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Thread: PDF accessibility
Number of posts in this thread: 10 (In chronological order)
From: Jean Marc Sfeir
Date: Fri, Oct 30 2015 6:52AM
Subject: PDF accessibility
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Hello,
I am working on making PDFs from my organisation more accessible. As we have a very large amount of documents, I would like to make sure of what is really mandatory to help visually impared, and what isn't. So far, I think that the 5 elements listed below are the most important. Does anyone thinks we are missing something really important?
- Define title of document and show it
- Define heading titles
- Mark background images as background
- Links from real words, and not "click here"
- Image alt text
Thank you very much for your opinion.
Jean-Marc Sfeir
EURORDIS
From: Duff Johnson
Date: Fri, Oct 30 2015 8:54AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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> I am working on making PDFs from my organisation more accessible. As we have a very large amount of documents, I would like to make sure of what is really mandatory to help visually impared, and what isn't. So far, I think that the 5 elements listed below are the most important. Does anyone thinks we are missing something really important?
>
> - Define title of document and show it
> - Define heading titles
> - Mark background images as background
> - Links from real words, and not "click here"
> - Image alt text
>
> Thank you very much for your opinion.
Off-the-cuff, if I was to make a list of the 5 "most important" things, and assuming these are documents and not forms, the list might look more like:
1 Ensure PDF documents are tagged
2 Ensure all semantically significant content is tagged
3 Ensure the tags are in the correct logical reading order
4 Ensure the tags are semantically correct
5 Ensure content tagged as <Figure> includes alternative text, or ActualText, as appropriate
Duff.
From: Karlen Communications
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 4:49AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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I agree with Duff. I would add a 6th unless I could associate it with number 2. The language has to be correct for the content. For example if a paragraph is in French or Spanish, the Tag Properties, language attribute for that paragraph must be French or Spanish.
Cheers, Karen
From: Chagnon | PubCom.com
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 8:37AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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We can specify the language for the entire PDF in the File/Properties dialogue.
But I don't believe there's a way in Acrobat Pro to specify that a particular paragraph (or any amount of selected text) uses a particular language.
Or have I missed a new feature in the latest version of Acrobat?
Let us know if that's possible!
And I, too, agree with Duff on the priorities. The Title and other metadata settings, meaningful links, and artifacting background images should also be done, but when overlooked, they usually don't provoke an insurmountable barrier to AT users that prevent them from using and understanding a PDF.
Duff's list are the core requirements for accessibility. Without them, you don't have an accessible PDF.
--Bevi Chagnon
From: Duff Johnson
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 8:50AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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> We can specify the language for the entire PDF in the File/Properties dialogue.
Yes.
> But I don't believe there's a way in Acrobat Pro to specify that a particular paragraph (or any amount of selected text) uses a particular language.
Simply set the "Lang" attribute on the structure element of your choosing…
> Or have I missed a new feature in the latest version of Acrobat?
> Let us know if that's possible!
It's been there since 2001. :-)
In Acrobat, language is set in the Object Properties dialog for your selected tag.
Duff.
From: Karlen Communications
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 9:01AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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We've had the ability to assign a language to a Tag for a long time...I think from the beginning of tagged PDF but don't quote me on that.
Select the Tag, for example <P> and right click or press the APpKey. Choose Properties and near the bottom of the dialog I'd the Language edit box.
When adaptive technology comes across the Content, my screen reader/JAWS switched synthesized voice to read the content as per the assigned language. Other AT should do this as well.
I recommend using plain vanilla language attributed like English, French or Spanish instead of localized language attributes.
The reason is that, for example English, I use a British voice. If the assigned language for the document it a Tag is English-US, my voice switches to American pronunciations which I'm not used to hearing. It takes me a while to get used to the pronunciations which affects comprehension. Same thing if someone is using American voice and is forced to listen to British pronunciations.
You can also affect the language of Alt Text on a <Figure> Tag but as of now we don't have the ability to assign language attributes to pieces of Alt Text. I foun the need to do this for people's names.
Cheers, Karen
Sent from my iPad
> On Oct 31, 2015, at 10:37 AM, Chagnon | PubCom.com < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
>
> We can specify the language for the entire PDF in the File/Properties dialogue.
>
> But I don't believe there's a way in Acrobat Pro to specify that a particular paragraph (or any amount of selected text) uses a particular language.
>
> Or have I missed a new feature in the latest version of Acrobat?
> Let us know if that's possible!
>
> And I, too, agree with Duff on the priorities. The Title and other metadata settings, meaningful links, and artifacting background images should also be done, but when overlooked, they usually don't provoke an insurmountable barrier to AT users that prevent them from using and understanding a PDF.
>
> Duff's list are the core requirements for accessibility. Without them, you don't have an accessible PDF.
>
> --Bevi Chagnon
>
>
From: lcmcevoy
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 9:04AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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What would your list be if it was PDF forms?
On Oct 30, 2015, at 10:54 AM, Duff Johnson < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
>> I am working on making PDFs from my organisation more accessible. As we have a very large amount of documents, I would like to make sure of what is really mandatory to help visually impared, and what isn't. So far, I think that the 5 elements listed below are the most important. Does anyone thinks we are missing something really important?
>>
>> - Define title of document and show it
>> - Define heading titles
>> - Mark background images as background
>> - Links from real words, and not "click here"
>> - Image alt text
>>
>> Thank you very much for your opinion.
>
> Off-the-cuff, if I was to make a list of the 5 "most important" things, and assuming these are documents and not forms, the list might look more like:
>
> 1 Ensure PDF documents are tagged
> 2 Ensure all semantically significant content is tagged
> 3 Ensure the tags are in the correct logical reading order
> 4 Ensure the tags are semantically correct
> 5 Ensure content tagged as <Figure> includes alternative text, or ActualText, as appropriate
>
> Duff.
> > > >
From: Karlen Communications
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 11:20AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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My list would be the same but I would add that the form controls must be accessible.
Be aware that in order for the form controls to be accessible, once you've built the accessibility into the form controls/fields themselves, you THEN Tag the document. You don't add form controls/fields to an already tagged PDF. If you are using a Word document as a template, this is the ONLY time you use Print to PDF to create an untagged PDF. You open the untagged PDF in acrobat Pro and begin adding the form controls. (Unless the document is a scanned document, in which case you perform the text recognition first.)
Here is the hierarchy of tasks that Adobe established years ago and I advocate that clients use:
1. Is the PDF a scanned document? If yes, perform Text Recognition.
2. Is the PDF document a fillable form? If yes, then add the "accessible" form controls/fields.
3. Does the PDF document have links? If yes, then use the Create Links from URL's tools and the Links tool to add them.
4. Does the PDF document have multimedia? If yes, then add the multimedia. I would add that the multimedia itself must be accessible and.
Only THEN do you add Tags to the document and then go through the remediation and/or Quality Assurance process. So the list of basics for the document are the same, but since you are adding another element, the form controls/fields also have to be accessible .
Cheers, Karen
From: Jonathan Avila
Date: Sat, Oct 31 2015 3:33PM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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> Be aware that in order for the form controls to be accessible, once you've built the accessibility into the form controls/fields themselves, you THEN Tag the document. You don't add form controls/fields to an already tagged PDF.
I've added accessible form fields to many already tagged documents. Admittedly it's more work because you have to had the Form OBJR for each field manually via (tags > find > unmarked annotations) but IMO it can be done. In fact, if you check the "tag annotations" item on the tags options menu the form OBJ will be added to the currently selected tag in the tree automatically when you insert the form field. So you would then need to create the form tags and then select them before creating each form field and then you would have tagged accessible form fields after you supply tooltips.
Jonathan
--
Jonathan Avila
Chief Accessibility Officer
SSB BART Group
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From: Chagnon | PubCom.com
Date: Sun, Nov 01 2015 5:02AM
Subject: Re: PDF accessibility
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Ah, thanks for the reminder.
I keep forgetting that setting is there at the bottom of the Properties dialogue box.
I never have documents with different languages used for just one paragraph, they're always "homogenous," that is the entire PDF uses only one language.
--Bevi