First off I appreciate all that 121Books is doing. I am a new legally blind student at Goddard College and I am just getting the hang of all this.

1. Am I correct that the functions of "print, highlight, and add notes" are all part of Adobe Reader and that I should devote my time to learning that program? I looked at Kurzweil and liked it but it seems like that option is not possible.

2. I can't seem to copy and paste quotations into Word from your files. I understand your legal issues but Is there a work-around?

3. I downloaded a test book and tried to use Read Out Loud and got an error message saying that "an incorrect structure was found in the pdf file." I am on a Mac running Adobe Reader 8.0 if that matters.

4. Do books with lots of illustrations cause problems?

5. I cut the spine off one book. Will that be a problem for conversion?

1. We have recently enabled the Commenting Tools in Adobe Reader. This was done to help 121Members, and schools, avoid the cost of Acrobat. There are also other PDF applications that have commenting capabilities. We would suggest the free Adobe Reader, but the final choice is yours.

2. We have disabled the ability to copy/paste.

3. Provide the name of 121File and one of our people will take a look at it. All 121Files are set to allow Adobe's free Read Out Loud tool and 3rd party screen readers. Math and Science books are not suitable for reading aloud.

4. No. They are just larger in size, which may cause issues for systems with low memory. Some 3rd party screen readers may also have trouble unless they are able to incrementally process the file.

5. No. It is our normal practice to remove the spine. We prefer to cut books ourselves to avoid "cutting into" the text and make it easier for members who do not have access to a commercial paper cutter.

Don't hesitate ask if more questions come up. That's what we are here for.

Let me know how your experience on OS X is going. I am trying out a few different ways to do screen reading.

Thanks.

I am new to this whole forum stuff so let me know if I should be doing something differently.

I am writing a thesis so I need to figure out how to read more quickly and be able to take notes and extract quotes for my writing.

Adobe Reader seems to be fussy about reading. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. It seems like when it works there are frames around the text and this has something to do with how I click on it. I need to learn more

My current idea is to use a program called IAudioize, a $50 program I got at the Apple store. It will convert any Word document or PDF into an MP3 that I can play on my ipod. This allows me to go backwards and forwards easily. The problems are that you need to break the book up into chapters so that you do'nt have to start from thhe beginning of the book all the time. Also you have to be careful that you don't hit the reverse key twice or it starts over. I convert the pdf into text first so that all illustrations are stripped out and it also retains pages numbers so that I know where I am. I then take notes with page numbers and then go back to extract quotes.

Any better suggestions would be appreciated.