Standards - UK Association for Accessible formats

Standards Braille

Introduction

UKAAF publishes a wide range of standards, guidance and articles in support of braille users and transcribers. The Unified English Braille publications listed below are the most up-to-date information on braille standards and the primary source of information to use. The Standard English Braille section contains an archive of Braille standards prior to the introduction of UEB.

Unified English Braille (UEB) is a braille code developed by the International Council on English Braille (ICEB) to bring together several existing Braille codes into one unified code. In October 2011, UKAAF decided to adopt UEB as the official braille code in the United Kingdom. UKAAF is working to facilitate the transition from Standard English Braille (SEB) to UEB.

UKAAF is the UK representative body for the International Council on English Braille (ICEB). The ICEB is responsible for developing Unified English Braille (UEB), used in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Nigeria and South Africa. UKAAF’s Braille subject area is very active and regularly participates in ICEB meetings.

Standards Large Print

UKAAF’s Clear and Large Print subject group oversees standards and addresses any issues relating to this format. In volume terms, clear and large print are probably the most commonly requested hard copy format in the UK.

Unlike some other subject areas, particularly braille, this subject area generally lacks any internationally recognised standards. It is therefore important, given the formats popularity, to try to ensure that the needs of vision impaired users are properly understood and addressed so that poor quality solutions such as enlarging originals on photocopiers are not used.

In addition to maintaining its clear and large print standards UKAAF therefore attempts to publicise and encourage their use.

Publications

MS03 UKAAF Minimum standards Clear and large print PDF
G003 UKAAF Creating clear print and large print documents PDF

MS03 UKAAF Minimum standards Clear and large print
G003 UKAAF Creating clear print and large print documents

Subject Experts

Standards PDF

Introduced by Adobe Systems in 1993, Portable Document Format (PDF) is widely used for publishing and reading digital documents and became an ISO standard in 2008. PDF/UA (Universal Accessibility) is a revision of the PDF standard that defines guidelines for making PDF documents accessible and became an ISO Standard in July 2012 (updated in 2014). PDF/UA is referenced by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0.

PDF/UA includes several features in support of accessibility the core of which is the ability to determine the logical order of content in a PDF document, independently of the content’s appearance or layout, through tags. Hence the term tagged PDF. This makes it possible for an assistive technology like web browsers to read a PDF out loud, reflow it for a small screen and facilitate users who rely on the keyboard control.

PDF has the benefit that it can faithfully render printed material on a digital devices and on print media. PDF/UA ensures that documents are fully accessible when they use the guidelines, however, there are still many examples of bad PDF that fail to reach accessible standards.

UKAAF’s aim is to ensure that PDF/UA is adopted successfully in the UK market in industries such as publishing, government, healthcare, financial services and utilities.

UKAAF is a strategic partner of the PDF Association and provides guidance to the UK market on how to leverage the PDF/UA specification for producing high quality digitally accessible documents.

Publications

MS04 UKAAF Min standards Accessible PDF for Assessments PDF
G019 Accessible PDF for Assessment PDF
G018 Guidance for the Production of Source Documents For Transcription PDF

MS04 UKAAF Min standards Accessible PDF for Assessments

MS04 UKAAF Min standards Accessible PDF for Assessments
G019 Accessible PDF for Assessment
G018 Guidance for the Production of Source Documents For Transcription

Useful Links

PDF Techniques for WCAG, W3C
ISO 32000-1:2008, ISO
PDF 1.7, Adobe
ISO 14289-1:2014, ISO
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 ISO/IEC 40500:2012

Subject Experts

Standards Office Documents

To help make these documents accessible, UKAAF has drafted accessibility guidelines to
assist users when creating them within Google and Microsoft office software.

Microsoft Office is a family of client software, server software, and services developed by
Microsoft comprising of Word, Excel and PowerPoint with reportedly over 1 billion users
worldwide.

G Suite is a set of cloud computing, productivity and collaboration tools, software and
products developed by Google comprising of Docs, Sheets and Slides as well as a handful of
other tools including GMail with reportedly over 4 million paying businesses and over 70
million education based users worldwide.

