I'm over 80. My only phone just died.
I just bought an ATT CL84207 desk set which came with minuscule 5"x7"
manual.
Fortunately an ATT site has PDFs of manuals.

*HOWEVER* only BOLD text is in a saturated image.
All other text is in a marginally readable pale grey.

Is the a PDF reader in Debian repository that will coerce ALL text to
appear as a saturated black?
I assume ATT set things up to treat everything as an image.
If I get something with readable characters, all illustrations will just
be black blobs. That is OK as paper copy that came with phone is usable.
Also Atril can display those images adequately.

Help please.

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On 6/2/25 2:03 PM, Van Snyder wrote:

On Mon, 2025-06-02 at 13:39 -0500, Richard Owlett wrote:

I'm over 80. My only phone just died.
I just bought an ATT CL84207 desk set which came with minuscule 5"x7"
manual.
Fortunately an ATT site has PDFs of manuals.

*HOWEVER* only BOLD text is in a saturated image.
All other text is in a marginally readable pale grey.

Is the a PDF reader in Debian repository that will coerce ALL text to
appear as a saturated black?
I assume ATT set things up to treat everything as an image.
If I get something with readable characters, all illustrations will
just
be black blobs. That is OK as paper copy that came with phone is
usable.
Also Atril can display those images adequately.

Help please.

If the PDF is images, there's (IIRC) a program called "ocrmypdf" to
turn it into text, which you can then read in your favorite editor.

There is such a file for my version of Debian.
Its webpage looked interesting.
Just installed it.
Now to read the docs ;}

If it's text in PDF, maybe LibreOffice can help.

I opened the PDF with LibreOffice DRAW.
Experimented with "Viewing" a region as "Greyscale" or "Black and White"
rather than the default of "Color" looks promising.
Time for more documentation reading ;}

If RETIREMENT isn't for learning, "What use is it?"

After my initial post, I discovered readability of the dim grey type was
in some sense easier when blew up image further by choosing "Fit Width"
rather than "Fit Height" in Atril.

THANKS

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Perhaps, for the hardcopy manual, buying a pair of reading glasses
might help.

I think it's safe to assume that people above 50 years old know about
reading glasses. 🙂


Stefan

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On 3/6/25 02:39, Richard Owlett wrote:

I'm over 80. My only phone just died.
I just bought an ATT CL84207 desk set which came with minuscule 5"x7"
manual.
Fortunately an ATT site has PDFs of manuals.

*HOWEVER* only BOLD text is in a saturated image.
All other text is in a marginally readable pale grey.

Is the a PDF reader in Debian repository that will coerce ALL text to
appear as a saturated black?
I assume ATT set things up to treat everything as an image.
If I get something with readable characters, all illustrations will just
be black blobs. That is OK as paper copy that came with phone is usable.
Also Atril can display those images adequately.

Help please.

Perhaps, for the hardcopy manual, buying a pair of reading glasses might
help.

Here, reading glasses (not prescription glasses, although, it may be
best to consult an optometrist, to find the best magnification for you)
are available in varying magnifications, from 1.5x to about 3.0x
magnification, and, using such spectacles, can make a significant
difference, when reading ridiculously small fonts.

..
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
(UTC+0800)
..............

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On 3/6/25 03:25, Stefan Monnier wrote:

Perhaps, for the hardcopy manual, buying a pair of reading glasses
might help.

I think it's safe to assume that people above 50 years old know about
reading glasses. 🙂

Stefan

Sometimes, the obvious might not occur to us.

Due to a persistent chronic medical condition, in the course of
referrals to specialists, I was referred to an optometrist, as loss of
sight is one of the possible consequences of the condition. Amongst
other things that the optometrist said to me, I was recommended to try a particular magnification level of reading glasses. I had never used
spectacles before, and, was the only one of my siblings (and my parents,
also had needed spectacles), who had not needed spectacles. I had seen
reading glasses for sale, of the different magnification levels, at
pharmacies, but, did not take the step, until the recommendation from
the optometrist. I have found the 1.5x magnification level (the level recommended by the optometrist) to be quite helpful, in reading
ridiculously small print fonts, including in user manuals and nutrition information on foods and diet supplements, and other ridiculously small
font print information that is designed to be illegible.

Whilst I do not doubt that almost everyone is aware of reading glasses,
I believe that most people tend to regard them as only devices for use
upon prescription, and, reading glasses can be beneficial, without prescription.

I was merely suggesting something that I had found helpful, that might
not occur to everyone - using reading glasses had not occurred to me, as
being necessary, until the recommendation from the optometrist.

