[BlindResearch] Seeking Guidance on Accessible PDF Reading and Annotation with Screen Readers

[Brandon Keith Biggs]

Hello Ronak,
1. I recommend getting an OCR tool like opening a PDF in Google Docs, then
downloading it as a word file. Also, try this paper OCR tool:
https://papertohtml.org/
You can also ask your disability services to convert papers to word, but I
prefer the above options. I personally use Kurzweil 1000 to OCR.
2. The best annotation option is with word or google docs. I use *~* to
designate a comment from me. I also will put all papers into a spreadsheet,
and paste interesting quotes into one column, and put my thoughts in
another column. I have many other columns like bibtex citation, abstract,
link to the paper, pointer, title, type, tags, etc. I have over 600 papers
in my spreadsheet and run queries and searches to find the ones I'm looking
for when writing a paper.
Sadly, most of the mainstream research tools are inaccessible.
Hope this helps.
Thanks,

Brandon Keith Biggs <http://brandonkeithbiggs.com/>


On Tue, Oct 29, 2024 at 8:31 AM ronak shah via BlindResearch <
blindresearch at nfbnet.org> wrote:

> Dear researchers,
>
> I hope this message finds you well.
>
> I am reaching out to ask for advice on two specific challenges I’m facing
> while reading and annotating research papers in PDF format as part of my
> PhD work. I would be truly grateful if anyone could share their experiences
> or workflows on these issues.
>
> *1- Accessible PDF Reading:* Many of the research papers I need to read
> are decades old and often difficult to access with my screen reader (NVDA,
> latest version). If anyone has workflows or techniques to improve PDF
> accessibility for smoother reading, I would be very interested in learning
> about them.
>
> 2- *Annotating PDFs with Screen Readers:* I am also looking for ways to
> highlight and annotate text within PDFs using NVDA, allowing these
> annotations to be captured by tools like Zotero for future note-taking. Any
> guidance on annotation methods that work well with screen readers would be
> incredibly helpful.
>
> I am working on a Windows 10 university-provided machine, which limits any
> significant system modifications. I would appreciate any insights or shared
> practices that could help streamline my reading and note-taking process
> with PDFs.
>
> Thank you in advance for your time and suggestions.
>
> Warm regards,
> Ronak
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