PDF Page Content

 

Tagged Content

This error will occur when your document and the content inside of it has not been appropriately tagged. Make sure all the content is either tagged or marked as an artifact. To do this, do ONE of the following fixes:

  1. Open the Content panel and Right-click (on Windows) or Ctrl-Click (on Mac OS) the content that you want to mark as an artifact. Then, select Create Artifact from the context menu. (To display the Content tab, choose View > Show/Hide > Navigation Panes > Content.)
  2. Tag the content by choosing Tools > Accessibility > Reading Order. Select the content, and then apply tags as necessary.
  3. Assign tags using the Tags panel. Right-click (for Windows) or Ctrl-click (for Mac OS) the element in the Tags tree, and choose Create Tag From Selection. Items such as comments, links, and annotations don’t always appear in the Tags tree. To find these items, choose Find from the Options menu.
Tagged Annotations

This error will occur when your document has annotations that are not tagged. Make sure all annotations, such as comments or editorial marks, are either in your Tags tree or marked as an artifact. The general steps we follow are:

  1. Click Edit PDF in the right-hand menu
  2. In the left menu of icons, click the Tags menu option (A tooltip will appear when you hover over the icons)
  3. In the tags panel, click the options icon. Click Find.
  4. In the box that pops up, change the option to Unmarked Annotations and click Find. This will highlight the first unmarked annotation on the page.
  5. Click Tag Element.
  6. In the box that pops up, type a description in the field and click OK. It will automatically move to the next unmarked annotation.
  7. Continue steps 4-7 until all annotations are marked.

If, for some reason, the previous steps do not fix your problem, try ONE of the following:

  1. Open the Content panel, and right-click (for Windows) or Ctrl-click (for Mac OS) the content that you want to mark as an artifact. Then, select Create Artifact from the context menu. (To display the Content panel, choose View > Show/Hide > Navigation Panes > Content.).
  2. Tag content by choosing Tools > Accessibility > Reading Order. Select the content, and then apply tags as necessary.
  3. Assign tags using Tags panel.
Tab Order

When not able to use a mouse, or if one is not in possession of a mouse, they must rely on navigating through content using the Tab key on their keyboard. Tab order is the order in which thing are selected when you use Tab. Because this also applies to PDFs, we must make sure that the tab order parallels the document structure. This error will occur when your tab order is not set up properly or at all. This can be fixed automatically or manually:

To fix the tab order automatically, simply select Tab Order on the Accessibility Checker panel on the right hand side of the screen, after running an accessibility check. From here, click Fix on the Options menu, or simply right click Tab Order and click Fix.

To fix tab order manually for links, form fields, comments, and other annotations:

  1. Click on the Page Thumbnails panel on the navigation panel on the far left side of the screen (these are little icons in a row vertically)
  2. Click a page thumbnail, and then choose Page Properties from the Option menu, or by right clicking the thumbnail and clicking Page Properties.
  3. In the Page Properties box that pops up, choose Tab Order. Then, select Use Document Structure, and then click OK.
  4. Repeat these steps for all thumbnails in your document.
Character Encoding

If you are receiving this error, there is a problem with your encoding. Specifying the encoding helps the PDF viewer present the user with readable text. Some character-encoding errors cannot be repaired using Adobe Acrobat.

To ensure proper coding as well as you can, do the following:

  • Verify that the necessary fonts and files are installed on your system.
  • Use a different font, preferable OpenType, in the source document, and then re-create the PDF.
  • Re-Create the PDF with a newer version of Acrobat Distiller.
  • Use the latest Adobe Postscript driver to create the PostScript file, and then re-create the PDF.
Tagged Multimedia

This error occurs if there is any multimedia content this is not tagged in your PDF. Make sure the content is either included in the Tags tree or marked as an artifact.

Open the Content panel and right-click (on Windows) or Ctrl-Click (on Mac OS) the content that you want to make as an artifact. Then, select Create Artifact from the context menu. (To display the Content panel, choose View > Show/Hide > Navigation Panes > Tags.)

Tag the content by choosing Tools > Accessibility > Reading Order. Select the content, and then apply tags as necessary.

Assign tags using the Tags panel. Right-Click (on Windows) or Ctrl-Click (on Mac OS) the element in the Tags tree, and choose Create Tag from Selection. (To display Tags panel, Choose View  > Show/Hide > Navigation Panes > Tags.)

Screen Flicker

Elements that make the screen flicker, such as animations and scripts, can cause seizures in individuals who have photosensitive epilepsy. These elements can also be difficult to see when the screen is magnified.

If the Screen Flicker rule fails, manually remove or modify the script, code, or content that causes screen flicker.

Scripts

Content cannot be script-dependent unless both content and functionality are accessible to assistive technologies, such as screen readers. Make sure that scripting doesn't interfere with keyboard navigation (using Tab Order) or prevent the use of any input device.

Check the scripts manually. Remove or modify any script or content that compromises accessibility.

Timed Responses

This rule check applies to documents that contain forms with JavaScript. If this fails, make sure that the page does not require timed responses. Edit or remove scripts that impose timely user response so that users have enough time to read and use the content.

Navigation Links

For URLs to be accessible to screen readers, they must be active links that are correctly tagged in the PDF. (The best way to create accessible links is with the Create Link command, which adds all three links that screen readers require to recognize a link.) Make sure that navigation links are not repetitive and that there is a way for users to skip over repetitive links. It’s always good practice to make link text unique.

If this fails, check navigation links manually and verify that the content does not have too many identical links. Also, provide a way for users to skip over items that appear multiple times. For example, if the same links appear on each page of the document, also include a "Skip navigation" link.