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Re: Q: More Excel questions

for

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Apr 17, 2012 7:23PM

Hello

The answer is a resounding no. Screen readers are aware of formulas
and will announce them (except NvDA I believe, at least v 2010.2 did
not recognize formulas, but I would not recommend NVDA for Excel
users, at least not back then).
In fact more screen readers recognize formulas in spreadsheet cells
than comments, so having the formula of a cell in its comments serves
absolutely no purpose.
You can always read a cells formula by pressing f2 to edit it, and
then treat it like a multi-line edit field, using text reading
commands to explore the formula).
I am pretty durn sure about this, this guideline is absolutely
nonsensical for screen reader users.
Cheers
-B

On 4/18/12, Bevi Chagnon < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> I'm trying to sort out a bunch of conflicting issues about accessible Excel
> spreadsheets.
>
> From the government agency's guidelines (not Sec. 508 or WCAG):
>
> "Formula cells are indicated by a comment to alert users of their
> functionality. The comment is the actual formula in the cell so that an
> Assistive Technology (AT) screen reader will alert the user to what it is
> doing."
>
> Screen readers can't read formulas in spreadsheets? If AT can't read a
> spreadsheet formula, what the heck are they doing in a spreadsheet to begin
> with? The function of a spreadsheet is to organize data and perform
> calculations via formulas.
>
> Control + F2 reads the formula in JAWS.
>
> Is there a reason why a comment should be placed on the cell with the
> formula with the comment repeating the formula?
>
> --Bevi
>
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