1. PDF Accessibility Principles Part I
[Intro name, role, and UDC. Provide brief description of what the UDC does] Example: The Universal Design Center collaborates with various groups on campus to support Universal Design and Accessibility efforts. Our goal is to support the process- accessibility does not happen overnight.
Presenter Guide:
[text]- notes information for the presenter only. Not to be mentioned to attendees
Crystal Monroy, Project Analyst
Kathryn Sharron, Program Manger
Alen Davoudian, Senior Web Developer
Universal Design Center

2. Training Objectives
Understand the benefits of a Portable Document Format (PDF)
Identify the accessibility tools available within Adobe Acrobat Professional
Explain key features of an accessible PDF
Evaluate converted PDF to identify inaccessible features
Our goal for each of you is to come away from this training with the ability to understand the benefits of a PDF
Identify the accessibility tools available within Adobe Acrobat Professional
Explain the key features of an accessible PDF
Evaluate a converted PDF to identify inaccessible features.

3. Today’s Topics PDF Accessibility Principles Part I Introduction to PDF
PDF Accessibility Tools
Creating Accessible PDF’s in Adobe Acrobat Professional
Hands-on Group Exercises
Our topics for today will cover 3 section and we’ll finish the training evaluating 2 documents

4. PDF Accessibility Principles Part I
Portable Document Format
PDF Accessibility Tools
Building Accessible PDF’s
Hands On Exercise

5. Portable Document Formats
What is a PDF?
What are the benefits of having a PDF?
A PDF is a file format that presents itself like a printed document, and can be viewed, printed, and electronically submitted. Using PDFs allows authors to lock their material as well as have users electronically sign documents.

6. Portable Document Formats
What is a PDF?
What are the benefits of having a PDF?
PDF’s are the document type of preference to create universally accessible documents.
Accessibility features in the Portable Document Format (PDF) make it easier for people with disabilities to use PDF documents and forms, with many different types of assistive technology so structuring a PDF properly will ensure accessibility across multiple platforms.

7. What is the best path to create an accessible PDF?

8. Adobe Acrobat Professional
“Acrobat DC features a number of built-in accommodations for people with disabilities, as well as support for users of assistive technologies. In addition, Acrobat DC provides authors with a complete set of tools to create and optimize accessible PDF files from almost any source.”
-Adobe Accessibility
Adobe Acrobat Professional DC has extensive amount of features all to 1.) support the reading of PDFs by people with disabilities and 2. support the creation of accessible PDF’s
Adobe acrobat is by far the only software out there to create a fully accessible (or near accessible) PDF.

9. PDF Accessibility Principles Part I
Portable Document Format
PDF Accessibility Tools
Building Accessible PDF’s
Hands On Exercise

10. Accessibility Tools
This is an introduction to all the accessibility tools and Icons. We will be covering these tools and some of the key subcomponents of these tools in further detail

11. Action Wizard
Best suited for anyone new to accessibility or anyone with simple documents
Features:
Title
Text Recognition
Language
Form Field Detection
Detect Images and Add Alt Text
Run a Final Full Check
The action wizard hasn't been around for too long in adobe acrobat but within the action wizard this is a feature called “make accessible” this will begin the process of adding accessibility to your document.
It does this using a step by step approach to some key accessibility markup. (some of the features it includes are on the screen)
Word of caution: it does not add all the accessibility mark up. This is a good tool to use if you are new or if you have a big document but it should not be the only tool to use.

12. Accessibility Tool
Contains settings to build accessible PDFs and to support the reading of accessible PDFs
The accessibility tool will by far give you the greatest amount of features to enhance the accessibility of your document. In addition, this is where people can go to ensure screen readers properly read an accessible PDF. (its where you can set up all accessibility settings as well.)
This is what you do to complete a full check of your PDF.
Set up accessibility preferences (for screen readers)
Add tags to your document: Via the touch up reading order
Auto tag document and form fields: good tools if you have long PDF’s but they are not perfect. You will need to manually inspect and make changes to tags.

13. What are Tags?

14. Tags Accessibility markup for your document
Tags are the accessibility mark up all of your document text, images, object require. Tags are invisible identifiers that will tell screen readers an object is an image, header, regular text, link, etc…
Tags are added through the touch up reading order but can be modified through the tags panel on left side of screen

15. Touch Up Reading Order (TURO)
How do I tag my document for accessibility?
You begin tagging your document with the touch up reading order by drawing a rectangle around the content you want to tack and selecting one of the buttons. Use your mouse, right click and begin dragging your mouse to make a rectangle around the area you want to tag.
TURO is key to begin the tagging process but it is limited in that it does ot display all the tags Adobe Acrobat has available.
NOTE: if you miss any area while dragging, you can simply use Shift+ right click+ drag mouse to highlight more elements. If you highlight too much you can use Control+ right click+ drag mouse to remove any unwanted highlights.

