WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Thread: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins

for

Number of posts in this thread: 6 (In chronological order)

From: Donna Blumberg
Date: Fri, Nov 04 2016 8:36PM
Subject: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins
No previous message | Next message →

I'm part of a volunteer team that formed for an annual contest
http://air-rallies.org/; we are building an accessible website for a
nonprofit. Our nonprofit has a website, http://www.autismismedical.com/ which
they want us to redo to be accessible; we are recreating this site in
WordPress. Their content is mostly PDFs of medical articles; that is all
we have to work with. The articles (such as the ones at
http://www.autismismedical.com/gastroenterology.html#sthash.1Wntc5DS.dpbs)
are fairly complex, with tables, images, citations and numerous footnotes.
We're working to convert some of these to WordPress posts; we'll remediate
others as PDFs.

Here are my questions:

- Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to
HTML? We're converting them to Word or and then are doing copy/paste; this
is very time consuming as often the conversion isn't clean (typos etc).
We're creating posts using Advanced Custom Fields to separate and format
the various sections (journal, abstract, body etc). Some of these articles
are lengthy and have many footnotes or citations.

- which footnote plugin(s) are the most accessible? We're currently
using Easy Footnotes, https://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-footnotes/

- any other thoughts or recommendations?

From: Jonathan Avila
Date: Fri, Nov 04 2016 8:45PM
Subject: Re: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins
← Previous message | Next message →

> - Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to

PDFGoHTML is a plug-in for Acrobat that I have heard good things about.

https://www.callassoftware.com/en/products/pdfgohtml/?type=product&product=pdfgohtml

Jonathan

Jonathan Avila
Chief Accessibility Officer
SSB BART Group 
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
703.637.8957 (Office)

Visit us online: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin | Blog
Check out our Digital Accessibility Webinars!

-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Donna Blumberg
Sent: Friday, November 04, 2016 10:36 PM
To: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
Subject: [WebAIM] questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins

I'm part of a volunteer team that formed for an annual contest http://air-rallies.org/; we are building an accessible website for a nonprofit. Our nonprofit has a website, http://www.autismismedical.com/ which they want us to redo to be accessible; we are recreating this site in WordPress. Their content is mostly PDFs of medical articles; that is all we have to work with. The articles (such as the ones at
http://www.autismismedical.com/gastroenterology.html#sthash.1Wntc5DS.dpbs)
are fairly complex, with tables, images, citations and numerous footnotes.
We're working to convert some of these to WordPress posts; we'll remediate others as PDFs.

Here are my questions:

- Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to
HTML? We're converting them to Word or and then are doing copy/paste; this
is very time consuming as often the conversion isn't clean (typos etc).
We're creating posts using Advanced Custom Fields to separate and format
the various sections (journal, abstract, body etc). Some of these articles
are lengthy and have many footnotes or citations.

- which footnote plugin(s) are the most accessible? We're currently
using Easy Footnotes, https://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-footnotes/

- any other thoughts or recommendations?

From: Chagnon | PubCom
Date: Fri, Nov 04 2016 10:47PM
Subject: Re: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins
← Previous message | Next message →

I noticed that many of the article PDFs on the agency's website are from other publishers, such as medical journals.

You need to check with the publishers of these articles to verify that they'll let you republish their material in another format (HTML versus their PDF and with a different appearance) or you could violate their copyright. Keep in mind that as you convert them from PDF to HTML, regardless of the tool you use, you could be altering the content or the conversion could mistakenly alter it, such as dropping characters or special symbols.

PDFs can be made accessible. Ideally, the accessibility should be built in the original source file, which could be either Word or InDesign. Then the PDF is mostly compliant needing only minimal remediation in Acrobat Pro.

--Bevi Chagnon

-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Donna Blumberg
Sent: Friday, November 4, 2016 10:36 PM
To: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
Subject: [WebAIM] questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins

I'm part of a volunteer team that formed for an annual contest http://air-rallies.org/; we are building an accessible website for a nonprofit. Our nonprofit has a website, http://www.autismismedical.com/ which they want us to redo to be accessible; we are recreating this site in WordPress. Their content is mostly PDFs of medical articles; that is all we have to work with. The articles (such as the ones at
http://www.autismismedical.com/gastroenterology.html#sthash.1Wntc5DS.dpbs)
are fairly complex, with tables, images, citations and numerous footnotes.
We're working to convert some of these to WordPress posts; we'll remediate others as PDFs.

Here are my questions:

- Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to
HTML? We're converting them to Word or and then are doing copy/paste; this
is very time consuming as often the conversion isn't clean (typos etc).
We're creating posts using Advanced Custom Fields to separate and format
the various sections (journal, abstract, body etc). Some of these articles
are lengthy and have many footnotes or citations.

- which footnote plugin(s) are the most accessible? We're currently
using Easy Footnotes, https://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-footnotes/

- any other thoughts or recommendations?

From: Ryan E. Benson
Date: Fri, Nov 04 2016 10:50PM
Subject: Re: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins
← Previous message | Next message →

I agree with Jonathan, however you need to be careful about what you're
doing. Where I work, most of the journals we work with (I am using that
term loosely) do not allow us to remediate their stuff as they see it as
editing. We have to basically say here is the PDF, if you have issues, you
must raise it with the publisher because our hands are tied.

