tagged PDF

[Labeaux Schiek <DH...@dhs.state.il.us>]

Dear FOP Developers,
 
This is our first post to this group, so we hope that we are following
the proper etiquette and procedures.
 
Recently, we sent an e-mail to the FOP-users group inquiring on how to
make a PDF a 'tagged PDF'.  We were informed that at this time FOP does
not support tagged PDF.  
 
We were wondering whether the development group might consider
incorporating this feature in a future release.
 
We are part of and write applications for the Illinois Office of
Rehabilitation Services.  Many of our customers are visually impaired
and use a variety of screen readers to assist them in understanding the
content of a document.  
 
A 'tagged PDF' document is a great asset to a screen reader and Adobe
has added a module to assist in the creation of tagged pdfs. (See
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/access_faq.html for more
information about accessible/tagged PDF).
 
We have no idea how much work this request entails and would be happy
to assist in this undertaking in anyway possible, unfortunately, at this
time, we are not a shop of Java programmers, and as such, our knowledge
of Java is very limited.
 
We appreciate your consideration of this request and hope that you
understand our desire to assist visually-impaired individuals.
 
Sincerely,
 

Labeaux Schiek,
Mary Ann Hedland,
Jay Bowman,
Moses Gujjarlapudi
Office of Rehabilitation Services
Department of Human Services
State of Illinois
Springfield, Ill.

AW: tagged PDF

["J.U. Anderegg" <ha...@bluewin.ch>]

What are your application requirements? When I look at the Adobe description
of accessibility below, I see some features easy to program in FOP and some
ones rather challenging.

Hansuli Anderegg
__________________________________________________________

What is Accessibility?

Here are some things to consider to optimize your documents for
accessibility and help screen reader applications use them:

Logical reading order.

Documents are more accessible if they have been authored with a logical
structure in mind. Using application-based tools to define and create
document structure such as titles, chapters, headings, and multi-column text
can make it easier for assistive technologies such as screen readers to
understand the logical reading order of the content without any ambiguity.
For example, if a document has been correctly authored using two columns to
create a two-column format, the screen reader knows it should read all the
way down the first column and then proceed to the second column. On the
other hand, if the writer used tabs to imitate the look of two-column text,
the screen reader would not recognize the layout as two-column. Instead, it
would simply read horizontally, going from the first line in the first
column and then tabbing over to the first line in the second column.

Alternate text descriptions for images.

The document should contain written descriptions of images in the document.
For example, you can use the Tags palette discussed later in this guide to
add a description of an image. Then, when a screen reader encounters that
image in the document, it will read the alternate text description so the
user can understand what the image is about.





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funding developers (WAS: tagged PDF)

[Victor Mote <vi...@outfitr.com>]

Peter B. West wrote:

> > for adding any extensions. As the "gethelp" document states,
> one option is
> > to fund a developer. One of our most talented (Jeremias) is looking for
> > funded work right now, so please contact him directly if that
> matches your
> > needs (his email address can be found in the mail archives).
> There may be
> > others as well.
>
> Indeed there are, or indeed there is.  You can add me to that list.

Sorry Peter, I meant to respond to this sooner.

When I was writing up the related section at
http://xml.apache.org/fop/gethelp.html#how-to-help, I thought it might be
good to formalize this. There is a place on the Apache site to which PayPal
contributions can be made. Does anyone know whether these could be earmarked
for a project, such as FOP? Do we want to consider adding a section on our
"Resources" page for such developers? Ken Holman and Eliot Kimber and
related outfits might be good candidates too. I can think of some reasons
why this might not be a good idea, but it seems a shame if there are people
who are willing to fund Jeremias & Peter to get something done, and we don't
have a way to put them together.