16. Auto-tagging What is auto-tagging?
You can use the auto tag when you have long documents. However keep in mind that this is not an accurate system. You will need to go back into your tags panel and validate that the correct tags were used for your content.
Use for long documents only
Always validate tags

17. Tags Panel Why is the tags panel important?
The tags panel is located on the left panel and allows you to view a list of tags and make new tags as well as modify tags.
It is important to keep the tags in a correct order because at times screen readers may follow the tag order instead of the reading order to review the document.

18. Reading Order What is the Reading Order?
The reading order defines how the document will be read to screen readers. If any item is incorrect, the document will not be read correctly.

19. Accessibility Full Check
Run the Accessibility Full Check at the beginning and at the end !
Adobe acrobat has a built in accessibility checker as well. This checker is a lot more potent than the word checker and it is important to always run the checker at the beginning and at the end when creating an accessible PDF.
The checker will identify any accessibility passes, failure and it will also remind you to conduct manual or visual checks on items too. (E.g. check color contrast).
If you have a failure, you can right click on the item and you can get adobe to fix your error or you can go to the link that will take you to adobe website that further explains the problem.

20. Read Out Loud Reads the entire PDF Validates Reading Order
Great tool if you want to demo how a screen reader user may hear the document.

21. PDF Accessibility Principles Part I
Portable Document Format
PDF Accessibility Tools
Building Accessible PDF’s
Hands On Exercise

22. Building Accessible PDF’s Part I
Step 1: Convert from an accessible document
Step 2: Check for Accessibility!
Step 3: Add your Title and Language
Step 4: Add Tags for
Headings
Paragraphs
Images
Links
Lists
Step 5: Fix Reading Order
Step 6: Final Accessibility Check
Step 7: Read out loud
This is an overview of creating accessible PDF documents using Adobe Acrobat Pro DC. Accessible PDF documents allow information to be readily available for assistive technology. Screen readers can easily navigate the content when accessibility is considered during the design process. This will not only benefit people with disabilities, it will improve overall usability for all users. This information will cover using the built in Action Wizard and Accessibility Checker in Adobe Acrobat Pro DC. Principles I will highlight basic PDF modifications for accessibility issues including accessibility set up, logical reading order, title, bookmarks, color contrast, links, images, and headings while Principles II cover forms, tables, bookmarks, lists, table of contents, and footnotes/headers. The resource provided (at the bottom)- the PDF checklist is an interactive 10 point checklist to use while creating accessible documents. I’ll be referencing the questions throughout the training and we’ll be using it later.
Resource: PDF Checklist

23. Step 1: Document Conversion!
Always start with an accessible Document!
It’s always better starting with an accessible Word document
For graphic design, start off with an accessible Adobe InDesign file
When you create a PDF, it is always better to start with a Word doc. If you create an accessible word document and convert to PDF, all the accessibility features should be transferred over to PDF thus making it easier to finalize the accessibility enhancement within the PDF.
If you have a graphic content, Adobe recommends using Adobe InDesign. InDesign allows you to export documents to epub, HTML and make accessible PDFs. InDesign contains accessibility features (tags, alt text, reading order) and this can be transferred over to PDF.
We are seeing more and more graphic contenting being converted to PDF such as info graphics. It is highly recommended to avoid using image making software such as Photoshop and illustrator if you are making an infographic. Use InDesign instead. If you use these tools you run the risk of all your text not being readable by adobe and you will not be able to add the accessibility markup into your PDF. You will need to recreate all your work within adobe acrobat DC.
Authoring too is important
Word higher chances of creating an accessible PDF
InDesign Adobe software that allows you to add accessibility markup. If you can add it here, when you convert to PDF it will be easier
Other Authoring Tools:
PowerPoint (Some limitations)
Excel (Some limitations)
Open Office
Pages (limitations)
Not work
Photoshop

24. Step 2: Accessibility Full Check
Start with an Accessibility Full Check to know where your document stands!
Adobe acrobat has a built in accessibility checker as well. This checker is a lot more potent than the word checker and it is important to always run the checker at the beginning and at the end when creating an accessible PDF.
The checker will identify any accessibility passes, failure and it will also remind you to conduct manual or visual checks on items too. (E.g. check color contrast).
If you have a failure, you can right click on the item and you can get adobe to fix your error or you can go to the link that will take you to adobe website that further explains the problem.

25. Step 3: Add Title and Language
Are the title and Language set?
Set up a title. A title is needed to allow users truly know what the document is about. Often times we leave the generic name as the tile and it can be misleading to assistive technology users.
You can add the title using the make accessible tool. Or you can go to your document properties and add it from there.

26. Step 4: Adding Tags How do I tag my: Headers? Regular text? Images?
Links?
List?
All the objects in your document should have a specific tag if they convey meaning. Here are the most common tags used in a document and we will go over a couple.

