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From: England, Kristina
Date: Mon, Dec 19 2016 9:26AM
Subject: Microsoft Publisher Accessibility - Reading Order
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Hi there,

One of our departments uses Microsoft Publisher for an annual publication. We are training everyone on making file types accessible and I can't find much on reading order with Publisher. I know that you can select to bring text boxes, tables, and media forward or backward on a page but it doesn't seem to have the same capabilities as PowerPoint in being able to view the Selection arrangements to confirm you have everything in the right order. Does anyone know if there's a way to open a pane in publisher to view and confirm the reading order?

Thanks!

Kristina England
University of Massachusetts

From: Chagnon | PubCom
Date: Mon, Dec 19 2016 9:45AM
Subject: Re: Microsoft Publisher Accessibility - Reading Order
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We've tested Publisher every which way from Sunday and have concluded that is lacks accessibility tools of any kind.
No, there isn't any way to control reading order (as you can in Adobe InDesign), so you'll need to correct it in the PDF.

One thing to keep in mind: all software programs record the sequence of steps when the document is created in the source (what was imported and laid out first, then second, etc.), and this becomes the architectural/structural reading order in the exported PDF (as seen in the Order panel, or in the Reflow view).

So you can control the tag reading order by being more careful as to what you bring into the layout fist, then second, etc.--which is nearly impossible to do in desktop publishing!

Our recommendation to clients: use Adobe InDesign instead. And if you must use Publisher, be prepared to do extensive remediation of the PDF file, especially to correct tags and reading orders.

--Bevi Chagnon

PS: and we have upcoming classes in creating accessible PDFs from InDesign.

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Bevi Chagnon | www.PubCom.com
Technologists, Consultants, Trainers, Designers, and Developers
for publishing & communication
| Acrobat PDF | Print | EPUBS | Sec. 508 Accessibility |
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