Three Ways to Reduce PDF File Size

Most of you who have access to your county's Extension website frequently post Adobe PDFs on the site, as it is seen as a universal format, since it does not requite the end-user to buy anything, but merely download the Adobe Reader.

Just like images, it is a good idea to compress the size of your PDF document as much as possible, to save valuable file space on the web server.  Here are three ways to do so.

Save as a Reduced Size PDF. In Adobe Acrobat, choose File, then Save As, then Reduced Size PDF.  A screenshot is below, taken from Adobe Acrobat Pro X.  You'll then get a dialogue box asking for Acrobat version compatibility.  As it states in the dialogue box, the later version of Acrobat you choose, the lower the file size.

 

 Optimize the document.  In Adobe Acrobat, choose File, then Save As, then Optimized PDF.  Set Compression quality to Low (see screenshot below) for both Color and Grayscale Images.  For more control, you have a panel on the left to control which objects to compress (Images, Fonts, etc.).

 

Housecleaning.  Realize that when you delete a PDF file (or any other file) in your local copy of your website, that file is NOT deleted on the website itself.  So, perhaps twice a year, go into the site (in Dreamweaver's FTP use the Remote Panel, typically on the left) and delete any old PDFs (and any other files) that you no longer link to or use.  You will be surprised at the unused documents that can accumulate over the months.

Website Readability

Readability is an often overlooked aspect of website accessibility. In fact, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines require that documents are clear and simple. Ideally, your site should be easy for the end-user to scan for information.

Juicy Studios has three readability tests available at http://juicystudio.com/services/readability.php: Gunning Fog, Flesch Reading Ease, and Flesch-Kincaid. These are reading level algorithms that can give you a good sense of how easy your text is to read.

The Gunning-Fog index returns a number between 6 and 30, with 6 being the level of TV Guide, and 15-20 the level of most academic papers (the website gives a more complete explanation of results).

The Flesch Reading Ease scale rates the text on a 100 point scale. Shoot for 40-70.

Flesch-Kincaid grade level attempts to measure how many years of schooling it would take someone to understand the content.

In addition, the readability test will return the average number of words per sentence, syllables per word, and more. The results of my own Computer Applications website are shown below.

W3C's HTML Validator and Link Checker

W3C, the World Wide Web Consortium, the guardians of webpage standards, has two tools worth noting to help you validate your HTML and check your links.

The first is a Mark-up Validation service (http://validator.w3.org/) that checks the validity your HTML against current web standards. It gives you the line number and a brief explanation of any errors it finds. If you pass the validator, you get a nifty icon to put on your website!

The second is a link checker (http://validator.w3.org/checklink) that looks for issues in links, anchors and referenced objects in a webpage, or on an entire website.

Also available on the site are HTML tutorials, HTML cheat sheets, and much more. Check them out!

Text Link Checker Tool

Is your website in a bad neighborhood?

The Bad Neighborhood text link checker (http://www.bad-neighborhood.com/text-link-tool.htm) automatically scans the links on your website, and on the pages that your website is linking to, and flags possible problem areas. Cut-and-paste your URL into the box, and the site will examine the anchor text linking to the various pages, and check for parts of certain words within them, such as “adult”, “sex”, and “pharma” (among others). Obviously, not every site with those words is a suspect site, but the tool does help you ferret out potential problem areas.

Clarification of what the tool actually does is available at http://bad-neighborhood.blogsblogsblogs.com/2007/08/26/a-quick-clarification-on-the-bad-neighborhood-detector/

A partial screenshot of the results of my own site is shown below. Click to enlarge.

WAVE: Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool

At http://wave.webaim.org/ you will find the easy-to-use WAVE (Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool). There are several ways to use it: put in your URL, upload your HTML files, or cut and paste your code directly into a provided window.

What WAVE returns is your page with an overlay that tags both good accessibility practices and accessibility errors. Errors are noted with a big headline above the page. A screenshot is below, with various tags circled. Click it to see a larger version.

In addition, there is a button in the upper right corner that alows you to disable your CSS styles and see the basic structure of your site, sans CSS. Remember, An accessible document should be well-structured, meaningful, and readable without CSS.

Screen Reader Emulator

A key issue in website accessibility is how well your site converts to a text-to-speech reader, used by end-users with visual impairments. Essentially, a screen reader "reads" a website to the end-user, noting links, headers, tables and frames.

There is a very cool add-on to Firefox called the Fangs Screen Reader Emulator. It strips away graphics and layout and allows you to read your site as it will be read by a text-to-speech screen reader. You can download it at https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/402.

Then, to test your website's screen reader friendliness, go to the Tools menu and choose Fangs. It will bring up your page in a screen reader emulator that translate your site to text only, listing exactly what will be read by the screen reader.

Here is a site as it appears in Firefox:


And as it appears in the Fangs Screen Reader Emulator (click to enlarge):


Things to watch out for (taken from the Fangs tutorial on writing for text-to-speech screen readers):
-Are there many consecutive table announcements?
-Are there long sections of uninterrupted text?
-Are the navigation links well labeled?
-Are the heading texts understandable? Is it clear for the user under which heading to look for specific content?

To learn more about writing for screen readers, go to the Fangs help site at http://www.standards-schmandards.com/fangs/help/index.php?l=en-US&v=1.0.7#about

Colorblind Web Page Filter

A web accessibility tool after my own heart! Color-blindness is an oft-neglected but important consideration when determining web accessibility. There is a tool at http://colorfilter.wickline.org/ that allows you to see your website as a colorblind person would see it. The sight can replicate lots of different forms of colorblindness, from the relatively common red/blue color-blindness (8% of males) to total color blindness, or monochromacy (well under 1% of the population).

Just cut and past your URL into the box, and choose the type of color blindness you'd like to replicate. Some screen shots of the Extension template with the colorblind filter applied are below.

Our website in full color:


Our website as it would look to someone with red/green color blindness:


Our website as it would look to someone with monochromacy: