Re: Org mode export accessibility

["T.V Raman" <raman@google.com>]

As one example, yes.

Here is hopefully a more detailed explanation:

1. First off, here Accessibility == Specifically, Accessibility to the
   blind.
2. For blind and low vision users, you may need to "re-render" the
   math, either via magnification, speech or Braille.
3. For doing this, you need the original "generating markup" MathML,
   or better yet LaTeX (those distinctions  require more  explanation,
   but this should suffice for this thread)
4. When things are rendered to PDF, a derivative format that traces
   back to the print world and traditionally didn't feel the need to
   recreate the original, all that info from (3) is lost.
5. For regular document structure, e.g. headings etc, PDF now supports
   this "natively" via something called "marked content" introduced in
   the late 90's; to leverage this, publishing tools exporting to PDF
   can leverage that facility to enable downstream tools re-create or
   extract an approximation of the original structure. 
6. The above left out Math --- mostly because authoring tools did not
   go as far as doing that for Math.
7. Then you got  pdftex that replaced DVI (which was essentially pure
   visual layout) with PDF -- also pure visual layout -- but a format
   that has continued to evolve.
8. Now, connect the dots, newer LaTeX packages like the one mentioned
   (there may well be others now or in the future) can inprinciple
   ensure that the required "back pointers to regenerate the original
   markup" can make it all the way through  to the generated PDF.
9. Note that this is not the end of the trail; for such exports to
   make a difference to the end-user, user-facing tools still need to
   know "how" to leverage these facilities.


Max Nikulin writes:
 > Accessibility issues of exported files have been raised on the Org mode 
 > mail list again. I decided to revive this thread because I noticed a 
 > LaTeX package that may be related to the following suggestion (I am not 
 > sure that I got it right though).
 > 
 > On 07/07/2022 21:42, T.V Raman wrote:
 > > 
 > > 3. For math especially, make sure the TeX/LaTeX is preserved one
 > >    way  or the other in the export
 > 
 > Math can be extracted from PDF files as TeX commands using e.g. 
 > pdftotext if LaTeX source file contains \usepackage{mmap}. Is it what 
 > you were writing about?
 > 
 > https://ctan.org/pkg/mmap
 > https://mirrors.ctan.org/macros/latex/contrib/mmap/README
 > 
 > The latest thread with discussion of accessibility:
 > 
 > https://list.orgmode.org/th4dth$5df$1@ciao.gmane.io
 > Max Nikulin Re: Add \usepackage{cmap} as default LaTeX class in ox-latex 
 > (was: org exported pdf files) Thu, 29 Sep 2022 22:34:07 +0700.

-- 

Thanks,

--Raman(I Search, I Find, I Misplace, I Research)
♉ Id: kg:/m/0285kf1  🦮

--

Thanks,

--Raman(I Search, I Find, I Misplace, I Research)
♉ Id: kg:/m/0285kf1  🦮