UKAAF has no official partnerships with Microsoft or Google at this time

Google Slides
Microsoft PowerPoint

Google Docs
Microsoft Word

Subject Experts

Jeff Mills

Standards Accessible Images

The UKAAF minimum standards documents are free to download in doc, docx PDF formats and are listed below. To obtain an electronic version, simply select the UKAAF document you wish to access and you will then be taken to the UKAAF download page where you can download it.

Hardcopy versions of UKAAF’s documents in print, large print, synthetic audio and braille are available to purchase (14 day delivery). UKAAF members benefit from being able to purchase these at a reduced rate. To enquire about purchasing accessible format versions please contact [email protected].

Formerly, UKAAF has not produced its own guidance on tactile graphics but contributed to the comprehensive document produced by BANA (The Braille authority of North America) which is available for free download from their website http://www.brailleauthority.org/tg/

Accessible Images document archive

G013-UKAAF Describing images 1.General principles
G014 UKAAF Describing images 2. Charts and graphs
G015 UKAAF Describing images 3. Maps maths and tables
G016 UKAAF Describing images 4. Photographs illustrations and works of art
G017 UKAAF Describing images 5. Accessible images
G021 UKAAF Describing images 6: Large Print

G013 UKAAF Describing images 1. General principles
G014 UKAAF Describing images 2. Charts and graphs
G015 UKAAF Describing images 3. Maps maths and tables
G016 UKAAF Describing images 4. Photographs illustrations and works of art
G017 UKAAF Describing images 5. Accessible images
G021 UKAAF Describing images 6: Large Print

Subject Experts

Standards HTML

HTML (HyperText Markup Language) is the most basic building block of the Web. It defines the meaning and structure of web content. Other technologies besides HTML are generally used to describe a web page’s appearance/presentation (CSS) or functionality/behaviour (JavaScript). Web content can be made accessible just by making sure the correct Hypertext Markup Language elements are used for the correct purpose. The HTML standard is developed and published by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

WAI-ARIA is a specification written by the W3C, defining a set of additional HTML attributes that can be applied to elements to provide additional semantics and improve accessibility wherever it is lacking, for example for user interface controls that involve un-semantic HTML and dynamic Javascript.

HTML standards are used by W3C WCAG standards, the ePub that can help make UI controls that involve unsemantic HTML and dynamic JavaScript, by ePub and the Daisy standards.

UKAAF has no formal relationship directly with the W3C, but we retain connections through our work with the Daisy Consortium.

Subject Experts

Jeff Mills

Standards ePub

ePub, is a standard for digital e-books published by the International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF) and is the most widely supported vendor-independent, XML-based (as opposed to PDF) e-book format. ePub 2.0 was approved in October 2007 and the ePub 3.0 specification became effective in October 2011. The ePub format is based on many open standards that include W3C’s HTML. In May 2016 IDPF Members approved a merger with the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) “to fully align the publishing industry and core Web technology”.

DAISY (Digital Accessible Information SYstem) is a technical standard for digital audiobooks, periodicals, and computerized text. DAISY is designed to be a complete audio substitute for print material and is specifically designed for use by people with “print disabilities”, including blindness, impaired vision, and dyslexia. Based on the MP3 and XML formats, the DAISY format has features that allow visually impaired listeners to navigate something as complex as an encyclopaedia or textbook, otherwise impossible using conventional audio recordings. DAISY and ePub are closely related standards using similar container formats.

UKAAF’s aim is to ensure that Daisy standards are widely understood and adopted in the UK market, particularly in the publishing sector.

UKAAF is a co-respondent and associate member of the Daisy Consortium and Richard Orme (Chief Executive of Daisy), is a member of the UKAAF board. We aim to work closely with the Daisy Consortium to ensure that this standard is widely understood and adopted.

Useful Links

Specifications for the Digital Talking Book, ANSI/NISO Z39.86-2005 (R2012) http://www.daisy.org/z3986/2005/Z3986-2005.html

Subject Experts

Richard Orme