There are, however, limitations on usability that are imposed by the format of the primary source materials contained in our products - whether they be a periodical, dissertation or other type of content. The format of the materials we receive may prevent some impaired users from being able to use certain of the works where the format is incompatible with the person’s disability and/or the ability of third party applications such as screen readers to render a useable version of the work.  For example, while a PDF rendered from a work submitted in text format may allow the Adobe Reader screen reader functionality, a PDF rendered from a work submitted in hard copy form is rendered as an image of the hard copy work (also known as a Scanned Image PDF) and therefore is not compatible with the screen reader functionality. Again, this is a consequence of the format of the works provided to UMI for inclusion within our products.

Where compatible formats are provided by the content owners, we endeavor to the best of our ability to include those compatible formats within our products.  For example, although many of the older dissertations included in our products are in Scanned Image PDF form, as technology improves and we receive more electronic dissertation and theses submissions, we are able to include those improve formats in our ProQuest® Digital Dissertations and Theses database.  Likewise, while video content may not be useable by a hearing impaired user, where transcripts are provided by the content owner, we provide those formats to our users.