FW: [SEC508] Accessible PDF generators

["Baquis, David " <baquis@Access-Board.gov>]

Karen asked me to forward this comment since she is having difficulty posting to the list.

David Baquis

 

From: Info @ Karlen Communications [mailto:info@karlencommunications.com]
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 7:51 AM
To: 'Lars Ballieu Christensen'
Cc: 'sec508-admin@trace.wisc.edu'
Subject: RE: [SEC508] Accessible PDF generators

 

This is difficult to answer. First a PDF can be tagged but this does not mean that it is accessible. Second, the tools that I know of that generate tagged PDF use various versions of the PDF specifications/references. Since tagging is improved with each version of Adobe Acrobat/each version of the PDF specs/references, you can see why it is difficult to pin something down.

Adobe Acrobat  and the Microsoft Save as PDF tool for Microsoft Office 2007 use the PDF 1.7 specs so Acrobat 8 level of tagging.

The latest version of Nuance tools use the PDF 1.6 specs so are at the Acrobat 7 level.

I am not sure what the latest version of Open Office uses for its underlying specs.

Acrobat is the only tool I know of for making tagged forms. This is done through Acrobat and to some extent LiveCycle Designer; however, you need to be careful using LiveCycle Designer.

The Save as PDF tool from Microsoft tends to generate better tagged PDF from the .doc or .docx format while Acrobat tends to generate better tags for the .doc format. Acrobat does not produce tagged PDF from Microsoft Publisher, while the Save as PDF tool does for Publisher 2007; Acrobat does generate tagged PDF from Outlook 2007 while the Save as PDF does not. Acrobat also produces tagged PDF from Outlook 2003.

InDesign and FrameMaker can produce tagged PDF, depending on the version. I’ve heard that the new Quark CS also can export to tagged PDF but have not found any documentation of this so far…none seems to be on their web site or in any “new features” documentation and I would have thought that it would be easy to find since this has long been a complaint of the software.

An accessible PDF depends on the source document being compiled of non-corrupted assets [in the case of desktop published documents], headings made with styles, tables being made properly, Alt Text on images and links, lists being converted as lists not individual paragraphs/again the use of styles, and the content flowing logically. Elements of documents that throw this off are text boxes in word processed documents, paragraph frames, Tabs used to create tables, no styles in the document, and in the case of desktop published documents, there are issues with links that are mouse activated but cannot be activated using the keyboard so must be repaired in the PDF document. Desktop published documents also tend to have more “images of text” rather than text. This means that content is not available to the end-user once it is tagged. You can only put so much into an Alt attribute.

I don’t know of any research or survey that looks at the various tools and compares them. It gets difficult since there are so many variables for documents. For example, I can use OnmiPage Pro to generate a tagged PDF but it does not generate tagged tables so these have to be done manually in the PDF document, as does adding Alt Text and links to the document. This adds to the repair cost and makes OmniPage a less than worthy tool to generate tagged PDF. The last I looked, Nuance’s PDF Creator did not generate tagged PDF but if they have added it, it will be at the PDF 1.6 spec level.

Even among the versions of Acrobat, version 8 has better OCR for scanned documents than 7 did and better table tagging.

I have some of the other tools but rely on Acrobat and now the Save as PDF tool for tagging the PDF, then I go in and see what repairs need to be made. Ultimately, the Tags Tree should accurately represent the visual structure of the document where you are adding the tags while the source documents should have generated fairly solid tags if the document was designed to be accessible in the source application. This would not include decorative elements which should be delegated as Artifacts. So many variables.

Cheers, Karen

 

 

From: sec508-admin@trace.wisc.edu [mailto:sec508-admin@trace.wisc.edu] On Behalf Of Lars Ballieu Christensen
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 12:56 AM
To: 'WebAIM Discussion List'
Cc: LISTSERV@jiscmail.ac.uk; disabilitylist@lists.etr.org; LISTSERV@listserv.buffalo.edu; LISTSERV@listserv.ucop.edu; LISTSERV@listserv.uga.edu; sec508@trace.wisc.edu
Subject: [SEC508] Accessible PDF generators

 

Dear all

I am looking for a list of PDF generators to produce accessible PDF in accordance with Adobes guidelines. Is anyone aware of such a list or a study that evaluates PDF generators for accessibility?

Kind regards

Lars

----

Lars Ballieu Christensen
Rådgiver/Adviser, Sensus ApS

Specialister i tilgængelighed/Accessibility Consultants
Tel: +45 48 22 10 03 – Mobil: +45 40 32 68 23 - Skype: Ballieu
Mail: lbc@sensus.dk – Web: www.sensus.dk & www.robobraille.org