Accessible Digital Documents
NOTE: Information about the June 2012 Accessible Digital Documents webinar series
This resource provides information about common office documents and accessibility. It was developed as a supplement to our Accessible Web Design page when we realized that much (if not most) of what gets posted on the web either starts out as a simple document, created by a word processor or other office suite product, and is then converted into a web page, PDF or other web-based resource. Often in this conversion process, accessibility is not taken into consideration and the final result is a web document that cannot be used by all. This is particularly problematic in large organizations where there are many content producers. It is important for content producers - especially those creating content that will be sent out to the public - to ensure their document are accessible to all.
We are also concerned that office documents that are used "in house" or shared with others as attachments, need to be accessible to all.
To this end, we have created this resource which provides information and resources to help you create accessible documents.
We begin with a series of articles (from 2007 - 2010) about creating accessible documents originally written for the Maine State Office of Technology (OIT). In 2011, we began the process of revising the articles to bring them up to date.
All of the articles are here as a resource to support anyone interested in learning more about this topic. As the technologies change, and we learn more about accessible documents, we will post that information here as well on the jebswebs blog.
Accessible Documents Articles
Article 1: Accessible Word Processor Documents - Revised
Article 2: Accessible Spreadsheet and Presentational Documents
Article 3: Portable Document Format (PDF) Files and Accessibility
Article 5 - General Considerations about Web-based Communications
Article 7 - Web 2.0 Applications and Accessibility
Article 8 - Social Networking and Accessibility
Article 9 - A Look at the Future
Article 10 - Learning Management Systems
Article 11 - Accessible PDF - Revisited
Article 12 - Microsoft Office 2010 and Accessibility - revised
Handouts and Presentation
Screencaptures
How to use the "Accessibility Checker" in Adobe Acrobat Pro X- This video (MP4 format - requires plugin) demonstrates how to check a newly created PDF document made from a MS-Word document for accessibility. In the video, the Accessibility Checker finds that the Alternative Text for an image is missing. The demonstration continues showing how to highlight the image in question using the Object Editor and adding the Alternative Description. The demonstration ends with a re-check of the file to assess accessibility. You may also view this recording on YouTube.
How to insert an image into a MS-Word 2007 document (Requires Flash plugin) [Close captioned]
How to add ALT text to chart in MS-Excel 2007 document (Requires Flash plugin) [No Audio]
How to add ALT text to an image in MS-Powerpoint 2007 document (Requires Flash plugin) [No Audio]
How to add ALT text to an image in Adobe LifeCycle Designer (Requires Flash plugin) [No Audio]
Other Resources
Accessible Digital Documents Resources
The National Center on Disabilities and Access to Education - Goals Project has developed a new set of resources, or “cheat sheets” to help assist individuals in the quest to create accessible content. GOALS currently has four cheat sheets available, addressing the following topics:
- Creating accessible documents in Microsoft Word
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- PDF conversion in Microsoft Word
- Creating accessible PDF documents in Acrobat X
Each resource is a single page, and is intended to be printed.
Web Site Development Resources
These are the resources directly related to Article 5 - General Considerations about Web-based Communications
Images
WebAIM - Appropriate use of alternative text
Guild of Accessible Web Designers (GAWDS) - Writing good ALT text (Excellent summary with place for comments)
Wikipedia - Alternative text for images
Jim Thatcher - text alternatives for images
Webcredible - Writing effective ALT text for images
Web Design Group (WDG) - Use of ALT texts in IMGs (Warning: this is long, complicated, and a bit dated)
Tables
WebAIM - Creating Accessible Tables
Jim Thatcher - Accessible tables
Accessify - Accessible Table Builder (actually builds the code for you)
evolt - Building Accessible Tables(old but interesting)
Maine CITE - My own example of layout tables and an example of a Data table
Forms
WebAIM - Creating Accessible Forms
Web Standards Project - Accessible HTML/XHTML Forms: Beginner Level
Jim Thatcher - Accessible Forms
A List Apart - Prettier Accessible Forms (lots of CSS if you are interested)
Links
WebAIM - Introduction to Links and Hypertext
Captioning
Web Captioning General Information
Maine CITE Captioning Video - NEW
Universal Design in Maine blog
Media Access Group at WGBH Boston
Captioners/Captionists
Maine CART and Captioning Services - Shari Majeski
Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART)
Captioning Services
National Institute on Deafness and Other Communications Disorders
National Association of the Deaf - When is captioning required?
Captioning Software
SynchriMedia - MovieCaptioner for Mac
Easy YouTube caption creator (from accessify.com)
Adobe Acrobat Accessibility Training Resources
These resources are found on the Adobe Acrobat Accessibility Training page. If you have difficulty viewing the videos below, use this link to go to the source page.
Using accessibility features within Acrobat 8(SWF, 11.3M)
Assessing PDF files for accessibility (SWF, 7.5M)
Creating accessible PDF files (SWF, 16.4M)
Check out the Acrobat Users website as well for training as well as great ideas on making your PDFs accessible.
Additional Training Documents
There are a number of additional training guides and resources on this Adobe Acrobat Accessibility Training resource page. I recommend visiting that site and downloading these for your reference.
Return to Maine CITE Accessible Web Design page
Revised: 09/23/2012