Accessible Word & PDFScott WilliamsOffice of Institutional Equity
Introductions
The nature of disabilities
Visual: blindness, low-vision, color-blindness
Hearing: partial to total deafness
Motor: inability to use a mouse, slow response time, limited fine motor control
Cognitive: Learning disabilities, distractibility, dyslexia, inability to remember or focus on large amounts of information
1in 5 people have a disability
People with disabilities in the U.S: 54.4 million
People age 15 and older having difficulty hearing a normal conversation: 8 million
People who cannot hear at all: 1 million
People age 15 and older having difficulty reading ordinary newsprint (even with glasses): 8 million
Number of people being completely unable to see: 1.8 million
A diverse population
Cognitive disabilities Greater number than physical and perceptual
disabilities combined Adults with ADD/ADHD: 16 million 38% of soldiers, 31% of Marines and 49% of National
Guard members returning from combat report psychological conditions such as TBI and PTSD
Mobility issues—8 million Americans have difficulty using their arms or hands
11 million people 6 and older need assistance with everyday activities
More stats
8.3% of the U.S. population have 2 or more disabilities
40,000 people the in U.S are both deaf and blind
41 percent of adults 65 and older have a disability
8.7 million people with disabilities are poor
70% of disabled are unemployed
What is document accessibility?
Perceivable
Operable
Understandable
Robust
Perceivable
Sight Hearing Touch Transformability (e.g., text to audio) Content vs. style (separate styling information
from content)
Operable
Various input methods available: Keyboard-only Mouth stick Trackball mouse
Interaction methods allow users to: Discern structure (proper headings and markup) Bypass irrelevant information (e.g., table of
contents) Navigate by multiple routes
Understandable
Economical use of language
Text supplemented with illustrations, videos, and other formats where appropriate (i.e., use good Universal Design)
Navigation, information structure discernable and consistent
Robust
Functional across various technologies (e.g., mobile devices, screen readers, refreshable Braille, web)
Accessible MS Word
Navigation and orientation are key to document accessibility
Create structured documents Use heading formatting for headings Use table-of-contents utility for large documents to
provide navigation
Provide alternative text for images and equations
Use table utility to create tables (not tabs)
Add author, title, subject, and keywords to document properties
Provide metadata
Format headings
Provide alt text for images
Right click on the image in MS Word to view popup window
Select Format Picture… menu item
Select Alt Text tab in Format Picture pop-up window, fill in alt text, and click OK button
Add inline long descriptions for graphs and charts
Beneath the graphic, add:
Author equations using MathType MS Word add-in
Toggle equation to Tex
Copy Tex format and toggle back to equation
Right-click equation to add alternative text
Paste Tex into alt box, click OK
2 useful add-ins for Word PDF creation
MS Office add-in for accessible PDF (not needed if you’ve installed Acrobat Pro): http://goo.gl/oyBO
Adobe PDF maker for Word: installed automatically when Adobe Acrobat Pro is installed over MS Word
Creating a PDF with Microsoft add-in
Click on the Office button, hover over the Save button and select PDF
Creating a PDF with Microsoft add-in (2)
Before you save the file, make sure that the Document structure tags for accessibility checkbox is selected.
Creating accessible PDFs with the Adobe add-in
Make sure accessibility features are enabled in Adobe add-in preferences
Publish PDF from Word
Once the settings are correct, click the Create PDF button
Checking PDF Accessibility
Using Adobe Reader, select the menu pick:Document > Accessibility Quick Check
Pop-up window will alert you to any accessibility issues with the PDF
Complex documents must be tested with a screen reader (NVDA is free) or a verification and remediation tool, such as NetCentric’s CommonLook (expensive, big learning curve)
Contact me ([email protected]) for assistance
Word & PDF Resources
http://www.webaim.org/techniques/word/
http://www.webaim.org/techniques/acrobat/converting.php
PDF Section 508 checklist: http://goo.gl/tV6l
MS Office add-in for accessible PDF: http://goo.gl/oyBO
MathType add-in: http://www.dessci.com/en/products/mathtype/
Accessibility Resources
U-M: http://umich.edu/access.php
WebAIM: http://webaim.org
Online accessibility checkers: http://www.achecker.ca/ http://fae.cita.uiuc.edu/ http://wave.webaim.org/