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Thread: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
Number of posts in this thread: 7 (In chronological order)
From: Jim Homme
Date: Thu, Apr 04 2019 8:22AM
Subject: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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Hi,
The subject says it. It would be great if I could make an accessible Word form and it would convert well when I turn it into a PDF. Should I do it this way or have someone else do the form in Adobe?
Thanks.
Jim
==========
Jim Homme
Digital Accessibility
Bender Consulting Services
412-787-8567
https://www.benderconsult.com/our%20services/hightest-accessible-technology-solutions
From: chagnon
Date: Thu, Apr 04 2019 8:30AM
Subject: Re: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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Ha ha ha!
Word exports accessible forms to PDF. Such a kidder you are!
Best method:
1. Create the visible "form skeleton" in Word (instructions, visible labels,
etc.), but don't put in the form controls.
2. Use Acrobat Pro's form tools to make it into an accessible PDF form.
-Bevi
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Bevi Chagnon, founder/CEO | = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
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PubCom: Technologists for Accessible Design + Publishing
consulting . training . development . design . sec. 508 services
Upcoming classes at www.PubCom.com/classes (there's a FORMS class on our
schedule!)
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From: Karlen Communications
Date: Thu, Apr 04 2019 8:53AM
Subject: Re: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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I agree. I would also add that you can start with an accessible tagged PDF
and then add your form controls. I've been using this method for about 3
years now and it saves a lot of time.
You just have to remember to add the <Form> Tags for every form control and
make sure that they are in their correct place in the Tags Tree.
Cheers, Karen
From: Morin, Gary (NIH/OD) [E]
Date: Fri, Apr 05 2019 8:59AM
Subject: Re: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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Hi, Bev, Sometimes ya need a good laugh to get through this work!
Do you recommend doing formatting work in Adobe Professional, CommonLook, or where? Is there one, or more, application you find best for working with the well-produced Word file to format into a well accessible PDF? Any tools or programs you avoid?
Gary
From: Jim Homme
Date: Fri, Apr 05 2019 2:19PM
Subject: Re: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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Hi,
Can a screen reader user successfully make form fields and make them accessible in Adobe Pro?
Thanks.
Jim
==========
Jim Homme
Digital Accessibility
Bender Consulting Services
412-787-8567
https://www.benderconsult.com/our%20services/hightest-accessible-technology-solutions
From: Philip Kiff
Date: Fri, Apr 05 2019 3:52PM
Subject: Re: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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In March, I sat in on two webinars on creating Accessible PDF Forms led
by Rob Haverty from Adobe. If I recall correctly, in one session he
mentioned that it isn't currently possible for exclusively screen reader
users to complete all aspects of accessible form creation.
The problem I think is that form fields "float" in the annotations
layer, which doesn't have any landmarks in the tag or content tree. So
there is currently no way for a screen reader to verify or locate the
position of such form fields on the visual page.
Much of the work involved with making a fillable PDF into an accessible
PDF involves creating these floating fields (or locating pre-existing
ones) and tagging them as form fields and then moving those Form tags
into the correct location in the tag tree.
I suppose if you used a very well-formatted Word document as the source
and then used Acrobat to automatically identify form fields, and all the
fields were correctly identified with correctly inferred field names in
the correct order, then you might be able to get away without verifying
the position of any fields or manually inserting any new fields on the
form. But that would be a very exceptional case, I would think.
Phil.
Philip Kiff
D4K Communications
On 2019-04-05 16:19, Jim Homme wrote:
> Hi,
> Can a screen reader user successfully make form fields and make them accessible in Adobe Pro?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Jim
>
>
>
> ==========
> Jim Homme
> Digital Accessibility
> Bender Consulting Services
> 412-787-8567
> https://www.benderconsult.com/our%20services/hightest-accessible-technology-solutions
>
>
From: Karlen Communications
Date: Fri, Apr 05 2019 3:33PM
Subject: Re: Do Word Forms Convert Accessibly To PDF?
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No. We are always in virtual view of a PDF document which is not necessarily
at what can be considered a "cursor point" to place form controls. Creating
an accessible form in a PDF document is a visual, mouse driven activity due
to the nature of the format/document type.
Cheers, Karen