Sensus Access: Convert documents using Sensus in a Moodle course

The Sensus Access activity enables Moodle course participants to upload documents directly from the course into Sensus Access for conversion to file formats that meet their accessibility needs. (If you have a brynmawr.edu email address, you can also use Sensus Access outside of Moodle; see Sensus Access: Convert documents to more accessible formats.)

Before you start, you may need the following:

  • a person with a teacher role in a Bryn Mawr Moodle course (i.e., Instructor of record, Other editing teacher, Non-editing teacher) must add the Sensus Access Document Converter to a Moodle course before participants can use it. If you don’t see this activity in your course, ask your instructor or the person managing the course site to add it for you.
  1. Click on the  Sensus Access Document Converter activity.
  2. Click the File Selection drop-down menu and choose a file from the list.

Note: This menu should list all course documents that Sensus Access can convert, including those attached to forum posts or assignments. If you aren’t seeing the file you want, however, you can save or download it from Moodle to your computer and follow Sensus Access: Convert documents to more accessible formats instructions to manually upload it to Sensus Access instead. Check the input file types listed in that guide to see if your document’s type is listed; if not, you will need to convert the file to a type that is listed before uploading it. If you need help, please contact the Help Desk (7440, help@brynmawr.edu).

  1. Under Requested Conversion, click the target format for this document (not all will be available for every type of file):
    • Accessibility conversion — converts image files or image-only PDFs into files with screen-readable text
    • MP3 — uses text-to-speech software to create an audio file of text in a document
    • E-book — reflowable-text (with or without synchronized audio) formats used by e-book reader devices and software, e.g., Kindle, Nook, Apple Books, Kobo, Bluefire, etc.
    • DAISY — creates a Daisy talking book file; note that fewer languages are supported than for other conversions
    • Braille
  2. Depending on the format you chose, you may prompted to set Conversion Parameters:
    • Accessibility conversion parameters
      • Target format: Select a file format for the converted file. If you are uncertain, choose TXT file if you do not need to preserve any visual formatting and a PDF, RTF or DOC if you do.
    • MP3 parameters
      • Language: Select the language the file is written in. For some languages, you may also have a choice of recording voices.
      • Speed: Choose the speed at which you would like the text read.
    • E-book parameters
      • Format: Choose MOBI if you will read the e-book on a Kindle or Kindle app; otherwise choose EPUB3 with media overlay (for a e-book with a synchronized text-to-speech audio recording), EPUB3 (no audio) or EPUB (for very old devices)
      • Base font size: Set a default font size
    • Braille parameters — see the Producing Braille with Sensus Access guide for information.
  3. Under Delivery method, choose Campus email (recommended) or Download. 
Attention: We STRONGLY recommend having files delivered to your campus email! The conversion and download process can take awhile, especially for long documents and/or more complex conversions. If a download hangs or never completes, repeat the steps above using the campus email option.