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Re: How do organizations deal with turning large quantities of pdf and word documents accessible?

for

From: chaals
Date: Mar 10, 2017 5:05AM

Hi Ayelet,

I have to say that the usual answer to your question is "badly" :( It's actually a complex problem in most cases.

In an ideal world, there would be enough budget to just convert everything, which would provide a better market for accessibility-aware conversion tools, make a lot of jobs available and rapidly increase the level of accessibility knowledge among a large number of people who do those jobs. But that isn't a scenario I see in practice :(

Where the original documents have some common style, you can make it easier, by using a conversion tool that actually recognises the various styles, and can explicitly add the structures they implicitly represent.

Dealing with graphics in particular is usually really hard.

If you have access to source material used to generate graphics, you might be able to process classes of information - tables of data, flowcharts, sets of instructions *may* be sufficiently well structured to automate a basic level of conversion.

Many realistic scenarios mean you'll need to set up a process for "on-demand" development of accessible versions of something when someone actually needs it.

Anything like good practice includes a method to verify and accept accessibility improvements into your content, to minimise redundant effort.

On the plus side, there is a lot of opportunity to demonstrate a really good solution to a complex problem that many people haven't managed very satisfactorily :)

cheers

10.03.2017, 12:14, "Ayelet Abraham" < <EMAIL REMOVED> >:
> Dear fellow forum memebers,
>
> Im working at the moment with a large institution that has to turn
> thousands of graphicaly complex documents accessible. It is a key question
> how to tackle this task.
>
> I would be happy to hear from your experience how can such large quantities
> be made accessible? Is it feasable? what would you suggest the best
> solution?
>
> Thank you,
>
> Dr.Ayelet Abraham
> Accessibility specialist
> *Migdalor (Lighthouse) - Multi service rehabilitation center for the
> blind, **Israel*
> > > > -- 
Charles McCathie Nevile - standards - Yandex
<EMAIL REMOVED> - - - Find more at http://yandex.com