{"id":799,"date":"2018-09-13T15:00:13","date_gmt":"2018-09-13T19:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.ocps.net\/presenceblog\/?p=799"},"modified":"2018-09-13T15:00:13","modified_gmt":"2018-09-13T19:00:13","slug":"checking-the-accessibility-of-your-documents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.ocps.net\/presenceblog\/checking-the-accessibility-of-your-documents\/","title":{"rendered":"Checking the Accessibility of your Documents"},"content":{"rendered":"

So now that you have created your Word document, how can you check if that document is accessible? There are many accessibility checkers available on the Internet. However, did you know that you have an accessibility checker built right into Microsoft Word? I’m sure most of you did not because I did not either until I began work on this series of posts. Furthermore, it is easy to use and it often helps you to fix any issues it finds. Let’s take a look at a ‘randomly’ selected document from the Internet.<\/p>\n

I found a document named: Executive and Resource Manager Training for Project Server 2013. This was an internal document, but that does not matter because anyone can submit an accessibility complaint. The documents do not have to be public facing. I will not reveal the author or department of this document, but will use it as a typical example of a document you might see. In this case, the document was already a Word document with a .docx extension. Had it been a .PDF, I could use Word to open the file and attempt to convert the document back into a .docx style document. However, it is always better to begin with the original document.<\/p>\n

After opening the document in Microsoft Word, click File<\/strong> in the main menu. If the Info<\/strong> section is not selected, click on Info<\/strong> in the left menu. The Info<\/strong> section displays a series of buttons. Look for the one labeled: Check for Issues<\/strong>. The text to the right of it should begin with the header: Inspect Document.<\/p>\n

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Note the small down pointing arrow after the word Issues on the button. This indicates that there is an additional menu under this button. Click on the Check for Issues<\/strong> button to display the submenu.<\/p>\n

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In this menu, you will find the Check Accessibility<\/strong> option. Click on it. Word returns to your document and opens a panel on the right side titled: Accessibility Checker<\/strong>. This panel has two sections: Inspection Results<\/strong> and Additional Information<\/strong>. In the Inspection Results section, the checker lists all the accessibility errors and warnings it has found. Errors are accessibility issues that you must fix for a document while warnings are suggestions. The Tips section at the bottom of this list are items that the checker cannot verify but suggests that the document creator review before publishing the document. For each issue that it finds, it includes the number of occurrences of that issue in parenthesis.<\/p>\n

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Note that this document has nearly 90 errors and another 60 warnings. To locate individual errors, open the error category by clicking on the carat to the left of the error category.<\/p>\n

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As you can see, the accessibility checker catches images and tables without alt-text. But where are these individual instances? What is Picture 2135 or Picture 5 and where are they in the document? By double clicking on an error, the Accessibility Checker takes you directly to the object in the document and selects it for you.<\/p>\n

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Now with the object having the accessibility error selected, take a look at the Additional Information<\/strong> section in the right panel to see why you need to fix the error and how to fix it.<\/p>\n

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This error is easy to fix if you read my past post on adding alt-text to images. All you need do is right click on the image, select Format Picture, select the Layout & Properties menu and then open the Alt Text properties.<\/p>\n

After adding the alt-text for ‘Picture 7’, notice that the Accessibility Checker automatically updates by removing this error from the list as shown in the following figure that now goes from Picture 6 to Picture 237.<\/p>\n

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In a similar fashion, you can work your way through the rest of the errors and warnings to create a final document that satisfies all the accessibility requirements.<\/p>\n

Does that mean that this Accessibility Checker will solve all of your ADA issues issues? Unfortunately, not yet. For example, it would not know the difference between the alt-text of ‘picture’, ‘abc’, or ‘Image of the Project Professional screen with a sample project displayed.’ All it really looks for is whether the alt-text field has something in it. You are still responsible for determining appropriate alt-text.<\/p>\n

However, Microsoft Word’s Accessibility Checker will at least get you started thinking about and addressing accessibility issues before creating your PDFs. Let me just give you a few additional caveats before finishing this section. Word’s Accessibility checker will not:<\/p>\n