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yn68_2
Inspiring
October 2, 2019
Question

Your Process for Client Additions Mid PDF Remediation?

  • October 2, 2019
  • 2 replies
  • 1476 views

What do YOU do when a PDF remediation requires editing PDF content?

 

My experience has been if I try to edit the PDF then my tag tree is destroyed. Granted that was several months back so software updates may have fixed that and/or my experience in troubleshooting (may) have improved, but you can't really account for every possible event. Or can you?

 

I'm constantly in a lessons learned the hard way mode. Generally, if we get a doc from a client our contract is that it's a complete document correct in and of itself. Our responsibility is strictly remediation. However, we do go through everything, for as much as we can predict, using an evolving checklist of risks. It seems that no matter how thorough we are up front, halfway into the PDF side of remediation (and sometimes too, after submission), a client requests a line of text to be removed. Or added. But PDF is not flowing text. Things break. Tag trees break!

 

I feel kind of thick for starting over in some of these circumstances as I hate to repeat labor and question whether there is an obvious solution that I've just not read or stumbled upon yet. Is that the case? That repeating work is the sad truth? Do you have Acrobat-side solutions for client requests mid-remediation? Do you return to the source and reformat? Have I been ignorant of obvious compliance salvation?

 

To reference specifics, I have a doc containing approximately 300 URL links to client documents. I am in my final stages or attaching alt text to the many (many!) link annotations. To do so, I take the link, reference the base domain + a brief description of the page/document topic, and update the Contents property of the <Link> tag. Wait. What's this? A document no longer exists on the server?  Well #%^&@$&.......

 

I know links should be descriptive, but some clients have been strict on keeping documents as they are delivered to us. In those instances I figure the Alt Text provides the work around, as time consuming as that can be. Am I wrong? Looking back, I probably should have checked every link and every line break of every link assuming client docs are NOT properly checked before coming to us. That's a harsh lesson. My feeling is that the client will eventually want several lines of reference material removed due to this link issue. I'm just not sure my fragile psyche is ready for that.

 

What has been your work around in these type of cases?

 

- Lost in Compliance

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2 replies

Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
Legend
October 7, 2019

Sometimes this method works:

  1. Extract the page that contains the editorial change into a new PDF document of just that page.
  2. Make the editorial change.
  3. Clean up the new page's tags, RO: run AutoTag or do it manually.
  4. Slip the new page into the old PDF. Generally I do a drag-and-drop between the thumbnail panels, but my colleagues say the Insert Page command on the Thumbnails panel works, too.
  5. Delete the old page

You will lose internal hyperlinks, such as those in cross references and TOCs, so you'll have to fox those manually, too.

 

This is a serious bug in Acrobat.

Vote for it to be fixed at https://acrobat.uservoice.com/forums/590923-acrobat-for-windows-and-mac/suggestions/36540487-bug-edit-pdf-text-editing-breaks-tag-structure

 

And as they say in Chicago, vote early and often. And have your friends vote, too.

Adobe looks at the vote counts in UserVoice to determine what they'll fix, so complaining here in the help forums won't get a solution.

|&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Bevi Chagnon &nbsp;&nbsp;|&nbsp;&nbsp;Designer, Trainer, &amp; Technologist for Accessible Documents ||&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;PubCom |&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Classes &amp; Books for Accessible InDesign, PDFs &amp; MS Office |
    Y
    yn68_2Author
    Inspiring
    October 7, 2019
    Thanks for the reply. I've used the thumbnail drag-and-drop to replace pages for broken tables but those have been relatively short documents and links were not an issue. Thanks for pointing THAT out ugh. I wouldn't have thought it probably. Also, the vote link you shared is actually my original post 😉 shame it's been what like 10 months and only 2 votes!? lol. Thanks for promoting it though here. 🙂
    Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
    Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com
    Legend
    October 7, 2019
    Recognized the name! I'm going to start a new column in our newsletter...Vote the Bugs Out! Since Adobe and Microsoft moved to this outside vendor for UserVoice, all they look at are the vote counts. GIven that the topics are so difficult to find there, no wonder no one issue gets enough votes. So my column will direct people to the items and encourage them to vote. Hopefully we can get some numbers that will catch Adobe's eye and get the problem fixed. So sad that "doing the right thing" to include 40% of the world's population isn't enough. We have to "get out the vote!"
    |&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Bevi Chagnon &nbsp;&nbsp;|&nbsp;&nbsp;Designer, Trainer, &amp; Technologist for Accessible Documents ||&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;PubCom |&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Classes &amp; Books for Accessible InDesign, PDFs &amp; MS Office |
      raeben3
      raeben3
      Inspiring
      October 7, 2019

      This is an annoying problem.  Older versions of Acrobat allowed minor edits without dropping tags. No more!

      If the edits are relatively minor, to a line or paragraph or just a word I will:\

      1. create a blank document. 

      2. Use the Print Production Edit Object Tool to select the element to be edited. 

      3. Copy it to the clipboard and paste it into the blank document. 

      4. Make the edits there using the Edit Text tool.

      5. Switch back to the Edit Object Tool, select the item and copy to the clipboard

      6. Paste the edited object into the original document. Adjust placement using the Edit Object Tool which you will probably need to re-select as you switch documents. You can delete the original unedited object now or move it out of the way. 

      7. Tag it, fix the "reading order" and delete the original unedited object. 

      Note: Use ruler guides to make replacement inline accurate. If there is significant reflow this may require some additional copying and pasting, but it's better than retagging an entire section of content particularly if there are links involved. The trickiest thing is getting the right tool selected when you switch back and forth.  If you add those tools to your quick access Toolbar at the top (or whatever it's called) this will help. Be careful Save As before you start.  Objects will sometimes "combine" with other objects you paste near them on the page. Not sure when this happens but I don't save again until everything is in the right place. 

       

      Good luck!

        Y
        yn68_2Author
        Inspiring
        October 7, 2019

        Thanks for the details. You know, every time I think I get a solid handle on the remediation process something brand-friggin-new pops up from nowhere with an error in something that by all rights shouldn't error! Then I'm left to troubleshoot territory that I don't even know how to approach sometimes. Drives me batty, this past weekend especially!

         

        For example, copying content from one doc to another to fix externally, then surgically re-inserting it. Oh, and of course repairing whatever errors that entails. NONE of that is intuitive and requires some serious out-of-the-box testing to even stumble upon a workable process. This is wild!

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