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A podcast for those who design, develop and run websites.

Boagworld is the blog of web strategist Paul Boag who lives in the heart of rural Dorset (hence the cows). He produces a weekly podcast with UX consultant Marcus Lillington on building and running websites. They also run the web design agency Headscape.

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Can PDF really be used for good?

Posted in Usability on: Tuesday, August 23, 2005 by Paul Boag

Yesterday Joe Clark published his long awaited article on PDF accessibility and it did not disappoint. It includes some excellent advice on when to use PDF and dispelled many of the accusations levelled against the format. If you use PDF on your site, you should read on.

He argues that posting a PDF online with no alternative does not automatically constitute discrimination.

Boo sucks to the PDF critic

The PDF format has always received a bad press for but Joe Clark’s article debunks many of these criticisms arguing that in many ways it is no worse than HTML. In fact, at one point in the article he actually argues that it has taken screen readers considerably longer to HTML correctly, than it has PDF. He argues that posting a PDF online with no HTML alternative does not automatically constitute discrimination.

However, Joe’s article was far from being a ringing endorsement for the format. In particular, he identifies two specific problems not so much with the format itself but the way it is used:

PDF is overused

Firstly, he argues that the format is overused. The implication of the article is that many people use PDF simply because they are easier to create than converting to HTML. Joe argues that in most cases content should be displayed as HTML unless PDF offers functionality that cannot be recreated in HTML. He goes on to list some examples of circumstances where PDF might be a more suitable solution.

PDF is badly tagged

Secondly, Joe argues that in most cases PDF is not marked up in such a way as to maximise accessibility. This is done using a tagging system that many people are completely unaware of and that can only be added by a limited number of software applications (such as Adobe Acrobat). Although "untagged" documents can still prove accessible, the likelihood of them being so is considerably reduced.

Click here for the full article

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Produced by Headscape

Boagworld is produced by the web design agency Headscape founded by Marcus, Paul and Chris Scott. Headscape also has a number of other talented guys who blog. Check them out.

  • Craig Rowe is one of our amazing developers and writes some superb posts on everything from .net to AIR apps.

  • Ed Merritt is a Headscape designer who's blog contains examples of his work and a number of free Wordpress themes.

  • Dave McDermid is a Headscape developer who has an excellent blog. He blogs on everything from AJAX to security.

  • Rob Borley is one of our project managers and blogs regularly on client and project management issues.

  • Leigh Howells is our multimedia design guru (whatever one of those is). He blogs on a mixture of design and music.

Paul elsewhere

Paul just can't shut up. He publishes regular audioboos, has a personal blog and is addicted to twitter. He also writes and speaks regularly. Check out the most recent below: