Quote:
Originally Posted by KenJackson
Does that accurately represent the issue?
The original link criticized PDF because it was less accessible to visually-impaired users. They weren't diminishing what PDF does well, they were criticizing it for what it doesn't do and wasn't originally intended to do....
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Not quite correct.
The original link is to some rather pointless study, which basically says that Australian bureaucrats need to be trained to prepare better PDFs (like, don't import an image of a scanned page).
The title is hardly accurate, given the scope of the study and its recommendations.
Then some attacked PDF as a proprietary format, which it is not.
The bottom line is, most PDFs are perfectly compatible with text-to-speech and the free Adobe Reader has provided such capabilities for years.
But somehow the format gets blamed, because the creators of some of the custom software used by blind people have failed to integrate the standard into their products.
It's akin to dismissing PDF or EPUB because Amazon has failed to implement them well in the Kindle.
And as to books in PDF format, it would be the only format I would personally purchase, if there were any 11"+ readers, because PDF is currently the best way I know to preserve the layout and typography of books.