TU Berlin, University Library: Guidelines for PDF files (November 2022)
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(1) Presets & PDF properties
The PDF requirements can usually be met by changing settings or certain options in
your word processing application, when creating the document and/or when exporting
it as a PDF. Some of the settings can be changed later, notably with Adobe Acrobat
Pro (licence required).
Accessibility (recommendation)
The file should be accessible (i. e. also usable for people with visual impairments).
Please use the regular features of your word processing application to specify
alternative texts for content that is not text (illustrations, charts and graphs, tables,
etc.) to ensure accessibility.
Information by the TeX User Group: [Link]
LaTeX
List of packages with accessibility support: [Link]
Libre Office Recommendation: tab “Tools” → “Accessibility Check”
Word Recommendation: Tab “Review” → “Check Accessibility”
Adobe
Check: “Tools” → “Accessibility”
Acrobat Pro
Content can be copied and indexed
The text-based content is machine-readable, i. e. the content must not be embedded
as an image, it is searchable, it can be selected and copied to other applications.
Document properties
In most word processing application, the most important metadata can be entered
directly. At least the following must be included: title, author and keywords. It is
recommended to state the main language of your document to ensure accessibility.
Use hyperref package: add entries for (at least) “pdfauthor”, “pdftitle”
LaTeX and “pdfkeywords” in “hypersetup”
Recommendation: additional entry “pdflang”
Tab “File” → “Properties” → “Description” → entries for “title” and
Libre Office
“keywords” (“author” not available)
Tab “File” → “Info” → “Properties” → entries for “title”, “tags”
Word
(corresponds to keywords) and “author”
Check/Add entries: tab “File” → “Properties” (or: Ctrl + D)
Adobe
Recommendation: state the document language in tab “File” →
Acrobat Pro
“Properties” → “Advanced” → “Reading Options” (at the bottom)