--
Ryan E. Benson

On Fri, Nov 4, 2016 at 10:45 PM, Jonathan Avila < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
wrote:

> > - Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to
>
> PDFGoHTML is a plug-in for Acrobat that I have heard good things about.
>
> https://www.callassoftware.com/en/products/pdfgohtml/?
> type=product&product=pdfgohtml
>
> Jonathan
>
> Jonathan Avila
> Chief Accessibility Officer
> SSB BART Group
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> 703.637.8957 (Office)
>
> Visit us online: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin | Blog
> Check out our Digital Accessibility Webinars!
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On
> Behalf Of Donna Blumberg
> Sent: Friday, November 04, 2016 10:36 PM
> To: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> Subject: [WebAIM] questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and
> accessible footnote plugins
>
> I'm part of a volunteer team that formed for an annual contest
> http://air-rallies.org/; we are building an accessible website for a
> nonprofit. Our nonprofit has a website, http://www.autismismedical.com/
> which they want us to redo to be accessible; we are recreating this site in
> WordPress. Their content is mostly PDFs of medical articles; that is all
> we have to work with. The articles (such as the ones at
> http://www.autismismedical.com/gastroenterology.html#sthash.1Wntc5DS.dpbs)
> are fairly complex, with tables, images, citations and numerous footnotes.
> We're working to convert some of these to WordPress posts; we'll remediate
> others as PDFs.
>
> Here are my questions:
>
> - Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to
> HTML? We're converting them to Word or and then are doing copy/paste;
> this
> is very time consuming as often the conversion isn't clean (typos etc).
> We're creating posts using Advanced Custom Fields to separate and format
> the various sections (journal, abstract, body etc). Some of these
> articles
> are lengthy and have many footnotes or citations.
>
> - which footnote plugin(s) are the most accessible? We're currently
> using Easy Footnotes, https://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-footnotes/
>
> - any other thoughts or recommendations?
> > > at http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> > > > > >

From:
Date: Sat, Nov 05 2016 12:53AM
Subject: Re: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins
← Previous message | Next message →

The downside here is that pdfGoHTML requires the file to already be decently tagged - it extracts the PDFs content by relying on the structure tree.

> On 05 Nov 2016, at 03:45, Jonathan Avila < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
>
> PDFGoHTML is a plug-in for Acrobat that I have heard good things about.
>
> https://www.callassoftware.com/en/products/pdfgohtml/?type=product&product=pdfgohtml

Olaf

From: JP Jamous
Date: Sun, Nov 06 2016 7:24AM
Subject: Re: questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins
← Previous message | No next message

I second Ryan and Jonathan. If any PDF is provided by a vender, you can ask the vender to make it accessible. It is not the responsibility of the hosting site to make it accessible. You get into copyright issues.



-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Ryan E. Benson
Sent: Friday, November 4, 2016 11:51 PM
To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and accessible footnote plugins

I agree with Jonathan, however you need to be careful about what you're doing. Where I work, most of the journals we work with (I am using that term loosely) do not allow us to remediate their stuff as they see it as editing. We have to basically say here is the PDF, if you have issues, you must raise it with the publisher because our hands are tied.

--
Ryan E. Benson

On Fri, Nov 4, 2016 at 10:45 PM, Jonathan Avila < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
wrote:

> > - Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs
> > to
>
> PDFGoHTML is a plug-in for Acrobat that I have heard good things about.
>
> https://www.callassoftware.com/en/products/pdfgohtml/?
> type=product&product=pdfgohtml
>
> Jonathan
>
> Jonathan Avila
> Chief Accessibility Officer
> SSB BART Group
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> 703.637.8957 (Office)
>
> Visit us online: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin | Blog Check
> out our Digital Accessibility Webinars!
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On
> Behalf Of Donna Blumberg
> Sent: Friday, November 04, 2016 10:36 PM
> To: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> Subject: [WebAIM] questions re converting PDFs to HTML (WordPress) and
> accessible footnote plugins
>
> I'm part of a volunteer team that formed for an annual contest
> http://air-rallies.org/; we are building an accessible website for a
> nonprofit. Our nonprofit has a website,
> http://www.autismismedical.com/ which they want us to redo to be
> accessible; we are recreating this site in WordPress. Their content is
> mostly PDFs of medical articles; that is all we have to work with.
> The articles (such as the ones at
> http://www.autismismedical.com/gastroenterology.html#sthash.1Wntc5DS.d
> pbs) are fairly complex, with tables, images, citations and numerous
> footnotes.
> We're working to convert some of these to WordPress posts; we'll
> remediate others as PDFs.
>
> Here are my questions:
>
> - Are there any tips or best practices to converting complex PDFs to
> HTML? We're converting them to Word or and then are doing
> copy/paste; this
> is very time consuming as often the conversion isn't clean (typos etc).
> We're creating posts using Advanced Custom Fields to separate and format
> the various sections (journal, abstract, body etc). Some of these
> articles
> are lengthy and have many footnotes or citations.
>
> - which footnote plugin(s) are the most accessible? We're currently
> using Easy Footnotes, https://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-footnotes/
>
> - any other thoughts or recommendations?
> > > archives at http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> > > > archives at http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> >