PDF Accessibility

Sera-Ann Hargrove; Mahrya Burnett; Jenay Dougherty; Heather Healy; Nancy A. Henke

25 PDF Accessibility

PDFs require some special considerations in order to be made accessible. This chapter contains step-by-step instructions for creating accessible PDFs from Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Adobe Acrobat Pro.

Creating an Accessible PDF in Microsoft Word

Headings
1. Create and give headings to titles of sections in a sequential order, starting with Heading 1.
Alt Text
1. Give inserted images alternative text:
  1. Word will automatically give an image alternative text when inserted. By clicking on it, it will open the Alt Text menu where you may type in your own alternative text, approve it, or mark the image as decorative.
  2. The Alt Text menu is also located in the Picture Format tab in Word (this tab appears when an image is selected).
Meaningful Hyperlink Text
1. Give links descriptive text so users know what they are opening:
  1. Highlight the text you would like to add a link to, right click on it, and select “Hyperlink”.
  2. From the “Insert Hyperlink” menu, you may paste an external link or file, link to something already in the document, or an email address. You may also change the text that describes the link.
  3. You can also change the display text of hyperlinks already in the document by right clicking on the link, going to “Hyperlink” and “Edit Hyperlink”.
Accessibility Checker
1. Review > “Check Accessibility” > Checks for:
  1. Color Contrast
  2. Alt Text
  3. Table headers
  4. Headings
Export as a PDF
1. Go to “Save As” and change file format to PDF, selecting the option that says: “Best for electronic distribution and accessibility”.

Creating an Accessible PDF in Microsoft PowerPoint

Accessibility Checker
1. Review > “Check Accessibility” > Checks for:
  1. Color and Contrast
  2. Alt Text
  3. Table headers
  4. Document Structure (slide titles, section names, reading order)
2. Selecting “Check Accessibility” brings up the Accessibility tab at the top of the screen which allows you to:
  1. Inspect without Color
  2. Edit Slide Titles
  3. Check Spelling
  4. Look at the reading order from the “Reading Order Pane”
  5. Give images alt text from the “Alt Text” menu
Export as a PDF
1. Export as a PDF through either:
  1. Going to the Acrobat tab at the top of the screen and selecting “Create PDF”
  2. Going to “Save As” and changing the file format to PDF and selecting the option that says: “Best for electronic distribution and accessibility”.

Using Adobe Acrobat Pro to Make PDFs Accessible

In Adobe Acrobat Pro, select “Prepare for accessibility”

Figure 1. “Prepare for accessibility” tool in Adobe Acrobat Pro
1. Select “Check for accessibility” from the panel and then select “Start Checking”
  
  Figure 2. Where to find the “Check for accessibility” tool in the “Prepare for accessibility” menu
2. Through the “Accessibility Checker Options” window, you can select what you would like to be checked within the document. This includes:
  1. Accessibility permission flag is set
  2. Document is not image-only PDF
  3. Document is tagged PDF
  4. Document structure provides a logical reading order
  5. Text language is specified
  6. Document title is showing in title bar
  7. Bookmarks are present in large documents
  8. Document has appropriate color contrast
    
    Figure 3. The “Accessibility Check Options” window in Adobe Acrobat Pro.
3. After running the accessibility checker, the “Accessibility Checker” menu will appear and share any issues that may have come up within the document, page content, forms, alternate text, tables, lists, and/or headings.
  
  Figure 4. The “Accessibility Checker” menu in Adobe Acrobat Pro, showing a list of found issues in the PDF.
4. Review any failed components by selecting Fix, Skip Rule, Explain, Check Again, Show Report, or Options.
  
  Figure 5. The options that appear in the “Accessibility Checker” after right clicking on an issue: Pass, Fail, Skip Rule, and Explain.
Tag the document
1. Select “Automatically tag PDF” from the “Prepare for accessibility” menu.
  
  Figure 6. Where to find the “Automatically tag PDF” tool in the “Prepare for accessibility” menu
2. If the document is already tagged, Adobe will ask if you would like to re-tag or view the current accessibility tags.
  
  Figure 7. Pop-up window asking “Update accessibility tags?” that appears after selecting “Automatically tag PDF” if the document is already tagged.
3. After tagging or re-tagging, you can then view the accessibility tags from the “Accessibility tags” menu, which can also be accessed through selecting the tag icon in the right sidebar menu (see image).
  
  Figure 8. The tag icon in Adobe Acrobat Pro
  
  Figure 9. The “Accessibility tags” menu in Adobe Acrobat Pro
Edit the tags
1. To edit tags, right click on the one you would like to edit and select “Properties”
  
  Figure 10. Where to find the “Properties” option after right clicking on an accessibility tag in Adobe Acrobat Pro
2. From the “Object Properties” menu, you can change the type of tag to be a heading level, table cell, paragraph, link, etc.
  
  Figure 11. “Object Properties” window in Adobe Acrobat Pro with a dropdown menu for options for accessibility tag type.
3. When done editing, you can select “Close” in the “Object Properties” menu and the tag will appear changed in the list.
Look over and correct the reading order
1. Select “Fix reading order” from the “Prepare for accessibility” menu.
  
  Figure 12. Where to find the “Fix reading order” tool in the “Prepare for accessibility” menu in Adobe Acrobat Pro.
2. This will bring up the “Reading Order” menu where you can either select highlighted items on the page or draw a rectangle around content
  
  Figure 13. The “Reading Order” window in Adobe Acrobat Pro with options to draw a rectangle around content and select tag type.
  1. You can also assign some tag classifications from this menu
3. Selecting the “Show Order Panel” or the reading order icon from the right sidebar menu will bring up the “Order” page.
  
  Figure 14. The reading order icon in Adobe Acrobat Pro
4. From the “Order” page, you can see the reading order list and drag items around in the list to correct the reading order
  
  Figure 15. The “Order” menu in Adobe Acrobat Pro showing the reading order of items on the page
Add alt text to the images
1. Select “Add alternate text” from the “Prepare for accessibility” menu.
  
  Figure 16. Where to find the “Add alternate text” tool in the “Prepare for accessibility” menu in Adobe Acrobat Pro.
2. This will bring up the “Set Alternate Text” menu and detect each image in the PDF.
  
  Figure 17. “Set Alternate Text” window in Adobe Acrobat Pro.
3. Click through the arrows and type in the “Alternate text” box to add alt text to each image in the PDF.
Edit document properties
1. Go to “Document properties” from the Adobe Acrobat Pro menu in the top left corner
  
  Figure 18. Where to find “Document properties” in the Adobe Acrobat Pro main menu.
2. This is where you can give your PDF a title, author, subject, and keywords.
  
  Figure 19. The “Document Properties” window in Adobe Acrobat Pro where users can add a title, author, subject, and keywords.

Scanned PDFs

To make scanned image PDFs accessible, follow these steps:

Run optical character recognition (OCR) on the document
1. Go to “Scan & OCR” in Adobe Acrobat Pro
  
  Figure 20. Where to find the “Scan & OCR” tool in the Adobe Acrobat Pro tools menu.
2. Select “In this file” to run OCR in the PDF
3. Select “Correct recognized text” to check for any errors or typos
  
  Figure 21. The “Scan & OCR” tool in Adobe Acrobat Pro with options to recognize text in this file, in multiple files, or to correct recognized text.
Tag the document
1. Go to “Prepare for accessibility” in Adobe Acrobat Pro
2. Select “Automatically tag PDF”
3. Correct the tags by clicking on them.
Edit the document properties
Run the Accessibility Checker
1. Under the “Prepare for accessibility” tab, select “Check for accessibility”