[Athen] Update: PDF Maker problems

[Bossley, Peter A.]

Forms are indeed tough - when I used to more regularly train staff on doing forms it was a full day of training. At this point I send most forms to Appligent - more time and cost effective that way as it costs less than the staff time to tag the form.


From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> On Behalf Of Susan Kelmer
Sent: Monday, October 4, 2021 10:28 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network <athen-list at u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Athen] Update: PDF Maker problems

Peter, this is why many of us will still have jobs long into the future.  I find the Adobe tools to make things "accessible" to be less than useful, and extremely time-consuming to use.  You fix one thing to find you broke another.  Every year they release updates and "new ways" of doing things, that still don't work.
I gave up on remediating PDFs after spending weeks trying to create an accessible form.
NO ONE has that kind of time.  NO ONE.


Susan Kelmer
Alternate Format Production Program Manager
Disability Services
Division of Student Affairs
T 303 735 4836
www.colorado.edu/disabilityservices<https://urldefense.com/v3/__http:/www.colorado.edu/disabilityservices__;!!KGKeukY!nMD4obI9yoOJtcq2E69SN45aKg0X_nsOjcPDQNqc4EAg7Ztw8vU7YXHeLIhkwIMKRQ$>


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From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> On Behalf Of Bossley, Peter A.
Sent: Monday, October 4, 2021 6:21 AM
To: Access Technology Higher Education Network <athen-list at u.washington.edu>; chagnon at pubcom.com
Subject: Re: [Athen] Update: PDF Maker problems

Susan,
As a former student who always asked for Word / RTF as my format, I don't disagree with you. On the other hand, from an institutional perspective, the reality is that lots of people around campus are going to use PDF. With that as a backdrop we really need to have a good way of making them accessible. It is pretty annoying when we train folks to use the Acrobat tools because they (usually) work better than the other methods just to have this happen.


[The Ohio State University]
Peter Bossley
Deputy ADA Coordinator
ADA Coordinator's Office - Office of Institutional Equity
260 Younkin Success Center, 1640 Neil Ave, Columbus, OH 43201
614-688-3028 Office
bossley.5 at osu.edu<mailto:bossley.5 at osu.edu> / ada.osu.edu<http://ada.osu.edu/>
________________________________


From: athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu<mailto:athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu>> On Behalf Of Susan Kelmer
Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2021 9:53 AM
To: chagnon at pubcom.com<mailto:chagnon at pubcom.com>; Access Technology Higher Education Network <athen-list at u.washington.edu<mailto:athen-list at u.washington.edu>>
Subject: Re: [Athen] Update: PDF Maker problems

All of this mess just reinforces, to me, that PDFs should NOT be being produced/remediated and given to students using screenreaders. I don't have these problems with well-formatted Microsoft Word or HTML files.

Sometimes I feel like a bit of a dinosaur, steadfastly continuing to create really great quality Word and HTML files for my students with VI, and not even attempting to make a PDF accessible for them, or to create a PDF as output.

Until Adobe gets its act together, there is absolutely no reason for me to waste time trying to make PDFs work.  It is not "easy" or "fast" to remediate a PDF file, and even more importantly, the resulting PDF output is not effective!  Why are we collectively banging our heads against the wall, as if there weren't a different path we could (and should?) be following?

Just my cranky .02 this morning.


Susan Kelmer
Alternate Format Production Program Manager
Disability Services
Division of Student Affairs
T 303 735 4836
www.colorado.edu/disabilityservices<https://urldefense.com/v3/__http:/www.colorado.edu/disabilityservices__;!!KGKeukY!mpeu2h8RZcMl-0TETiWCGc9m6FnEumciwHPNyV56j4iS_xXB9gCFAMp6ERMuMuMq8g$>


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