Export tags for semantic structure in PDF documents.

The PDF/UA standard (PDF for Universal Access) provides
the assignment of specific 'semantic labels'
(also referred to as 'tags', 'export tags') in order to map
the semantic structure in the PDF as precisely as possible.

Export tags are associated with paragraph styles and are used
to indicate the type of the parts of a document’s content,
like whether a piece of text is a paragraph, a title or a header.

In order for export tags to work well, paragraph styles
have to be used consistently across the document.

In a correctly tagged PDF, special text elements,
such as Caption, BlockQuote and Index,
must be specifically marked as such.

However, only basic tags (header or simple text)
are supported in Adobe InDesign.
Special elements, such as Caption, BlockQuote and Index,
do not have their own tag equivalent in Adobe InDesign.

With the extension of these export tags in MadeToTag,
the aspect of the accessible access to a PDF content
is addressed even more strongly.

For paragraphs and headings,
export tags have to be assigned by the user.

For lists, tables and tables of contents,
Adobe InDesign automatically creates
the correct tags when exporting to PDF,
but only if the respective features of InDesign are used.

Assign export tags to paragraph styles.

With MadeToTag assigning the right export tags
for paragraphs and headings is easy,
just assign the right export tag to a text that is
using the respective paragraph style:

• Make sure you have enabled keyboard
  'Use MadeToTag shortcut set'
  at the bottom of the MadeToTag panel


• Put the text cursor inside a paragraph for which
  you wish to assign an export tag


• Press Option-”1” for a heading level 1,
  Option-”2” for a heading level 2 etc., or
  Option-”7” for a paragraph


• In order to remove an export tag from a paragraph style,
  press Option-”0” (Option-“zero”)


• If a paragraph style is used for decorative parts ('artifacts')
  of the document’s content, use Option-”9”, but use this with care as
  all content inside paragraphs associated with the 'Artifact export tag'
  will not be an accessible part of the content structure in the exported PDF.

There is no need to set an export tag for lists or a table of contents
generated by InDesign, just leave the export tag at 'Automatic'.

For tables, the content in table cells is formatted as any other text content,
for example as a regular paragraph or a list.

Please avoid headings inside tables as this is usually not adequate.
Instead, header cells in a table are configured through
'Table Setup' in Adobe InDesign.

Select additional export tags for
'Caption, BlockQuote and Index'

MadeToTag has (since version 1.9 (093)) support for also defining
export tags for 'Caption', 'BlockQuotes' and 'Index'.

The following additional export tags can be assigned with
MadeToTag from within InDesign and transferred to
the PDF during export from MadeToTag:

• Caption

Caption of short text describing figure objects, images, digits, tables or lists:

• Caption

• This will clearly mark the paragraph as a <Caption> in the PDF/UA.

• Caption (List, at top)

• This will make the paragraph the first child of the list structure
  and mark it as <Caption> in the PDF/UA.


• (Only if a list structure immediately follows
  the paragraph tagged as caption).

• Caption (Table, at top)

• This will make the paragraph the first child of the table structure
  and mark it as <Caption> in the PDF/UA.


• (Only if a table structure immediately follows
  the paragraph tagged as caption).


• This should be used if the <Caption> paragraph
  is above (at top of) the table.

• Caption (Table, at bottom)

• This will make the paragraph the last child of the table structure
  and mark it as <Caption> in the PDF/UA.


• (Only if a table structure immediately precedes
  the paragraph tagged as caption).


• This should be used if the <Caption> paragraph
  is below (at bottom of) the table.

• BlockQuote:

Separates a block of text from the rest of the text
and highlights it as a quotation:

• BlockQuote

  • This will clearly mark the paragraph as a <BlockQuote> in the PDF/UA.
  
  
  • Where two or more consecutive paragraphs have this export tag,
    a single BlockQuote tag will be assigned.
  
  

• Index:

• Index

• This will clearly mark the paragraph as a <Index> in the PDF/UA.


• Where two or more consecutive paragraphs have this export tag,
  single Index tag will be assigned.

Reduce structure to predefined types.

The 'Reduce structure to predefined types' option
makes it so that the tags in the PDF file are no
longer named based on the user-defined paragraph styles
(and then mapped to P, H1 etc. using the role map),
but instead exclusively use the pre-defined types,
i.e. P, H1 and so on.

Review export tags for paragraph styles.

In order to make it easy to find out whether all text in an InDesign document
is using the correct export tag, check the 'Highlight export tags' check box
to activate color highlighting for export tags:

• Headings are highlighting by an orange color
  (darker orange for heading level 1,
  increasingly lighter for the heading levels below it)


• Paragraphs are highlighted by a blue color


• Lists are highlighted by green


• Paragraphs representing artifacts are highlighted by a red color

The color highlighting is only shown on screen and
will not be visible in print output or exported PDF files.

Establish correct content order by means of 'Article' feature.

Adobe InDesign comes with a feature called 'articles',
accessible through the 'Article panel', which makes it
possible to organize the content of an InDesign document
in a sequence of articles, each containing a sequence of frames
defining the order of the document’s content,
in the order it will usually be consumed by a reader.

Create articles.

MadeToTag provides keyboard shortcuts to make creation of articles faster.

• Make sure you have enabled 'Use MadeToTag shortcut set'
  at the bottom of the MadeToTag panel


• Make sure you have the 'Articles panel' open while
  organizing your content into articles


• Select a frame that shall become the first content object in a new article,
  and press Command-“N”, enter a name for the article, and press OK,
  as you can immediately see in the 'Articles panel',
  this will create a new article


• Select a frame that shall be added to the current article
  as the next part of that article’s content, and press Command-“A”
  as you can immediately see in the 'Articles panel',
  this will add the currently selected frame to the current article

Important to know:

• Once a frame from a text chain is associated with an article,
  the whole text chain is associated with the article,
  including all anchored frames in it.


• Frames on master pages cannot be associated with articles;
  in order to associate frames on a master page with an article,
  they first have to be turned into regular frames.

Ensure all content is ordered in articles.

MadeToTag offers various possibilities to temporarily hide or show frames,
depending on whether they are associated with the current article
or any article or not.

For example the shortcut Command-Shift-“X” hides all frames
already associated with the current article, to make it easier to
identify frames that still have to be associated with that article.
The available possibilities can be found in the fly out menu
of the MadeToTag panel.

Review content order and semantic structure.

In order to check and review the content order and
semantic structure of an article,
use the 'Show preview' feature (shortcut: Command-Shift-“V”).

The MadeToTag preview feature will display a new window containing
a stylized structural view of the content of the current article.

For creating an overview of the whole document, including all its articles,
use 'Preview for all articles' (shortcut: Command-Shift-“B”).

Provide alternate text for images and graphics.

In order to make the content of a PDF file to users with certain
disabilities, loss of vision, low vision or learning disabilities,
it is essential to provide a text equivalent for non-text content,
like images:

Locate frames requiring alternate text.

There are two ways to locate frames requiring alternate text:

• Use the 'Go to next frame without alternate text' button in
  the MadeToTag panel, the next image frame that does not yet
  have alternate text will be centered on screen and be selected;
  just enter the alternate text in the text field in the MadeToTag panel


• Use the 'Show overview' button in the MadeToTag panel
  to display a list of all image frames in the document,
  optionally displaying only images for which alternate text
  still has to be provided; just go to the text field to the right of
  the respective image and enter the alternate text

Review alternate text.

In order to review the alternate text in the context of
the surrounding content, simply use 'the article preview' feature.

By pressing Command-Shift-“V” for a
structural preview of the current article.

By pressing Command-Shift-“B” for a
structural preview of all articles.

Review Document Metadata.

The MadeToTag panel provides a view of the most important metadata fields
(to instead display a dialog view giving access to all metadata fields,
use Adobe InDesign's 'File Information'... feature).

In order to make an exported tagged PDF accessible it is mandatory
to at provide a meaningful document title as metadata.
'Title' can be entered in this step.

More metadata fields (author, description, keywords, copyright notice)
as well as URL to copyright information, can be filled in at the same time
to further increase document accessability.

Metadata Proof Reading Report

Review meta data and alternate text for approval.

The template document for review of metadata and
alternate text can be customized.
Saving a template can be done via "File -> Save As"
with the “Format” set to “InDesign 2023 Template”.

MadeToTag generates an overview of the meta data and
alternate text for images within the document which will be
shown as a list in a new InDesign document.

This document can be forwarded directly, as a PDF, or as a printout.
The quality of the PDF depends on the export settings,
i.e. the Image Handling ones.

The main frame should be in an article,
as well as the Paragraph Styles will have proper tagging.
Exporting the template with MadeToTag results in a tagged PDF.

Note that the alternate text for images function takes into account
whether an article is anchored or otherwise associated.

The template document for metadata and alternate text review
can now be fully customized.
You can adapt the template to have your own color scheme, translate it,
match your Corporate Identity, or having a different format/paragraph styles:

• Customsizing Proof Reading Report Template Document