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Re: PDFs that read one word per line

for

From: E.J. Zufelt
Date: Jan 28, 2010 8:12AM

Good morning,

I think that it is great that Adobe works with AT vendors like NVDA to
assist in making Adobe products accessible to a greater number of
individuals.

Not to detract from the former, however, another barrier to
information accessibility are training facilities who teach one
assistive technology to the virtual exclusion of any other. This
obviously works reasonably well if the students have access to the
technology on which they are being trained. But is less helpful for
students who cannot afford to acquire the technology for personal use
after they have completed the training.

Thanks,
Everett

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On 28-Jan-10, at 9:46 AM, Andrew Kirkpatrick wrote:

> Well, one thing that we can and are doing is work with free tools
> such as NVDA so that there are additional options for users...
> Andrew Kirkpatrick
> Senior Product Manager, Accessibility
> Adobe Systems
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <EMAIL REMOVED> < <EMAIL REMOVED>
> >
> To: Webaim Forum < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
> Sent: Thu Jan 28 06:42:26 2010
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] PDFs that read one word per line
>
>> I guess Adobe
>> and some screen tool vendors have more work to do to provide better
>> "accessibility support".
>
> Adobe are doing their bit and so are vendors of screen readers and
> other assistive technologies. For example, PDFs produced with the
> latest Adobe Acrobat and read using the latest JAWS are accessible for
> most types of content, although, as Michael points out, there are some
> unexplained inconsistencies in behaviour. For the most part, the
> responsibility now lies with the producers of PDF documents to do two
> things:
>
> 1. Make new PDFs as accessible as possible using these latest tools.
> 2. Make alternative and equitable arrangements for people who will
> still not be able to access these new PDFs, on account of not having
> access to the latest assistive technologies.
>
> Of course users themselves have a responsibility to acquire and learn
> to use the latest technologies if they are available and affordable.
> The problem is affordability. These assistive technologies cost a lot
> and many people with disabilities are unemployed or on very low
> incomes and do not have grant assistance. There's not a lot that
> Adobe, the assistive technology vendors or PDF authors can do about
> that.
>
> Mark
>
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