PDF Accessibility
Acrobat X and Accessibility

What's new in Acrobat X?

There are quite a few new and improved accessibility features in Acrobat X, including the following:

• Introduction of the Action Wizard, which guides users through complex processes, including the creation of accessible PDF files.
• Better conversion from PDF into other formats, especially Word files.
• Improved form field detection. If you create a form in a program like Word, Acrobat does a better job of automatically associating labels to their adjacent form fields.
• Improved keyboard accessibility of the Acrobat interface itself.
• The ability to create accessible PDF Portfolios.

Highlight content

One of the first things you should do in the tags panel is to select the Highlight Content in the Options () menu. When this option is checked, selecting a tag should highlight the corresponding text, image, or other element in the PDF file.

Find Tag From Selection

Just as selecting a tag highlights the content in the body of the PDF file, there is a way to accomplish the opposite effect of highlighting the tag that corresponds to selected content. First, click on the Select Tool . Next, select a portion of text, an image, or a table. Finally, select the Options menu at the top of the Tags panel and then select Find Tag From Selection. This will highlight the tag or tags that contain the content you previously selected.

Change tags

At times, you will encounter a PDF file that contains incorrect tags. You can modify these by right-clicking the tag you want to change by selecting Properties, then the Tag tab, and then selecting the appropriate new tag type from the dropdown list labeled Type. For example, to change a tag from <Normal> to <H1>, select the <Normal> tag you want to change and do the following: Right click the tag and select Properties and select Heading Level 1 from the list labeled Type.

Add tags to an untagged document

If you do not see any tags in the tags panel, your document is untagged, and you will need to tag the file. To add tags to an untagged document, choose Tools from the right-hand menu, then select Accessibility > Add Tags to Document. This process can sometimes be extremely time-consuming, and you will almost certainly have to edit some of the tags. Still, it is a start and will probably be faster than doing all the work manually. This is especially true if the document contains tables.

Adding/Changing tags

There are two ways to select an area of text, image, table, or other element using TouchUp Reading Order.

1. Drag a box around an element using the crosshairs that have replaced the default pointer. It is sometimes difficult to select exactly the right area, but it is a little easier if you try drawing a box that is slightly larger than the element. Once you have selected a new element, you can assign some of the most common tags to that element by clicking on one of the several buttons.
2. You can also select everything within a box by clicking on the number in the top-left corner.

Now that you have selected the text, you can assign a tag by clicking on the corresponding button. Once you select a button, Acrobat will place the selected content in the appropriate tag. If you have the Tags panel open, you can view these changes instantly.

While in TouchUp Reading Order, you can also assign alternate text to images by Right-clicking on the image and choosing Edit Alternate Text.

Order Panel

The order panel allows you to change the reading order of the content on the page so it matches the visual reading order. To open the Order panel, select or View > Show/Hide > Navigation Panes >Order or select Show Order Panel in the TouchUp Reading Order tool.

At first glance, it resembles the Tags panel, but there are a few differences.

• The document is divided into pages.
• Each element is numbered, and the numbers start over on each page.
• There is no hierarchy of elements; everything is on the same level.

These differences help make the Order panel a much easier way to reorder tags. To change the reading order of an element, just click and drag the tag to the location that reflects the correct reading order. This new order will be reflected in the Tags panel and when the document is viewed in Reflow mode.

Alternative text

The easiest way to add alternative text is with the TouchUp Reading Order tool. When an image is tagged as an image (or figure), the alternative text will appear next to the image. If it has no alternative text, the caption will read "Figure - No alternate text exists."

To add alternative text, Right click on the image and select Edit Alternate Text. Enter the appropriate alternative text in the dialog box.

Table Inspector

The Table Inspector allows you to easily identify and assign scope to table headers.

With the TouchUp Reading Order tool open, select a table and then select Table Inspector. You can now select table cells that should be headers. Right click on a selected cell or cells and choose Table Cell Properties. A dialog box will appear.

If the selected cell(s) needs to be tagged as a header, select the Header Cell option and assign a scope of either Row or Column. After selecting OK, you will notice that the table header cells will be highlighted in red and the data cells will be highlighted in gray.

Artifacts

Artifacts are elements that are ignored by a screen reader, much like an image with empty alternative text in HTML is ignored. Important text should never be labeled as an artifact. As with alternative text, the easiest way to change an element to or from an artifact is with the TouchUp Reading Order tool. Select the element and press the Background button to make it an artifact.

To search for artifacts, go to the Tags panel and select Options > Find. A window will appear with several search options. Artifact is the default search, so click Find. If there are any artifacts, the search will identify them and allow you to change them to other elements.

To change a tag to an artifact in the tags panel, right click on the item and select Change Tag to Artifact.

Convert Scanned Text

Before you can create a tagged PDF, you must first ensure that the PDF contains real text. If it does not, you must either reconvert it to Acrobat (if you have the original file) or convert it to text. To convert the document, select Tools in the right-hand column, then select Recognize Text. The quality of the text depends on the quality of the source document. The conversion is usually fairly good, but you should probably clean up the document by selecting Find All Suspects in the Recognize Text submenu.

Quick Check

Acrobat Professional includes two different Accessibility Checks. The first, the Quick Check, is not as helpful as it might sound. The Quick Check basically tells you whether the file has tags or not. It doesn't identify even the most basic errors, such as missing alternate text. To run a Quick Check select Tools in the right-hand column, then Accessibility > Quick Check.

Full Check

The Advanced Check (Tools in the right-hand column, > Advanced > Accessibility > Full Check) is a more detailed accessibility check. Although it is more complete than the Quick Check, it is far from complete. Still, it identifies features such as missing alternate text and offers hints on how to repair some errors.

Reflow

As with HTML, a screen reader will read a PDF document by the order of its tags, but the order of the tags in a PDF may not be the same as the visual reading order. This is especially likely if the PDF contains multiple columns or other blocks of text or complex nested lists. The Reflow Tool will allow you to see the visual order of the document’s content as determined by the order of the tags.

Select View > Zoom > Reflow or Ctrl + 4. If the document does not appear in the correct order while in Reflow view, the order of the tags will need to be changed.

Read Out Loud

Read Out Loud is a voice synthesizer that is available in Adobe Reader and Acrobat. It allows you to have the content of a PDF document read to you, approximating what a screen reader user might encounter. For more information, see the Read Out Loud section in the WebAIM article on Adobe Reader.

Action Wizard

One of the most exciting new features in Acrobat X is the Action Wizard. It helps automate multi-step processes, like the creation of an Accessible PDF. The Action Wizard will not make an inaccessible PDF file accessible, but it will help guide you through the necessary steps to ensure that the content is accessible.

To use the action wizard to create an accessible PDF file, select Tools in the right-hand column, then select Action Wizard > Create Accessible PDFs. The wizard will guide you through five steps:

1. Add Document Description
2. Instructions
3. Remove Hidden Information
4. Add Tags to Document
5. Accessibility Check (Full)

If each of these steps is completed successfully, the final PDF should be accessible. Custom Action Wizards can also be created (e.g., scanned document to accessible PDF).