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Apps: Publisher Platforms: macOS, Windows and iPad There is a new Tags panel in Affinity Publisher which allows you to add Alt-text to any image or object when exported to PDF for accessibility purposes. To use just open the Tags panel from the Window menu, select the image or object you want to add Alt Text too and add your description in the box: Alt Text Source As well as adding your own custom description to any object, you can also choose to scrape the Alt Text from the Title, Description or Headline meta data which may be embedded within the image in question. Mark as Decoration You also have the option to “Mark as Decoration”. This means no image description will be exported or used by screen readers as the item is purely there for decorative purposes rather than important to the understanding of the document. It’s primarily there so you can positively tag an image as not needing a description so will not return as needing one in preflight. Preflight Options have also been added in preflight to make it easy to check your document for any missing Alt Text should you wish. When creating or editing a profile you will see a new section for Alt Text. Here you can choose whether you want preflight to return a warning if images, placed documents or vector objects do not have Alt Text added (or marked as decoration). Export In the advanced section of PDF export there is a new option of "Tagged PDF". This is required to be checked if you wish to export your PDF including any tags you have added. Currently this is off by default for all factory PDF presets, although we do intend to make this on by default for all non-print based factory PDF presets. General note on accessibility features I also just wanted to say that there are a number of accessibility features we are working on which will be added in upcoming updates such as reading order, heading tags and other document structure tools important for screen readers. For the time being, and so to not go off topic, please keep comments on this thread focused on the new Tags Panel / Alt Text feature added in this version.

Hi I'm not sure I've missed it, but we need to produce online documents where we can have alt-text with pictures and reading order available. Is this a function I've missed or is it in the pipeline? Really important for us at stamma.org otherwise we're going to have to look at other software. Jane