Accessible Pdfs - every line in paragraph being tagged individually

[Katie Kelly Designs]

This never used to happen, but recently when exporting to PDF from InDesign, each line of a paragraph is being tagged (as opposed to the whole paragraph). I haven't been doing anything differently so I wonder if InDesign changed something? I work on a P.C. (not Mac)

[Katie Kelly Designs]

Here is a screenshot...

[Frans v.d. Geest · Accepted solution]

That is the order panel, show the Tags panel. (Even then, it does not matter for how it is read by the way). Use styles and no 'soft returns' or local formatting as a rule. But for accessibility it does not really matter if you see several containers inside the P-tag in the tags panel. For the order panel (the one you are showing) set the preference in the Order panel pane to 'show simular as block', this will show less lines.

[Katie Kelly Designs · Accepted solution]

Thank you! I found it, but in mine the option is "display like elements in a single box" so I clicked that and it worked. I was worried it would mess things up for accessibility having each line as it's own. Thank you so much for the help! 

[Frans v.d. Geest]

That is the one, I had to 'translate' it from memory 😉

[Katie Kelly Designs]

Close enough! Haha. I was able to find what you meant. Thanks again!

[anna-liisa_]

Thank you for the instructions on how to solve the problem. However, I have to disagree with you on whether it matters how it is read: it does matter! The intonation is different when there is a full stop, and a paragraph end is treated the same way, even if there is no full stop at the end of the paragraph. So, if every row is its own paragraph, the intonation can be very misleading if the paragraph ends in the middle of a sentence. (NB: In some languages this can be more significant than in others.)

Additionally, another accessibility issue arises: if you wish to move from paragraph to paragraph, you would end up moving from row to row in the case where each row is technically a paragraph. So yes, this really does matter!

[Frans v.d. Geest]

Yes, if every line would be a separate <P> but that is not what we are talking about  here;-)

One P can have more containers that show up like this in the order pane, there it does not matter. And learn to use the screen reader 'key': key+ arrow down reads paragraphs, only arrow keybreads lines, a big difference 😉

[anna-liisa_]

Thank you for the clarification.

I have noticed that some PDFs, which I know (and in some cases just suspect) were created with InDesign, have a separate paragraph on each line. I assumed that the screenshot by Katie Kelly showed a similar situation, using the page content order view instead of the structure type order.

I am curious about why InDesign sometimes creates separate paragraphs and how to avoid this issue. Currently, I don't have access to InDesign, so I cannot test it myself. Not being able to test it, but I would have thought that the default settings for exporting a PDF would create a properly structured tagged document? 

Here is a screenshot of the structure type order view of a PDF that has separate paragraphs on each line, and doesn't work well with a screen reader:

while this looks better and works better with the scren reader:

What do you think?

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

If you look at the Properties, under the Description tab, you should see what program created the PDF. InDesign should be listed unless they did some unusual process. Also, you should see if it is tagged or not. I believe untagged PDFs treat every line as a separate paragraph, whereas tagged PDFs retain the paragraph info. 

[Stefanie_Weyer3140]

Hi, unfortunately, the problem has not been solved for me. I understand what has been said so far. In the tag tree, for example, there are 10 containers in a p tag. The screen reader reads line by line, which is very cumbersome. Only when the entire text is in a container in the p tag is it read aloud continuously.
So the question is: how can I get InDesign to output a paragraph in only one container in a p-tag?
I'm using a Mac and have newest version of InDesign.
Many thanks in advance.

[Frans v.d. Geest]

Which screen reader? A 'real' one like NVDA or Jaws? Make sure not to use only the cursor arrow down but of course the NVDA-key (Jaws-key) plus cursor arrow down. (The AT key is mostly Caps Lock or Insert depending on how you set up the AT preferences - Windows only)

[Stefanie_Weyer3140]

Thank you very much! Unfortunately, I don't have Jaws or NVDA, only VoiceOver. I am familiar with the arrow keys. But when I look at accessible PDFs from official bodies or companies that deal with accessibility, there is only a single container for a very long text paragraph in the p tag. In my file, there are many containers instead. So it doesn't just depend on the reader, but also on the structure in the tag tree. A friend solves the problem by restructuring the tag tree manually, but there should be another solution.

[Frans v.d. Geest]

For reading, as said, it is about the P tag, not the containers in it...Make sure to use Paragraph styles and no local overrides, but that is no guarantee for less containers. I should not worry that much about it.

[Stefanie_Weyer3140]

Thanks again :). I've read a lot and think that my InDesign file is largely correct: no manual breaks, paragraph formats, no character formats, the tag export options, etc.
My client would like to have the file as I have described, but I am uncertain how to proceed. There are professionals who do this, and I believe they do not do it out of boredom. ;-)) Is acrobat the only way ...?

[Frans v.d. Geest]

Putting the text in one container (again, why should you, no real reason) is done in the Content Pane in Acrobat. A LOT of work, involving dragging, deleting empty containers and risking loosing spaces in text... I would advice against it.

[Stefanie_Weyer3140]

I understand, that's not my plan either ;-). That's why I asked whether InDesign can do that, but it seems that's not the case. Can both readers, Jaws and NVDA, read the text aloud without interruptions? Do you know for sure?

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Which version of InDesign exactly? 

[Katie Kelly Designs]

The most up to date version (I have the CC subscription)

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

The most up to date version (I have the CC subscription)

By @Katie Kelly Designs

That doesn't answer the question - as different regions can have different updates available. 

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Can you share your INDD file and PDF? 

[Katie Kelly Designs]

Thank you Robert, I got it solved. Frans suggested clicking the "display like elements in a single box" and that did the trick.

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

If you have to create accessible PDFs often, you might want to check out this book:

https://www.pubcom.com/books/bevi_508-indesign/508indesign.shtml

[Katie Kelly Designs]

Thanks so much Dave, I actually have that one and it is very helpful! I have done alot of accessible documents but for some reason this issue was popping up lately and thankfully it was an easy fix.

[marct14230458]

I had the exact same thing, my paragraphs, which are tagged as a P tag in the paragraph style, which is correct, but then I wondered why the heck my paragraphs were all separated into individual lines. So all I did was make a new document, just make a sentence using "Lorem ipsum" fill.

Then made a new paragraph style to match the one I was using and again added the P tag to the stylesheet. I then made a new pdf from that file to check that the P tag has made it all-in-one, low and behold, it did work.

I then copied that new style sheet, making sure its not the same name and just pasted it into my problem InDesign file. I then deleted the OLD stylesheet and replaced with the new one and IT WORKED.

Something in my InDesign file was making it do that. I even went and checked every single setting in that paragraph style, and there were no differences.

On a weird note, I even duplicated the paragraph style and made that into a h1 in and that broke up into individual lines. All I did was change the paragraph style to a h1 and nothing else.

Try this first on a duplicate InDesign doc - let us all know how it went for you.