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Re: Word/PDF accessibility guide

for

From: Ryan E. Benson
Date: Feb 22, 2016 11:51AM

Hi. I have a few trainings, and one is our 15 minutes version, which skips
all the details about why they need to make their documents accessible, and
just covers the 5 things that they can do to get their doc mostly
accessible. Those are
1 use styles for headings
2 add alt text for images and charts
3 don't use color alone to convey meaning
4 use tables correctly. We often see people use tables versus columns and
sometimes tabs/spaces versus a table
5 group images that are together to make up a larger image.

This is a 8 or 9 slide ppt, which I can do in either a 15, 20, or 30 minute
window

Ryan E. Benson
On Feb 22, 2016 10:24 AM, "L Snider" < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

> Thanks Cliff, great resources.
>
> I would like to know more about trying to get MS to do what you suggest in
> terms of the tabs.
>
> Anyone use these with Office 2016?
>
> Cheers
>
> Lisa
>
> On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 12:13 PM, Cliff Tyllick < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>
> > For several years, the Texas Governor's Committee on People with
> > Disabilities has maintained a set of tutorials on creating accessible
> > documents in Microsoft Word 2010:
> > http://gov.texas.gov/disabilities/accessibledocs
> >
> > These tutorials are based on using the Productivity tab (originally
> called
> > the Accessibility tab; many of us switched to calling it Productivity
> when
> > we realized the DAISY Consortium had created their own Accessibility tab
> to
> > optimize use of their reader with Word). When followed, they produce Word
> > documents that have the features needed to create PDFs that are almost
> > fully accessible. (No matter how well you build the Word document, there
> > always seem to be a few things to clean up in the PDF. In particular,
> > tables can be made much more accessible in PDF than is possible in Word.)
> >
> > Our Productivity tab was developed from our Accessibility toolbar for
> Word
> > 2003, the first interface I am aware of that includes only commands that
> > support the creation of accessible documents. Changing the interface to
> > ensure that authors and editors have ready access to commands that
> support
> > accessibility is essential. And it's as important to get rid of the
> > electronic equivalent of kindergarten tools—the different-colored
> crayons,
> > the fatter markers, the safety scissors, and the pot of paste—that are so
> > easy to use but cause the document to be inaccessible.
> >
> > We have just started working on updating these tutorials. If you have any
> > suggestions for improving them (I know they're not perfect; your comments
> > will help us make sure errors don't get repeated), please send them to me
> > and to Mike Moore, who also regularly participates in this forum.
> >
> > Our tab and instructions for installing it are available with the
> > tutorials for free. You may also freely modify this tab to remove
> features
> > that you don't need and add others that you do.
> >
> > Vision Australia has created a product called the Document Accessibility
> > Toolbar, which must be installed as a template:
> >
> >
> https://www.visionaustralia.org/business-and-professionals/digital-access-consulting/resources/document-accessibility-toolbar
> >
> > Their toolbar (actually a tab in Word's ribbon, named Accessibility) has
> a
> > number of features I like. For one, it can export Word to clean HTML, so
> > the people who contribute content to your website can write with Word and
> > the developer can quickly load the content as HTML. (Oddly enough,
> although
> > the macro correctly changes italicized text to <em> and bold text to
> > <strong>, it strips out the Word styles of Emphasis and Strong, rendering
> > that content as unformatted text. But it is a beta, and they, too, are
> > eager for your suggestions for improving it.)
> >
> > Although the beta version of the Document Accessibility Toolbar is being
> > distributed for free, you must also get a license—either a single-user
> > license or a multi-user license. When asked, they insisted that we not
> > modify this tab to add features our authors need. Your results may vary.
> >
> > Both of these tools are based on the same concepts:
> > ' No matter how poorly it actually works, people will use a tool that is
> > easy to find.
> > ' No matter how much they need the results that only it can provide,
> > people generally will not use a tool that they cannot easily find.
> > ' Once people find a toolkit that seems to work okay, they rarely if ever
> > try to find tools it lacks.
> >
> > Late last year I emailed Microsoft's Accessibility team about the need to
> > provide this kind of an interface as one of the standard tabs in Word.
> (I'd
> > call it the Professional tab so even people who know nothing about
> > accessibility would use it.) I need to follow up with them, because I
> have
> > had no response. Maybe if they hear the same request from many different
> > people they will respond.
> >
> > If you'd like to collaborate in this effort, please contact me. I will be
> > at CSUN, so maybe we could find time to discuss and plan there.
> >
> > Cliff Tyllick
> > Accessibility Specialist
> > Texas Department of Assistive and Rehabilitative Services
> > 512-377-0366
> >
> >
> >
> > > > >