DocAccess in Canvas - PDF Transcription Tool
DocAccess is a new digital accessibility tool that converts online PDF documents into accessible text transcriptions. This tool has been integrated into both Canvas and our university's website. While this page focuses on using DocAccess in Canvas, the tool's interface and capabilities are identical in both places.
The DocAccess transcription does not replace, remediate, or modify your original PDF document. Instead, the transcript is added to the PDF viewer as an alternate reading mode that can be toggled on and off by the viewer at any time. This transcript copy is text-based HMTL code, meant to be fully ADA compliant and screen reader-compatible.
It is a relatively new tool that uses AI to convert the transcript into an accessible transcript with proper formatting, all based in HMTL text. This should allow you to copy and paste the transcribed PDF into a Canvas page, if needed. It will also generate text descriptions for any images it detects.
As with all automated tools and AI-tools, it is recommended that you check the results yourself to verify that they are accurate depicitons of the original content.
Creating a DocAccess Transcription
It only takes a single click to request a DocAccess transcription for a PDF. First, locate the PDF in your course.
If you directly opened the PDF from a module or another page in your course, click on the Request Accessible Copy button at the top of the PDF viewer.
Alternatively, if you are looking at your course's Files page, click the grey DocAccess icon next to the PDF's publish status icon. Green icons mean that an accessible transcript was already generated by DocAccess.
The file will take at least few minutes to transcribe, depending on how big the PDF is and how many PDFs are already queued up for DocAccess transcription. Once the transcribing is finished, you will need to refresh the page in order to see the update.
Once a PDF has been transcribed with DocAccess, anybody who opens the PDF in your course will have access to the transcribed version alongside the original version. You can swap between versions with the toggle at the top of the PDF viewer interface.
Accessibility & PDF Remediation
DocAccess creates a transcript copy of your PDF that should meet ADA guidelines. However, this is not the same thing as remediating the PDF itself. Having this accessible transcription readily available does meet ADA requirements. However, if a time should come in the future where we no longer have access to DocAccess, then you will still be responsible for providing an accessible version of your PDF.
DocAccess provides a download button for the transcribed version of your PDF. This can serve as a backup copy for future use, and may prove to be an easier starting point for future remediation for long term use.
Known Glitches and Troubleshooting
DocAccess is an experimental new AI-powered accessibility tool and an even newer Canvas integration, so there may be times where things may not behave exactly as anticipated.
As with many Canvas integrations, the tool treats our two Canvas URLs (uwpks.instructure.com and uws.instructure.com) as two separate entities for now. DocAccess will work on either version of the URL. However, a file that gets transcribed in one version will not appear on the other, requiring you to either adjust your URL or transcribe it a second time.
If you find that a transcribed PDF isn't accurate enough, you can download the transcribed version, edit it, and re-upload it into your Canvas course. The downloaded transcription file can also be copy-and-pasted into a Canvas page if you find that easier to work with.