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Make your Digital Media Projects Accessible

1. Use good copy/paste practice

If you are copying text from a website or word document, remove code before pasting it into a rich text box. This can be done by:

  • Pasting it into a plain text editor (like Notepad) and then copying and pasting it into the rich text box, or
  • Pasting the text using the short cut Ctrl + Shift + V on Windows or Command + Shift + V on a Mac.

It is normal for limited coding to remain, including:

  • Break or paragraph tags (<br /> or <p>)
  • Character entities (&nbsp;, &lsquo;, &rsquo;)

2. Format your text using the tools in the rich text box

Once you’ve pasted your text using the steps above, you’ll need to add your formatting back in.

  • Headings: Use the Styles option to assign the proper heading level and provide specific and meaningful titles that will help your audience navigate the content.
    • Heading 1: Popular Pets (Page title)
      • Heading 2: Cats
        • Heading 3: Reasons to have a cat
        • Heading 3: How to care for a cat
      • Heading 2: Dogs
        • Heading 3: Reasons to have a dog
        • Heading 3: How to care for a dog
  • Use bulleted and numbered lists
    • Do not create your own lists using dashes and spaces. Use the formatting options to create proper lists.
  • Avoid the use of italics, underline and bold
    • Italics and bold tags are not automatically announced by screen readers, and therefore that additional meaning is not available to people using that technology.
    • Reserve the use of italics for specific circumstances:
      • Book or journal titles
      • Words in different languages
      • Variables in math, science and computing texts
    • Underlined text looks like a link, and it will cause confusion.

3. Create informative links

  • Linked text should always:
    • Identify where the link will take someone (e.g., Review the Word accessibility page for more information)
    • Open in the same window
    • Have the description appear below the link if it is in a list (i.e., do not use hover over text)
    • Avoid using “link to” or "Click here" in the text of the link
    • Use distinctive language for different links

4. Include Alternative Text for your images

Alt text should be succinct and meaningful. When creating alternative text or alt text for your image, consider the role the image plays:

Informative images

 Informative images communicate something to or inform the user.

The alt text should provide a description of the most important parts of the image in the context of the surrounding content. Do not describe every aspect of the image, but the alt text should connect to the message that the author is trying to convey

Decorative images

Images that are present only for decoration or the layout of the page.

These images should be skipped by assistive technology since they only exist to make the content more appealing. However, each platform or tool may have its own method to mark images as decorative.

Functional images

An image that provides some sort of functional purpose, such as a link or button.

The description should include the action or behaviour the image will perform. This is seen when an image acts as a link, and the alt text would be the same as used for linked text.

Complex images

An image that contains a large amount of visual infromatio that cannot be succinctly described.

To avoid lengthy alt text, it is best practice to provide additional context for complex images in alternative ways.

Examples of this are linking data tables for complex charts or graphs, or creating a longer narrative-based alt text which can be included in the main text or linked adjacent to the image. 

5. Use a free tool to check accessibility

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