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Subject: Article: AIIM meeting sets PDF/Access standard in motion


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PDF Zone.com
March 23, 2004

AIIM meeting sets PDF/Access standard in motion
By Don Fluckinger

It's fun to watch the incredible, expanding PDF standard grow and morph into a
multimedia e-paper format that makes paper look so 20th century. Unless, of
course, you are blind or have poor vision. In that case, getting work done,
reading e-books or filling out forms can be a nightmare.

Furthermore, the federal "Section 508" statutes require government agencies to
make their content accessible to people who use aids such as screen-reading
software to give voice to documents.

As we all know, Adobe--as well as third-party PDF software developers--would
like PDF to become the e-paper standard. Helping companies and the government
make their electronic documents Section 508-compliant can give PDF a leg up on
its competitors by making it more useful to more people.

That's why software companies, government agencies and advocates for the
visually disabled got together for the first time at the AIIM show March 9.
Under the auspices of the PDF/Access Working Committee, they formally kicked
off discussions for developing a new PDF standard that is usable by people who
rely on assistive technologies such as screen readers.

"The AIIM meeting was an inaugural effort," said Adobe accessibility expert
Greg Pisocky, who currently chairs the group but plans to step down and be
"just a member" once the ball gets rolling on PDF/Access. That's because he
understands that if PDF/Access becomes a true open standard--and not just an
Adobe initiative--it will have a better chance of widespread adoption.

"The aim is to formally define the characteristics of PDF files that lend
themselves well to working with conventional assistive technologies and enable
people to add additional attributes that will make PDF files easier for people
with disabilities--primarily visual disabilities--to consume on their
computers," Pisocky explained.

PDF/Access--like PDF/A for archiving, PDF/E for engineering and PDF/X (and its
variants) for prepress--is a subset of the greater PDF file format that makes
some aspects of a PDF file mandatory but bars things that each audience
doesn't want (i.e., PDF/A files must have fonts embedded and can't contain
executable scripts--so that in the year 2020 when people de-archive a PDF,
they won't have to decode archaic JavaScript or try and locate obsolete
fonts).

At the March meeting, the committee came up with a set of 20 "business cases"
in which PDF/Access files might be used, which will be expanded and edited
over several more meetings before the group drafts its first sketch of a
proposed PDF/Access standard. In time, the group hopes to get a formal
standard written and recognized by ISO. That could take three to five years,
or even longer.

Although it's very early in the proceedings, a few things about PDF/Access
files are self-evident: They will contain structural markup, including
alternate text for visual elements; they will support conversion to alternate
media such as Braille or synthetic speech; and they will support non-text
media such as video.

Representatives of 18 different organizations attended the March 9 meeting,
including Global Graphics, Adobe, DeQue, National Federation of the Blind, PDF
Sages and the Internal Revenue Service. Eventually, Pisocky hopes, the
assistive technology vendors will come to the table, too.

Pisocky said he's glad Global Graphics is at the PDF/Access table, even though
the company competes with Adobe. Because Global's Jaws software is a PDF
creation technology used by many people--including the QuarkXPress user
base--it's essential that Global has a voice in developing the standard.

"Something I sincerely hope PDF/Access will accomplish is that it will
significantly reduce the instances of inaccessible PDFs that people will
encounter," Pisocky said.

"Yeah, PDF is associated with Acrobat, and it's associated with Adobe. But the
vast majority of PDFs are generated in a non-Adobe environment. So as great a
pain as Adobe has taken to try and get its own house in order--InDesign and
FrameMaker have mechanisms for making accessible PDFs at the press of a
button--other vendors don't do the same things. And that's a big problem for
the file format.

More information regarding AIIM available on-line at:  http://www.aiim.org/

Source:  http://www.pdfzone.com/news/965-PDFzone_news.html


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