WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: A case for artifacting bullets in unordered lists in PDFs

for

From: Priti Rohra
Date: Jul 23, 2013 8:40AM

Hi,

As a screenreader user i need bullets to differentiate between list
items of an unordered list.

As an a11y consultant, i'll recommend to add actual text (bullet)
within the lbl tag to inform jaws to read the same.

HTH.

Regards,
Priti.



On 7/23/13, Jonathan Metz < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Currently I¹m working with someone who insists that unordered lists should
> have a <Lbl> in the tag tree if there is a graphic or glyph representing
> the Œbullet¹ character. My approach to unordered lists in PDFs is to
> artifact the bullet character. The only places I can back up this idea is
> from brief mention from CommonLook
> (http://www.commonlook.com/docs-commonlook-pdf-lists#lbl) that directs "If
> the bullet character itself provides no additional meaning, bullets in
> unordered lists should be marked as artifacts,² and the PDF/UA Technical
> Implementation Guide
> (http://www.aiim.org/Research-and-Publications/standards/committees/PDFUA/T
> echnical-Implementation-Guide) under 7.6 Lists, ³In such cases the
> graphics objects representing the list's labels should not be contained in
> the logical structure and should be marked as Artifacts.²
>
> This is all well and good, but it doesn¹t answer my client¹s complaint
> that if JAWS comes across a bulleted list, it¹s difficult to differentiate
> the different List Item elements on the page. Is there a way that AT is
> 'supposed' to interpret unordered lists? If we go with my preference, how
> does the average AT user typically acknowledge separate list item elements
> on a page? The problem is, while it would be great to have every PDF we
> make conform to ISO 14289; technically they only need to conform to
> Section 508. Worse, the only reference to handling lists from WCAG (which
> Section 508 Refresh is essentially going to mirror) can be found at
> http://www.w3.org/TR/2012/NOTE-WCAG20-TECHS-20120103/PDF21.
>
> This page has the worst recommendation for creating lists. First it
> suggests that using the list button on the ribbon as the "easiest way to
> ensure that lists are formatted correctly when they are converted to PDF².
> It doesn¹t actually, since it throws the label element in with the <Lbody>
> whenever one exports a list from Word. The user always has to edit those
> elements in the tag tree later. It even goes so far as to show screenshots
> of what happens when you do that. The worst part of this Œtechnique¹ is
> that it mentions the List Elements, but completely fails to explain what
> to do with any of them.
>
> Any way, any help would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Jonathan
>
>
>
>
> > > >