Announcing BANA Braille 2026

September 28, 2026

BANA Braille 2026 was first included with DBT 15.1 for Windows. DBT 15.1 SR2 includes an important update to BANA Braille 2026. We urge any customers with DBT 15.1 to download and install the second service release to update BANA Braille 2026.

Installation

Follow these instructions for most seamless installation of the updated template.

Quit Microsoft® Word, if it is running. DBT cannot not complete the template installation if Word is running.
Run DBT 15.1
Select Check for Updates from the Help menu.
You will be brought to a web page giving a link to the installer for DBT 15.1 SR2.
Quit DBT 15.1 before installing the service release.
Use the link on the web page to download and install DBT 15.1 SR2.
Start DBT. You may run it directly from the installer, when prompted, or run it after the installation has completed.
When prompted to install the BANA template, choose Yes. This step will not work if Word is running.
If more than one user uses this computer with DBT and the BANA Braille Template for Word, repeat the last two steps for each additional user.

Once you have installed the template, be sure to install SWIFT 5.9 as well. The two are made to work together. Remove any earlier versions of SWIFT before installing SWIFT 5.9.

When you have completed this installation procedure for Word and DBT, you have an updated BANA Braille 2026 template for Word and a corresponding template update for DBT.

To make use of this template, go to the Options dialog in SWIFT (the Braille tab in Word) and select BANA Braille 2026.dotx in the BANA Template control. Then press OK.

If you have existing documents already attached to the BANA Braille template, you should update these by reselecting the template using the first button control on the Braille tab.

A list of changes to the updated BANA Braille templates is given below, along with some other technical details.

Changes to BANA 2026

This description applies to combined use of the BANA Braille 2026 Template, SWIFT 5.9, and DBT 15.1 SR2.

SWIFT 5.9 is required to access the BANA Braille 2026 template.

The BANA Braille 2026 template is installed into the STARTUP folder instead of the Templates folder. Do not move it to the Templates folder, or duplicate it in the Templates folder.

Microsoft changed the way some styles were handled when attaching the template. The styles no longer had the basic Word appearance of how braille would be formatted, even though DBT formatted the styles correctly. Dozens of styles have been rebuilt to fix this problem.

Hierarchy styles (Contents, Exercise, Glossary, Index, List, Plays, Poetry) are working correctly in Word again. After the first item in the series, adjust a level by using the shortcuts ALT+SHIFT+Right Arrow and ALT+SHIFT+Left Arrow.

List menu: List Bullet (black circle) and List Bullet 2 (white circle) are added to the menu. List Bullet (CTRL+SHIFT+L) is formatted as 1-3, and changes to 1-5 when List Bullet 2 is used within the list. List Bullet 2 format is 3-5 (used in conjunction with List Bullet).
Note: The only bullet in Word’s Bullet Library that translates correctly is the black circle bullet. These List Bullet styles provide a quick style-based solution for the black and white circle bullets when needed. Another option are the bullet characters in the UEB group, used with a List style.

Some Page Setups were not working. They are now.

TN codes are working again.

Use one of the Centered styles whenever centered text is needed.

The blank line is correctly inserted between Heading 1 and Directions.

Styles Gallery on the Home tab: Modify as desired (currently displays Directions, Exercise 1, Heading 1, Heading 2, Heading 3, Normal). When modifying, decide if it is for a single document, or customizing the template and all future documents.

Styles Pane: Modify as desired. It is set up to display styles In use and Alphabetical (Alphabetical also means styles are in alphabetical order when using other style dialogs, such as find/replace for styles). This setting also hides styles that may never be needed in the current document or when using a different template (such as seeing math styles in a non-Nemeth document).