27. Headers Use TURO for H1-H6
Headers should be tagged with one of the Heading tags. Adobe provides H1-h6 and these can be found in the touch up reading order.
In addition to tagging your headings with an H tag, you will need to tag your title with an H tag as well. There is no title tag within adobe that will accurately convey the title of the page.

28. Text Regular text is tagged as “paragraph” <P>.
Regular texts should also be tagged with a <p> for paragraph text.
NOTE: by default, adobe typically tags most of the text in your document as a <p> (especially if you use the auto tag). You will need to review all of your tags to make sure they are the tag you want them to be.

29. Images Images are tagged as “Figure”
Decorative images can be tagged as “background”
There are a variety of ways you can tag an image. All images must be tagged as <figure>. If your image has a caption you can tag it as <figure/caption>. When you tag your image you can access the alt text box by clicking on the image. Then right clicking to “edit alt text”
If your image is decorative you can tag it as <background>. This tells adobe that this item does not need a real tag.

30. Links Tags Panel: Find Unmarked Links Link Nesting:
“OBJR” tag must be present so link is defined correctly
Links need to be have the link tag to be recognized as links. Unfortunately the links tag is not in TURO so users will need to go to the tag preferences to tag a link.
Start by adding any tag to the link (recommend using a distinct tag so you can recognize it in the tags panel). Then in the tags panel you would need to right click on the tag and go to tag options and change the tag type ot link.
In addition to a link tag, a link needs the OBJR script. This is what defines the link as a link to AT.

31. Lists Tags Panel: Create New Tags List Nesting: List <L>
List Item <LI>
List body <Lbody>
List require very distinct links tags that must come in sequential hierarchy.
They need a list tag <L>, a list item tag right below <LI> and within the list item a list item body tag is needed <Lbody> where the text will be located.
These tags are not in turo you would need to go into the tags panel to add all these tags. If you have a word document converted to PDF, these tags would automatically be there. But if you have a document you pulled form somewhere, it is likely you will have to do all of this if there are list in your document.

32. Step 5: Reading Order Is the reading order structured correctly?
The document author is always the one who defines what the reading order should be. To correct, in the order tag, drag the object to the place you want it to be in.
TIP!: Drag down instead of up. If you drag up, the program may close.

33. Step 6: Accessibility Full Check
Run the Accessibility Full Check at the beginning and at the end !
All documents must have this full report run and every document will have different results. I will cover the most common errors and some manual checks you’ll have to “pass” manually. Tips:
Click the square icon to expand the details
Right click titles to:
Pass
Fail
Explain (Adobe tutorial)
Check Again
For Troubleshooting Support visit: Accessibility Issues

34. Don’t forget a Visual Check!
Was color contrast considered?

35. Step 7: Complete with Read Out Loud!
Is the document read in correct order?
Is any text misread?
Great tool if you want to demo how a screen reader user may hear the document.

36. TIPS! Always save your PDF as you add accessibility markup!
If content disappears from view, change the reading order
When modifying extensive content in reading order, drag content down not up
Remove empty tags
Great tool if you want to demo how a screen reader user may hear the document.

37. PDF Accessibility Principles Part I
Universal Design (UD) Principles and Accessibility
Adobe: Commitment to Accessibility
Building Accessible PDF’s
Hands On Exercise
I’m going to walk through each question we covered and show what it looks like in Acrobat Pro DC. Version may vary but all the mechanics are the same.
[Open the Word testing document and show how to make adjustments to page structure (headers, styles, and , images, and color contrast]

38. Evaluating Documents Material Needed Walk through of Exercise:
Printed Handout with Exercise Instructions
2 Document on your Computer
Word Document
PDF Document
Walk through of Exercise:
Evaluate the document on our computers
Go through all the exercises as a group:
Make edits to the document
Check for Accessibility
Share Out
[Review directions for group task]
We have a digital copy of the documents. For digital copy, go to [set up document sharing platform].

39. PDF Accessibility Principles Part I
Universal Design (UD) Principles and Accessibility
Adobe: Commitment to Accessibility
Building Accessible PDF’s
Hands On Exercise
I’m going to walk through each question we covered and show what it looks like in Acrobat Pro DC. Version may vary but all the mechanics are the same.
[Open the Word testing document and show how to make adjustments to page structure (headers, styles, and , images, and color contrast]

40. Resources UDC Website PDF Document Accessibility Tutorial
UDC PDF Checklist
Accessible InDesign PDF
I wanted to share with you a few resources from UDC on the screen.
We have relaunched our website to become a resource to the campus community on accessibility and universal design. You will find lots of tutorials and information on a wide variety of topics for accessibility.
Our word accessibility tutorial online is similar to this in person training. I have covered the first part of this tutorial
PDF checklist is something UDC recently created and it is an interactive tool to help guide you in your creation of an accessible document
For those of you interested in understanding images we have the best practice for images on who to write good image descriptions