How to Set Up an Accessible Adobe Acrobat Workstation

Today’s post is a comprehensive tutorial on configuring Adobe Acrobat to improve document accessibility. You will learn how to customize toolbars, manage tags, and update document properties to ensure your PDFs are accessible to all users.

Video Guide

Customizing the Tools Menu

Steps to Configure an Accessible Adobe Acrobat Tools Menue

1. Access Tools Menu: Open Adobe Acrobat and locate the tools menu.
2. Move Essential Tools: Identify important tools such as “Prepare for Accessibility,” “Print Production,” and “Action Wizard.”
3. Drag and Drop: Select these tools and drag them to the top of the all tools menu for easy access.

Benefits

By customizing the tools menu, you can quickly access the most frequently used features, streamlining your workflow and making the process of ensuring document accessibility more efficient.

Using the Floating Toolbar

Customization Process

1. Access Floating Toolbar: Click on the three dots in the toolbar area.
2. Customize Toolbar: Select “Customize Toolbar” to open the customization options.
3. Add Specific Options: Choose options such as the “Pre-flight Menu” and “Auto Tag Document” to add to the Quick Access Toolbar.
4. Save Customizations: Click “Save” to apply the changes.

Key Options to Add

• Pre-flight Menu: Ensures that documents meet accessibility standards.
• Auto Tag Document: Automatically tags document elements for better accessibility.
• Accessibility Full Check: Performs a comprehensive check of the document’s accessibility.
• Setting Alternate Texts: Facilitates the addition of alternative text for images and other non-text elements.

Benefits

Adding these options to the floating toolbar provides quick access to crucial tools needed for making PDFs accessible, enhancing your productivity.

Ensuring Tags Panel Visibility

Steps to Show Tags Panel

1. Right-click Method: Right-click inside the column on the far right of the screen and select “Accessibility Tags.”
2. Menu Method: Navigate to Menu > View > Show/Hide > Side Panels and select “Accessibility Tags.”

Importance

Ensuring the tags panel is visible allows you to manage and verify the tags in your document, which are critical for accessibility.

Highlighting Content in the Tags Window

How to Highlight Content

1. Access Tags Window: Open the tags window by following the steps to ensure its visibility.
2. Right-click in Tags Window: Right-click inside the tags window and select “Highlight Content.”

Purpose

Highlighting content provides a visual cue to confirm that you have tagged all necessary elements correctly. This step helps you identify and rectify tagging issues, such as the presence of blank tags.

Updating Document Properties

Steps to Update Properties

1. Open Document Properties: Select the menu button and choose “Document Properties.”
2. Description Tab: Insert information such as title, author, subject, and keywords in the description tab.
3. Advanced Tab: Set the document language in the advanced tab.

Importance

Updating document properties ensures your PDF contains all relevant metadata, improving accessibility and making the document more searchable and user-friendly.

Configuring your Adobe Acrobat workstation for accessibility involves customizing the tools menu, using the floating toolbar, ensuring the visibility of the tags panel, highlighting content in the tags window, and updating document properties. By following these steps, you will make the process of creating accessible PDFs more efficient and effective.

Download the Free Section 508 Checklist for PDF Accessibility:

Let me be your champion for inclusion. I offer tailored solutions (and self-paced courses!) to ensure your documents meet and exceed compliance expectations. For more detailed insights, tutorials, and in-depth discussions on accessibility and related topics, don’t forget to check out my YouTube channel: The Accessibility Guy on YouTube. Subscribe for regular updates!