..
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
(UTC+0800)
..............

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On 6/2/25 2:25 PM, Stefan Monnier wrote:

Perhaps, for the hardcopy manual, buying a pair of reading glasses
might help.

I think it's safe to assume that people above 50 years old know about
reading glasses. 🙂

ROFL - Been wearing tri-focals since my 30's.
Also have wicked astigmatism correct that eliminates trying to use "off
the shelf" "reading glasses".

But for many Bret's comments could be useful.


But

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Richard Owlett <rowlett@access.net> wrote:

On 6/2/25 2:03 PM, Van Snyder wrote:

On Mon, 2025-06-02 at 13:39 -0500, Richard Owlett wrote:

I'm over 80. My only phone just died.
I just bought an ATT CL84207 desk set which came with minuscule
5"x7" manual.
Fortunately an ATT site has PDFs of manuals.

*HOWEVER* only BOLD text is in a saturated image.
All other text is in a marginally readable pale grey.

[snip]

If it's text in PDF, maybe LibreOffice can help.

I found the PDF manual online. Assuming it's the same one, the PDF is
indeed text rather than images-for-text. As such you can zoom the text
in atril to at least 400%. You can also invert the colours, which may
increase the contrast. Assuming you can see tolerably well, it's
difficult to see how that is unreadable. I'm not 80 yet, but I'm pretty
close to the legal definition of blind here, and I can see pretty well.

I opened the PDF with LibreOffice DRAW.
Experimented with "Viewing" a region as "Greyscale" or "Black and
White" rather than the default of "Color" looks promising.

As said, LO Draw allows much greater magnification and can transform
into black and white.

Time for more documentation reading ;}

If RETIREMENT isn't for learning, "What use is it?"

After my initial post, I discovered readability of the dim grey type
was in some sense easier when blew up image further by choosing "Fit
Width" rather than "Fit Height" in Atril.

THANKS

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On 3/6/25 03:44, Richard Owlett wrote:

If RETIREMENT isn't for learning, "What use is it?"

I believe that the whole of life is an education, for people willing to
learn.

"The more we know, the more we know the little we know."

..
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
(UTC+0800)
..............

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On Mon 02 Jun 2025 at 21:28:50 (+0100), debian-user@howorth.org.uk wrote:

Richard Owlett <rowlett@access.net> wrote:

On 6/2/25 2:03 PM, Van Snyder wrote:

On Mon, 2025-06-02 at 13:39 -0500, Richard Owlett wrote:

I'm over 80. My only phone just died.
I just bought an ATT CL84207 desk set which came with minuscule
5"x7" manual.
Fortunately an ATT site has PDFs of manuals.

*HOWEVER* only BOLD text is in a saturated image.
All other text is in a marginally readable pale grey.

[snip]

If it's text in PDF, maybe LibreOffice can help.

I found the PDF manual online. Assuming it's the same one, the PDF is
indeed text rather than images-for-text. As such you can zoom the text
in atril to at least 400%. You can also invert the colours, which may
increase the contrast.

https://att.vtp-media.com/products/CL/CL84XX7/CL84XX7_CIB_i6.0_20190821.pdf

Okular has various options of changing document's colors, including inverting colors, changing page color, changing light and dark colors and so on. See "Okular > menu > Settings > Configure Okular > Accessibility > Change colors" .

I tried https://att.vtp-media.com/products/CL/CL84XX7/CL84XX7_CIB_i6.0_20190821.pdf with the "Invert colors" option and it seems pretty readable to me, definitely more readable than  with the original colors.

Regards,

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Richard Owlett <rowlett@access.net> wrote:

On 6/2/25 2:25 PM, Stefan Monnier wrote:

Perhaps, for the hardcopy manual, buying a pair of reading glasses
might help.

I think it's safe to assume that people above 50 years old know about reading glasses. 🙂

ROFL - Been wearing tri-focals since my 30's.
Also have wicked astigmatism correct that eliminates trying to use "off
the shelf" "reading glasses".

But for many Bret's comments could be useful.

Yes!

I have prescription glasses for general use that correct mild
astigmatism and allow me to do most things (including reading the
newspaper etc.) without problems.

However +4 or even +5 'reading glasses' are very useful for me when
doing things like soldering and other close D-I-Y type things.

Reading glasses are **very** cheap, between £1 and £5 hereabouts so I
have pairs scattered all over the place.

(Oh, I'm approaching 80, so well above "50 years old")

--
Chris Green
·

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