Victor Mote


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Re: tagged PDF

["Peter B. West" <pb...@powerup.com.au>]

Victor Mote wrote:
> 
> I suppose that we will probably get to this eventually. As Rhett has already
> pointed out, it may require an extension to the xsl-fo standard. We have
> some other extensions already, and this seems like a useful feature. Within
> the past couple of hours the web site was updated with some changes that
> address your question in a very general way:
>   http://xml.apache.org/fop/gethelp.html
>   specifically http://xml.apache.org/fop/gethelp.html#how-to-help
> 
> The big issue is that the code is torn apart and spread all over the garage
> floor at the moment. We are maintaining two sets of code right now during a
> redesign phase. Until we get past that, there will be very little enthusiasm
> for adding any extensions. As the "gethelp" document states, one option is
> to fund a developer. One of our most talented (Jeremias) is looking for
> funded work right now, so please contact him directly if that matches your
> needs (his email address can be found in the mail archives). There may be
> others as well.

Indeed there are, or indeed there is.  You can add me to that list.

-- 
Peter B. West  pbwest@powerup.com.au  http://www.powerup.com.au/~pbwest/
"Lord, to whom shall we go?"


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Re: tagged PDF

[Clay Leeds <cl...@medata.com>]

Victor Mote wrote:
> Labeaux Schiek wrote:
> <snip>
> We have no idea how much work this request entails and would be happy to
> assist in this undertaking in anyway possible, unfortunately, at this time,
> we are not a shop of Java programmers, and as such, our knowledge of Java is
> very limited.
>
>
> </snip>
>
> <snip @=Victor ;-)/>
> As the "gethelp" document states, one option is
> to fund a developer. One of our most talented (Jeremias) is looking for
> funded work right now, so please contact him directly if that matches your
> needs (his email address can be found in the mail archives). There may be
> others as well. Otherwise, as far as FOP is concerned, unless you can find a
> volunteer, I think you will have to wait. Another alternative would be the
> commercial developers. The guys at RenderX are very sharp, and might be able
> to do this as either custom work or part of a large licensing deal.

Here's a 2nd "+1" for funding Jeremias. I've personally found Jeremias'
contributions and "help" to be most prompt and accurate. It would be
great to have him earn a little extra ca$h so he can continue his
generous contributions...

In addition to RenderX, which appears to be making great strides for
XSL-FO, I might also suggest looking in to Eliot Kimber & G. Ken
Holman's project to enhance XSL-FO, appropriately named "exslfo":

  http://exslfo.sourceforge.net/

Finally, you might be able to get Acrobat to work through java and/or
the command-line to post-process PDF files for the functionality you're
looking for. Also, I haven't had the opportunity to check out Acrobat 6
(it appears to have been announced today), but there may be other
features there...

Good luck!
-- 
Clay Leeds - cleeds@medata.com
Web Developer - Medata, Inc. - http://www.medata.com
PGP Public Key: https://mail.medata.com/pgp/cleeds.asc


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RE: tagged PDF

[Victor Mote <vi...@outfitr.com>]

Labeaux Schiek wrote:

<snip>
Recently, we sent an e-mail to the FOP-users group inquiring on how to make
a PDF a 'tagged PDF'.  We were informed that at this time FOP does not
support tagged PDF.

We were wondering whether the development group might consider incorporating
this feature in a future release.

...

We have no idea how much work this request entails and would be happy to
assist in this undertaking in anyway possible, unfortunately, at this time,
we are not a shop of Java programmers, and as such, our knowledge of Java is
very limited.
</snip>

I suppose that we will probably get to this eventually. As Rhett has already
pointed out, it may require an extension to the xsl-fo standard. We have
some other extensions already, and this seems like a useful feature. Within
the past couple of hours the web site was updated with some changes that
address your question in a very general way:
  http://xml.apache.org/fop/gethelp.html
  specifically http://xml.apache.org/fop/gethelp.html#how-to-help

The big issue is that the code is torn apart and spread all over the garage
floor at the moment. We are maintaining two sets of code right now during a
redesign phase. Until we get past that, there will be very little enthusiasm
for adding any extensions. As the "gethelp" document states, one option is
to fund a developer. One of our most talented (Jeremias) is looking for
funded work right now, so please contact him directly if that matches your
needs (his email address can be found in the mail archives). There may be
others as well. Otherwise, as far as FOP is concerned, unless you can find a
volunteer, I think you will have to wait. Another alternative would be the
commercial developers. The guys at RenderX are very sharp, and might be able
to do this as either custom work or part of a large licensing deal.

Victor Mote


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