Accessibility Checker

[LRae_Benedetto@adobeforums.com]

What is the purpose of the Accessibility Checker?

Is it a definitive assessment of a document's accessibility? Do you advise people to use it as a final check of a document or as a guide to making a document accessible?

We tag PDFs for 508 accessibility and we use a screen reader to check our document's accessibility. Now we have a client in a government agency whose 508 accountable person
is using the Accessibility Checker to grade our tagged PDFs.

They are finding problems--For example, depending on how a document is built, *parts* of graphics that are tagged and have alternative text provided,
may "fall out" or be omitted from the document structure for other reasons (i.e., incorrect PDE Object type). BTW, try explaining what "incorrect PDE Object type" is
to someone who has never tagged a PDF! I have *never* received an adequate explanation of that message and have been tagging PDFs for over a year.

Other problems might be footer information that doesn't need to be tagged. This client seems to have had no first-hand tagging experience and they are using
the "Accessibility Checker" as a measure of the document's total accessibility, rather than a guide for spotting *potential* problems..

I read your PDFs on document tagging some time ago and I do not recall -- is there something in there I could refer this client to that would tell them the
appropriate way for them to check if a document is accessible?

We need some help in providing guidelines for inexperienced clients.

Sincerely, Rae Benedetto

[Dorian_Grey@adobeforums.com]

This website could be a good starting point for them

<http://access.adobe.com/>

[meabh_powers@adobeforums.com]

The Accessibility Checker tends to be just a guideline more than a definitive test. Just because a PDF is Section 508 compliant does not mean that it is user friendly. Not knowing how many
documents are involved but maybe its worth it just to 'clean' the documents with regard to the Checker to satisfy your client? The biggest hurdle is to pass your internal testing with the screen reader and still be Section 508 compliant. Even PFd's with all the bells and whistles available are just not very user friendly.

FWIW
Meabh