MICROSOFT WORD 2010
508 ACCESSIBILITY CHECKLIST

Use paragraph spacing settings instead of carriage returns when additional line spacing is needed between paragraphs.

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Have carriage returns been used in place of paragraph spacing formatting?

To determine whether multiple blank characters have been used for spacing/layout:

• Run the accessibility checker: "Repeated blank characters"

Watch video (3:23 mins)

To show/find Repeated Blank Characters

• Show blank (non-printing) Characters: CTRL + ALT + SHIFT + C.

  Show blank (non-printing) Characters: CTRL + SHIFT + *.

  
  

• Repeated blank characters that need to be removed and replaced are:

  • Paragraph marks

    

  • Manual line break marks

    

  • Tab Characters

    

  • Spaces

    

To remove and replace repeated paragraph marks (and manual line break marks)

• Delete unnecessary blank characters

• Select the remaining single paragraph mark (or select the single paragraph)

• On the Page Layout Tab, in the Paragraph Group, select the Spacing options for Before and/or After the selected paragraph. (e.g., If the font is 12pt high, and 4 blank lines After are to be replaced, set After to 48pt).

Note: There should be only one paragraph marker per paragraph, as a general rule.

Note: To control different types of paragraph spacing for a large document, it is easiest to use the Paragraph settings in Styles.

To remove and replace repeated Tab Characters and Spaces used for indenting text

• Delete unnecessary blank characters

• Select the paragraph

• On the Page Layout Tab, in the Paragraph Group, select the Indent options for the selected paragraph.

Note: It may be useful to show the Ruler when setting indents: In the View Tab in the Show Group, Select Ruler.

Note: To control different types of Indents for a large document, it is easiest to use the Paragraph settings in Styles.

To remove and replace repeated Tab Characters and Spaces used for setting columns

• Delete unnecessary blank characters and move any errant text so that it becomes one continuous paragraph

  
  
  
  

• Select the paragraph

  
  
  
  

• On the Page Layout Tab, in the Page Setup Group, select Columns. Choose a preconfigured option from the list, or choose More Columns… to set your own column preferences.

  
  
  
  

• If More Columns… is chose, the Columns dialog box appears. Set your preferences in the dialog box.

  
  
  
  
  

• The selected text is correctly set in columns.

  
  

Note: Setting paragraphs of text in columns also divides the content into sections. Section break characters will also appear if non-printing Characters are showing: CTRL + ALT + SHIFT + C.

Note: Setting paragraphs of text in columns also divides the content into sections. Section break characters will also appear if non-printing Characters are showing: CTRL + SHIFT + *.

Use paragraph spacing settings instead of carriage returns when additional line spacing is needed between paragraphs.

Correct:

(Select the image to download example file in MS Word format)

Incorrect:

(Select the image to download example file in MS Word format)

Use paragraph spacing settings instead of carriage returns when additional line spacing is needed between paragraphs.

Excess carriage returns are spoken by screen readers, interfering with normal reading.

Legal References

508 references:

1194.31(b).

WCAG references:

WCAG-AAA: 1.4.8.

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