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SusanHales
Participant
February 17, 2016
Question

Accessibility and Character Encoding with Checkboxes

  • February 17, 2016
  • 2 replies
  • 5203 views

Hi!  I have an Adobe Acrobat XI form that needs to be accessible.  I began with a Microsoft Word document and saved it as a .pdf file.  I then created the fields in Acrobat, including a pair of radio buttons that I have formatted as check boxes (Properties->Options->Button Style->Check).  After doing all of the obligatory tagging, etc., on the document, I run the Accessibility Checker and everything is perfect except for one error, which is "Character encoding - Failed."  The checker indicates that it is the check boxes that are problematic. When I look up the error, I am advised to do all sorts of things (like make sure I have the right font on my system, use a later version of Distiller, etc.), and then re-create the .pdf file.  Unfortunately, these recommendations won't help because the problem is introduced AFTER the .pdf file is created, by adding the check box fields.  I'm guessing that these boxes are created with a special non-standard font and that is why I'm getting the error.  So – how do I make the error go away?  Can I change the font that the check boxes use to something more acceptable?  I've tried changing the font in the fields’ Properties->Appearance settings, but the font choice is set to Adobe Pi and it doesn't seem that I can change it – the menu is grayed out.

Or am I completely misunderstanding what is going on here? I appreciate any insight you folks can give me!

--Sue

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2 replies

olafdruemmer
Inspiring
February 17, 2016

Can you provide a sample file that shows the same issue? If your file contains cinfidential information, maybe you can strip it down so it does not contain much more than just the rpoblematic check box (and is still showing the error in the accessibility checker)?

Also, just as an additional test - could you use Preflight in Acrobat Pro and run a "PDF/A-2a validation", and report back what kind of errors are flagged regarding encoding?

Olaf

SusanHalesAuthor
Participant
February 17, 2016

Olaf, thank you for your thoughts!  However, I think I just figured out the issue.  I'm going to post my solution in case someone else ever has this question.

It seems that the problem was the check mark that I selected as the field style. Somehow that character is non-standard.  If I change the option in the field's properties from "check" to "cross," then the error messages go away. This doesn't seem to be documented anywhere that I can find.  Although I prefer the check mark visually, it's not really a problem to change the check to an "X".

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