PAC Engine in Enterprise Use: Automated PDF Accessibility Testing
Checking a single PDF with PAC is a quick task. In companies and organizations, however, the situation is often different: large volumes of automatically generated PDFs are created there every day. The challenge, therefore, is this: How can PDF accessibility be automated, scaled, and integrated directly into existing systems?
The PAC Engine with axesPAC can be integrated into existing systems, platforms, and processes via a REST API specifically for such automated verification processes. This allows PDF documents to be verified automatically, with the results transferred directly into the respective workflow.
From Manual Testing to Automated Testing
PAC (PDF Accessibility Checker) is a tool for checking the accessibility of PDF documents. Using the user interface, individual PDFs can be checked for compliance with the machine-verifiable requirements of relevant standards, such as PDF/UA and WCAG. The results show which requirements are met and where technical issues exist.
This approach is practical for individual documents. However, when dealing with large volumes of documents, manual review quickly reaches its limits. When hundreds or thousands of PDFs are generated daily, the review process must be automated and integrated into the existing workflow.
This is exactly why axesPAC uses the PAC Engine: PAC’s proven validation mechanisms are not implemented via a user interface, but directly within automated processes. The PAC Engine analyzes the submitted PDF documents and returns the validation results in a structured format.
Why is this relevant for businesses?
When dealing with large volumes of documents, automated checks offer several advantages:
- Scalability: Large volumes of PDFs can be checked automatically.
- Consistency: All documents are evaluated using the same checking logic.
- Integration: The validation becomes an integral part of existing document workflows.
- Automated post-processing: Validation results can be fed directly into downstream processes.
- Reduced manual effort: Recurring validations do not need to be initiated individually.
This provides greater control over the document inventory, rather than relying solely on individual spot checks.
axesPAC: The PAC engine via API
To enable the PAC engine to form part of such automated processes, it can be integrated directly into existing systems and applications using axesPAC.
Via a REST API, systems can automatically submit PDF documents for verification and then process the results directly. The verification results are provided in machine-readable JSON format and can thus be used, for example, for further process steps or automated decisions.
A typical process might look like this, for example:
Generate PDF → check automatically → receive result → carry out the next step in the process
The result can have a direct impact on the rest of the process: a document that meets the defined technical requirements can be automatically approved for further processing. If a problem is detected, the system can, for example, hold the document back and forward it for manual checking.
In this way, accessibility testing becomes an integral part of the document process rather than a manual step carried out at a later stage.
Tried-and-tested technology, implemented automatically
The PAC Engine combines established PDF accessibility checking mechanisms with the ability to integrate them into automated processes. With axesPAC, organisations can deploy this technology where their PDFs are created and processed – in a scalable, automated manner and integrated directly into their existing system landscape.
Automated checking of PDFs rather than spot checks
With axesPAC, you can integrate the PAC engine directly into your systems via a REST API. Automate the checking of large volumes of PDFs and process the results directly within your workflows.