# TikZ: add “alt tag/caption/invisible text” for accessibility

I'm using this amazing tex.sx answer tikz star macro for rendering a x-out-of-y stars graphic for my skills on my resumé.

The resume is done with xelatex and exported to pdf. Because it is a resumé, I'm concerned about it being machine readable.

Is there any way to add some alt tag/caption/label/invisible text to the output of the tikz, so it can be obtained when doing copy paste of the pdf?

Also, related question: Is there something like blind friendly latex?

I tried \pdftooltip from the \pdfcomment package, but didn't work out.

You could simply add an invisible node on top of the stars that contains the score. That way, the text won't be visible, but it will be copy/pastable:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{shapes.geometric}

\newcommand\score[2]{
\pgfmathsetmacro\pgfxa{#1+1}
\tikzset{
scorestars/.style={
star,
star points=5,
star point ratio=2.25,
draw,
inner sep=1.3pt,
anchor=outer point 3
}
}
\begin{tikzpicture}[baseline]
\foreach \i in {1,...,#2} {
\pgfmathparse{(\i<=#1?"yellow":"gray")}
\edef\starcolor{\pgfmathresult}
\draw (\i*1.75ex,0) node[name=star\i,scorestars,fill=\starcolor]  {};
}
\node [font=\tiny, opacity=0] at (current bounding box.mid) {#1/#2};
\end{tikzpicture}
}

\begin{document}
\score{0}{5} A meagre result.

\score{4}{5} Much better

\score{5}{5} Perfect score!

\end{document}

• that was fast! perfect solution for tikzs. If you don't mind, I will ask @Jake to add this to his tikz star macro. Many thanks for the answer! – viccuad Jul 16 '13 at 19:04

You can use the accsupp package.

\documentclass{minimal}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{shapes.geometric}
\usepackage{accsupp}

\newcommand\score[2]{%
\BeginAccSupp{method=escape,ActualText={#1 of #2}}%
\pgfmathsetmacro\pgfxa{#1+1}%
\tikzstyle{scorestars}=[star, star points=5, star point ratio=2.25, draw,inner sep=1.3pt,anchor=outer point 3]%
\begin{tikzpicture}[baseline]
\foreach \i in {1,...,#2} {
\pgfmathparse{(\i<=#1?"yellow":"gray")}
\edef\starcolor{\pgfmathresult}
\draw (\i*1.75ex,0) node[name=star\i,scorestars,fill=\starcolor]  {};
}
\end{tikzpicture}%
\EndAccSupp{}%
}

\begin{document}
\score{0}{5} A meagre result.

\score{4}{5} Much better

\score{5}{5} Perfect score!

\end{document}


Selection output:

0 of 5 A meagre result.
4 of 5 Much better
5 of 5 Perfect score!


Note: I'd have to escape line ends in the \score macro to avoid unintentional spaces.