Enhancing accessibility of e-Books (EPUB)
Table of Contents
Introduction
- Digital books are essential teaching and learning resources. Researchers may publish books to disseminate their research findings. Scholars may publish professional and academic textbooks.
- It is common to create separate versions of the publications which address certain specific needs of certain groups of potential users as a kind of reactive practice. However, it would be great to create a single version of the publications that could cater for the diverse needs of a wider range of groups of potential users (i.e., “born accessible”) at the outset.
- Some digital books require specific reading devices or programmes for reading. It is essential to consider the accessibility of both the book formats and the reading devices or programmes.
- It is important to consider accessibility from the beginning of the publication process to better cater for the diverse needs of the potential users to the greatest extent possible.
- In this section, there are some generic and useful resources about creating accessible publications. These resources are not exhaustive or definitive.
International standard
- EPUB is the distribution and interchange format standard for digital publications approved by the International Digital Publishing Forum.
- DAISY (the Digital Accessible Information System) is an international standard for the creation, conversion, and validation of accessible digital books around the world.
Essential guidelines
- Accessible ePub guide. UNICEF.
- DAISY Format. The DAISY Consortium.
- EBU Clear Print Guidelines. European Blind Union.
- Accessibility Guidelines for Self-Publishing Authors. The Accessible Books Consortium (ABC) and the International Authors Forum (IAF).
- Accessible Publishing Best Practice Guidelines for Publishers. Accessible Books Consortium.
- The Guidelines for Producing Clear Print (2022). Round Table on Information Access for People with Print Disabilities Inc (Round Table).
- Guidelines for Producing Accessible E-text (2018). Round Table on Information Access for People with Print Disabilities Inc (Round Table).
- Sound Advice Guidelines (2013). Round Table on Information Access for People with Print Disabilities Inc (Round Table).
Guidelines for producing accessible audio materials, covering equipment, narration, technical aspects of production, labelling, packaging, audio indexing and copyright.
Tools
- EPUBCheck
- an automated EPUB 3 accessibility checker that validates the conformance of EPUB publications against the EPUB specifications.
- for both content creators and content distributors, used by most of the digital publishing actors in their workflows.
- the official conformance checker for EPUB publications owned by World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
- SaveAsDAISY
- a free add-in for Microsoft Word for creating accessible publications in DAISY multimedia, EPUB 3, braille and large print.
- for converting Word document with accessible mathematical content inserted using MathType to DAISY.
- WordToEPUB
- for creating an EPUB file from documents created in a word processor.
- works on Windows 7, 8, 10, and 11.
- for converting Word document with accessible mathematical content inserted using MathType to EPUB.
- Ace by DAISY
- an automated accessibility checker for EPUB Publications to assist in the evaluation of conformance to the EPUB Accessibility specification.
- not a complete accessibility conformance evaluation tool; only a limited portion of accessibility checks can be automated.
- Tobi
- a multimedia book production authoring tool for creating human narrated talking books synchronized with text and images conforming to the DAISY and EPUB standards
- Obi
- for producing digital talking books that conforms to DAISY, W3C Audio Books and Accessible EPUB 3 standards.
Local community resources
- Centralised Braille Production Centre, The Hong Kong Society for the Blind.
It provides Braille transcription services, such as textbooks for university students with visual impairment, reference reading materials, examination papers, Braille e-books, and Braille audio e-books. It maintains the Braille ebook Reservation System. - The Information Accessibility Centre, The Hong Kong Society for the Blind.
It provides library services for people with visual impairment. Its recording studio would produce talking books and periodicals.
Useful resources
- DAISY Accessible Publishing Knowledge Base.
- Inclusive Publishing in Australia: An Introductory Guide.
- E-books, Making Information Accessible For All. European Blind Union.
- MathML in DAISY.
- Accessible Publishing: The Fundamentals.
- Inclusive Publishing, coordinated and managed by The DAISY Consortium.
- International Websites Offering Accessible Books. Accessible Books Consortium (ABC).