Comment by layer8
11 hours ago
As the sibling comments illustrate, “hidden text” isn’t well-defined, and it has legitimate purposes that end users consciously make use of. The AI needs access to it, for one because the user might actually want the AI to perform actions on the hidden text (not in the sense of following instructions stated in the hidden text, but in the sense of manipulating the hidden text as part of the document), and also because otherwise it might cause breakage in the document if the AI doesn’t consider the presence of the hidden text when manipulating the document.
What AI tools really need is reliable power-user levels of awareness about Word features, and corresponding structured access.
Maybe the AI doesn’t need access to it by default? It could be hidden behind another tool call.
As mentioned, what constitutes "hidden text" is not well-defined. Is #fffffe on #ffffff "hidden text"? Is text hidden behind an image or behind some other object "hidden text"? Is text outside the visible page boundary "hidden text"? Is text visually cut off in a table cell "hidden text"? Is text at 1 pixel line height "hidden text"?