Ensure Accessible Files
All electronic documents on your website are expected to comply with Stanford’s digital accessibility policy. This includes PDFs, Microsoft Word documents, PowerPoint Presentations, etc.
The Office of Digital Accessibility has guidance for making accessible documents.
Strategy for remediating documents
- Identify a date by which all documents uploaded to website will be accessible.
- Use Google Analytics or Siteimprove to see which documents are your top most accessed documents. Remediate those.
- Remove documents that do not get much traffic. If a document needs to be available for “historical purposes” then have a note that offers people who need it in accessible format to make a request.
Can you make it into a page?
The HTML of a web page is inherently accessible. Consider using a web page instead of uploading a PDF or Word document. Along with making it more accessible, and it will be more friendly for mobile users.
Which is preferable: PDF or HTML page?
A PDF is a Portable Document File. It's a standardized, versatile file format that is easy for presenting and exchanging documents. An HTML page uses hypertext markup language tags to define page structure and formatting. Most websites use HTML for their web pages. Although both formats are used to communicate information, their benefits differ:
| Features to compare | HTML | |
|---|---|---|
| Self-contained images and graphics make it easy to share | Yes | No |
| Easy to print | Yes | depends on CSS |
| Open to search engines | No |
Yes
|
| Easily created and viewed through the WYSIWYG and browser | No | Yes |
| Easy to make accessible to assistive technology | No | Yes |
- A PDF is self-contained with all images and graphs. The image and graphs on an HTML page are stored and loaded separately.
- A PDF is easy to print. An HTML page may need extra CSS code in order to print accurately.
- An HTML page is easy for search engines to find, index, and search. The contents of a PDF are not available to search engines.
- An HTML page is easily viewed through a browser. A PDF requires additional steps such as downloading and software such as Adobe Reader before it can be viewed.
- Making an HTML page accessible to assistive technology such as a screen reader is easily accomplished with a standard WYSIWYG editor. Making a PDF accessible to assistive technology is a complex process and requires Adobe Acrobat Pro.
Because HTML pages are best for SEO and accessibility, we encourage the use of HTML pages for content display whenever possible. When a PDF or other document type is required or the better choice, the Office of Digital Accessibility has guidance on making these documents accessible.
Related Resources
- Archival Content from Stanford's Office of Digital Accessibility
- Creating Accessible PDFs from LinkedIn Learning