8:03AM
Subject: how to handle line numbers in legal documents
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I have been asked to post a legal transcript. It has line numbers along the left side of that page. These were added using MS Word's "line number" tool, and they were converted to artifacts when the document was converted to PDF.
My question is, since the line number artifacts will not be exposed to the screen reader, should this be considered accessible? If not, the only alternative I can think of is to manually re-write the WORD source document as a two column table.
-- Mike
From: deborah.kaplan@suberic.net
Date: Tue, Feb 22 2011 8:21AM
Subject: Re: how to handle line numbers in legal documents
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It probably depends who the audience is, but line numbers in
legal documents are an essential part of the citation. If they
are being posted for law students or lawyers I can't imagine
losing the line numbers would be accessible, but if they are
being posted for the general public then perhaps they are?
-deborah
From: Duff Johnson
Date: Tue, Feb 22 2011 8:27AM
Subject: Re: how to handle line numbers in legal documents
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Mike,
Ah yes... the joys of line-numbered documents. We positively GROAN when we get these suckers in the door.
To answer the question: those line-numbers do indeed need to be tagged in the PDF. If they aren't tagged, the AT user won't have a clue as to which line they are reading.
Using a table is a viable approach... notwithstanding the pain & suffering required to do the work. Sadly, it's also the best approach at this time - better, in any event, than including the line-numbers in the tags for the paragraph text along with SPAN tags to indicate that these are line-numbers and not part of the content (which is the other approach).
In the (not too distant) future, ISO 32000-2 adds a "LineNum" standard structure type to PDF which is designed to accommodate this issue and make it easy for authoring application developers and AT developers alike to provide a solution to this (otherwise) very difficult problem.
Duff Johnson
Appligent Document Solutions
Web: http://www.appligent.com
Blog: http://www.appligent.com/talkingpdf
Tweets: http://www.twitter.com/duffjohnson
On Feb 22, 2011, at 10:02 AM, Langum, Michael J wrote:
> I have been asked to post a legal transcript. It has line numbers along the left side of that page. These were added using MS Word's "line number" tool, and they were converted to artifacts when the document was converted to PDF.
>
> My question is, since the line number artifacts will not be exposed to the screen reader, should this be considered accessible? If not, the only alternative I can think of is to manually re-write the WORD source document as a two column table.
From: John Foliot
Date: Tue, Feb 22 2011 6:00PM
Subject: Re: how to handle line numbers in legal documents
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Langum, Michael J wrote:
>
> I have been asked to post a legal transcript. It has line numbers
> along the left side of that page. These were added using MS Word's
> "line number" tool, and they were converted to artifacts when the
> document was converted to PDF.
>
> My question is, since the line number artifacts will not be exposed to
> the screen reader, should this be considered accessible? If not, the
> only alternative I can think of is to manually re-write the WORD source
> document as a two column table.
I didn't see a response come through, and I am not a lawyer Michael, but I
believe that the line number is in fact a requirement of the legal
transcript (along with line-breaks, etc.). While the reasoning is archaic
(citation and reference - almost similar to biblical verse), I do believe
it is a mandate in many instances. I would double check from the source.
FWIW
JF
From: ckrugman@sbcglobal.net
Date: Mon, Feb 28 2011 12:00AM
Subject: Re: how to handle line numbers in legal documents
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yes, if line numbers appear on a document such as one created using pleading
paper used for all legal complaints the line numbers are part of the
document as such documents are amended or referred to at times line by line
and this formatting must be preserved for those who view the document. This
would also apply to hearing transcripts or depositions that are frequently
summarized in a line by line format that is used for other reference
purposes.
chuck Krugman, M.S.W., Paralegal
1237 P Street
Fresno ca 93721
559-266-9237
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Foliot" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
To: "'WebAIM Discussion List'" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2011 5:00 PM
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] how to handle line numbers in legal documents
> Langum, Michael J wrote:
>>
>> I have been asked to post a legal transcript. It has line numbers
>> along the left side of that page. These were added using MS Word's
>> "line number" tool, and they were converted to artifacts when the
>> document was converted to PDF.
>>
>> My question is, since the line number artifacts will not be exposed to
>> the screen reader, should this be considered accessible? If not, the
>> only alternative I can think of is to manually re-write the WORD source
>> document as a two column table.
>
> I didn't see a response come through, and I am not a lawyer Michael, but I
> believe that the line number is in fact a requirement of the legal
> transcript (along with line-breaks, etc.). While the reasoning is archaic
> (citation and reference - almost similar to biblical verse), I do believe
> it is a mandate in many instances. I would double check from the source.
>
> FWIW
>
> JF
>