In Excel, several voices read numbers & cell coordinates in column E as scientific numbers

[Qchristensen]

Steps to reproduce:

1. Open Excel
2. Move to a cell in column E, for instance, E4
3. Type a number in a cell, eg 5
4. Ensure reporting cell coordinates is checked in NVDA's document formatting.
5. Ensure NVDA is set to use the David, Zira or Mark OneCore voice, or the David SAPI 5 voice.
6. Navigate away and then back to the cell.

Actual behavior:

NVDA reads the number and cell co-ordinates as a scientific number.
For the number 5 in the cell E4, NVDA reads "5 times 10 to the power of 4".

Expected behavior:

For the number 5 in the cell E4, NVDA should read "5 E4".

System configuration:

NVDA Installed/portable/running from source:

Installed

NVDA version:

2018.3.2

Windows version:

10 fast insider 18272.1000

Name and version of other software in use when reproducing the issue:

Office 365 Version:
16.0.11001.20093

Other information about your system:

Other questions:

Does the issue still occur after restarting your PC?

Yes

Have you tried any other versions of NVDA?

Tried on Windows 7, however, I only have the Microsoft Anna SAPI 5 voice available on that system and she reads numbers in column E correctly.

[lvimalchandran]

Hi NVDA Team,
I see this issue raised in 2018. just wanted to follow up whether is there any update provided (in new release.) for this bug.

Thanks, Vimal.

[Qchristensen]

This is actually one which needs a fix more from Microsoft's side than ours, as it is how their synthesizers read the information passed to them, however just testing this again, Windows OneCore seems to work correctly now. SAPI5 still reads "5 times 10 to the power of 4" in the above scenario.

A workaround for this is to create a dictionary entry to change:

E[0-9]
to
E,[0-9]
and set it to "Regular expression".

I'm going to follow this up with Microsoft. I expect they may not be working on SAPI 5 fixes anymore as they will encourage everyone to use OneCore, but I'll try to get an answer one way or the other and then close this if that is the case.

[bdorer]

Hi @Qchristensen is there a way to tell microsoft spelling mistakes for onecore? I ask because there are many uggly mistakes but they don't answer on public channels. Sorry for beeing off topic. Am 23.07.2020 um 10:33 schrieb Quentin Christensen:

…

This is actually one which needs a fix more from Microsoft's side than ours, as it is how their synthesizers read the information passed to them, however just testing this again, Windows OneCore seems to work correctly now. SAPI5 still reads "5 times 10 to the power of 4" in the above scenario. A workaround for this is to create a dictionary entry to change: E[0-9] to E,[0-9] and set it to "Regular expression". I'm going to follow this up with Microsoft. I expect they may not be working on SAPI 5 fixes anymore as they will encourage everyone to use OneCore, but I'll try to get an answer one way or the other and then close this if that is the case. — You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#8959 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ACV2PZOOPBTJVO4VEOWXNIDR47YV3ANCNFSM4GFII7RA>.

[Qchristensen]

There are a couple of ways you can report issues to Microsoft:

• Via the feedback hub in Windows 10 (press WINDOWS, type "feedback" and it should suggest "Feedback Hub". If something is accessibility related, tag it as an accessibility issue and it will go to their accessibility team rather than just being dealt with as a "regular" issue.
• Via the Disability Answer Desk: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/accessibility/disability-answer-desk

[Qchristensen]

Meanwhile, just on this issue - I take back what I said earlier - if I write "3" in cell E2, OneCore reads it as "3 times 10 squared". Looking in NVDA's speech viewer, it is reading: "3 E2" (3, then two spaces, then E2). The line in the log reads:

IO - speech.speak (12:49:04.775) - MainThread (7236):
Speaking [LangChangeCommand ('en_US'), '3', 'E2']

We have another issue #10318 which is around pausing between different types of information - if something like a comma was inserted between each item to pause, it would also have the effect of breaking up the "3" in this case from "E2", which might also resolve this?

[ehollig]

Hello @Qchristensen. In #8959 (comment) you mention you would follow this issue with Microsoft to file an issue on their side. Are there updates on this?