WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

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Re: PDF files and Section 508 Compliance

for

From: Jon Gunderson
Date: May 16, 2005 8:24AM

If possible try to get to the source documents used to
generate the PDF in the first place and use the accessibility
features of the PDF conversion tools. You will have a much
better chance of getting more accessible PDF from the source
documents than using the make accessible PDF tools. If any of
the source documents are office Word or Powerpoint documents,
you could also create highly accessible HTML versions to
parallel the PDF versions using the Illinois Accessible Web
Publishing Wizard [1]. This would give ALL users an option to
use PDF or HTML versions of the documents. In general the
make accessible tool will have widely varying results on the
accessibility of the pdf, depending on the information in the
PDF document and how much you want to go in and hand edit
accessibility tags in the resulting documents.

Jon

[1] http://www.accessiblewizards.uiuc.edu



---- Original message ----
>Date: Sun, 15 May 2005 20:58:44 -0400
>From: "Sue Kot" < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>Subject: [WebAIM] PDF files and Section 508 Compliance
>To: < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>
> I am in the process of making our educational site
> Section 508 compliant and have found that we
> have over 350 active PDF files present. Some of
> these files cannot be created into an html format
> easily (i.e. college course catalog, etc.). For
> those PDF files where we cannot make an HTML
> alternative easily, is it safe to just go into Adobe
> and run the "Make Accessible" option for them? Any
> insights into similar situations that some of you
> may have run into with PDF's and site accessibility
> issues would be helpful! I'd like to get a handle
> on this and the best route to take in making our
> site compliant. Thanks in advance!
>
> Sue
>________________
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Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
Director of IT Accessibility Services
Campus Information Technologies and Educational Services (CITES)
and
Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
Disability Resources and Education Services (DRES)

Voice: (217) 244-5870
Fax: (217) 333-0248

E-mail: <EMAIL REMOVED>

WWW: http://cita.rehab.uiuc.edu/
WWW: https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/jongund/www/