Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents
Readability has been studied for decades, ranging from traditional paper reading to digital document reading, Web page reading, etc. Different audiences have different needs and the needs trigger the researchers to investigate innovative solutions. For example, in recent years, researchers have stud...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2021-08-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Computer Science |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcomp.2021.628832/full |
| _version_ | 1818646571128979456 |
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| author | Chen-Hsiang Yu Zachary Shelton Omar Abou Nassif Mourad Mohamed A. Oulal |
| author_facet | Chen-Hsiang Yu Zachary Shelton Omar Abou Nassif Mourad Mohamed A. Oulal |
| author_sort | Chen-Hsiang Yu |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Readability has been studied for decades, ranging from traditional paper reading to digital document reading, Web page reading, etc. Different audiences have different needs and the needs trigger the researchers to investigate innovative solutions. For example, in recent years, researchers have studied readability enhancement of English articles for non-native English readers, either on paper reading or hypertext document reading. Using a variety of methods, researchers were able to enhance the reading comprehension and the users’ satisfaction on hypertext document reading, such as changing content presentation with visual-syntactic text formatting (VSTF) format or Jenga format. In terms of dynamically changing content presentation for reading, one less explored format is Portable Document Format (PDF), which was traditionally viewed within a modern Web browser or Adobe Acrobat reader on the desktop. PDF format was standardized as an open format in 2008 and has been widely used to keep a fixed-layout content. However, a fixed layout document presents a challenge to apply existing transformation methods, not mention on mobile devices. In this paper, we not only present a system that uses a novel algorithm to decode PDF documents and apply content transformation to enhance its readability, but we also generalize it to a framework that allows the users to apply customizations and the developers to customize their needs. Although we used Jenga format as an example to enhance the readability of PDF documents, we envision the proposed framework can be used to adopt different customizations and transformation methods. The current result is promising, and we believe it is worth further investigation to make PDF documents readable and accessible for different populations, such as non-native English readers, people with dyslexia or special needs, etc. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-17T00:48:45Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-3146c4bc896c4d089b57e291263bb82c |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2624-9898 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-17T00:48:45Z |
| publishDate | 2021-08-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Computer Science |
| spelling | doaj.art-3146c4bc896c4d089b57e291263bb82c2022-12-21T22:09:49ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Computer Science2624-98982021-08-01310.3389/fcomp.2021.628832628832Readability Enhancement for PDF DocumentsChen-Hsiang YuZachary SheltonOmar Abou Nassif MouradMohamed A. OulalReadability has been studied for decades, ranging from traditional paper reading to digital document reading, Web page reading, etc. Different audiences have different needs and the needs trigger the researchers to investigate innovative solutions. For example, in recent years, researchers have studied readability enhancement of English articles for non-native English readers, either on paper reading or hypertext document reading. Using a variety of methods, researchers were able to enhance the reading comprehension and the users’ satisfaction on hypertext document reading, such as changing content presentation with visual-syntactic text formatting (VSTF) format or Jenga format. In terms of dynamically changing content presentation for reading, one less explored format is Portable Document Format (PDF), which was traditionally viewed within a modern Web browser or Adobe Acrobat reader on the desktop. PDF format was standardized as an open format in 2008 and has been widely used to keep a fixed-layout content. However, a fixed layout document presents a challenge to apply existing transformation methods, not mention on mobile devices. In this paper, we not only present a system that uses a novel algorithm to decode PDF documents and apply content transformation to enhance its readability, but we also generalize it to a framework that allows the users to apply customizations and the developers to customize their needs. Although we used Jenga format as an example to enhance the readability of PDF documents, we envision the proposed framework can be used to adopt different customizations and transformation methods. The current result is promising, and we believe it is worth further investigation to make PDF documents readable and accessible for different populations, such as non-native English readers, people with dyslexia or special needs, etc.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcomp.2021.628832/fullreadability enhancementPDF documentsmobile devicescontent transformationaccessibility |
| spellingShingle | Chen-Hsiang Yu Zachary Shelton Omar Abou Nassif Mourad Mohamed A. Oulal Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents Frontiers in Computer Science readability enhancement PDF documents mobile devices content transformation accessibility |
| title | Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents |
| title_full | Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents |
| title_fullStr | Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents |
| title_full_unstemmed | Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents |
| title_short | Readability Enhancement for PDF Documents |
| title_sort | readability enhancement for pdf documents |
| topic | readability enhancement PDF documents mobile devices content transformation accessibility |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcomp.2021.628832/full |
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