Fw: Acrobat 4.0 And PDF Accessibility

FYI

----- Original Message -----
From: Robert Neff
To: David Baskerville


David,

 I am in the Federal Government and I just gave a presentation to the
 Government Printing Office on PDF and Universal Accessibility.  This was
 attended by Greg Pisocky, the Adobe Federal Account Rep <good guy, too>.

 My concern is the Federal government has a huge investment in PDF.  Next
 year, we expect the Federal Government to Mandate the "AA" Conformance
 level.  As I interpret the WAI Content Guidelines, Guideline 11, PDF is a
 non-W3C format and if PDF alone is used, we cannot obtain "AA".  Therefore
 to obtain a "AA" we must provide a HTML document and proof it!  That is a
 lot of work!!!  REPEAT - A LOT OF WORK ON NO BUDGET.

 We cannot rely on plug-ins because not everyone uses the same tools - some
 use screen readers, some use voice based web browsers, etc.  So the idea of
 using plug-ins or one tool is ludicrous.  I do like the Plug-in!

 So how can we easily obtain "AA" conformance?

 Here is what I think we need from Adobe:
 1.  Guidelines that provide formating instructions so documents are
properly
 created in their native format before they are converted.  For example, a
 very good workflow white paper.

 2.  From Exchange and Reader, the ability to export to HTML, where the
 images have ALT tags and links are added, Headings are applied.  Hmmm, what
 about CSS.  Does Adobe 4 do this?

 3.  Work with PWD browser companies to provide in-line acess where PDF can
 be read, for example pwWebSpeak.  Currently I just save the document and
 open else where and read it with a screen reader or convert  it to a text
 file and open it with pwWebSpeak.  Too many steps.

 David, I beleive in PDF and like it very much - ask Greg and Sandy in your
Federal Office in DC, but would like to see you help the federal government
incorporate universal accessibility as we are one of your largest customers.
If you dont, you will have to deal with angry webmasters, techincal and
 no-techincal and others come next year.  Please help us out here!

 Also, this was emailed to many lists.  Please use caution when replying or
else Judy Brewer will be very mad at me again <smile>.

 Lastly, please corect me if I have made incorrect statements.

 rob
>

Received on Friday, 28 May 1999 20:50:17 UTC