I’m preparing to re-enter the workforce and decided I should bolster my résumé. I had also recently been revisiting the WC3’s Web Accessibility Initiative, which covers a vast knowledgebase of information, resources, and guidelines for making the internet and digital technologies more accessible for those whose abilities might otherwise render them unable to operate in this dynamic space.
That doesn’t just mean people who have disabilities – on the contrary; many people face limitations, temporary or otherwise, due to changes in life, expected or unexpected, from which they recover or are forced to adapt new ways of operating.
So, I started working edX’s certificate in Web Accessibility.
In 1998, I started teaching myself HTML (2/3.0) and CSS (1.0) by reading the WC3 Standards Recommendations: as they unfolded via the publicly accessible bulletin boards where ongoing discussions were posted; in their final forms, linked and well-formatted; and eventually via resources created by the Web Standards Project, who triumphed in cleaning up the mess left by corporate bickering.
I was 13 at the time. I was reading documents by Tim Berners-Lee, Dave Raggett, Dan Connolly, and the extended cast of collaborators, as they were being published.
It was strangely fascinating and exhilarating to me, largely because this group was intensely focused on ensuring web technologies were developed from their very inception to be accessible for everyone, regardless of ability.
It was also arcane: the deeply-indented lines of responses, the absolutely terse technical explanations of how and why things should work, the back and forth over minutia. It felt like seeing science unfold in front of me, because that’s essentially what was happening.
So, it was plainly obvious that Web Accessibility is where I should dive back in. The links I’m gathering here were posted in the above course, but are easily found and publicly available. This is simply meant to be a short, curated aggregation of helpful resources for those who are curious in how to make the web a friendlier, better-designed space for everyone.
I’m making fast progress on the certification – planning on finishing by the end of the week. It’ll add a little time to the process, but I think it will also help me retain the information a little better, so I’ll do my best to document relevant information here.
Links
- W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)
- Web Accessibility Perspectives: Explore the Impact and Benefits for Everyone
- Understand a Different Perspective
- How People with Disabilities Use the Web
- Wikipedia: Typewriter
- Ofcom publishes third report on quality of live TV subtitles
- Keyboard Accessibility from WebAim (Web Accessibility in mind)
- Be consistent
- A Web of Anxiety Part 1 and Part 2 by David Swallow
- Cognitive Accessibility 103 by Jamie Knight
- Essential Components of Web Accessibility
- Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)
- Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines (ATAG)
- User Agent Accessibility Guidelines (UAAG)
- The Business Case for Digital Accessibility
- Electronic Curb Cuts Have Benefits for All
- Alexander Graham Bell; History.com
- Pellegrino Turri
- Older Users and Web Accessibility: Meeting the Needs of Ageing Web Users
- Stories of Web Users
- W3C WAI “More than Mobile”
- What is User-Centered Design? Excerpt from Just Ask: Integrating Accessibility Throughout Design by Shawn Lawton Henry, Accessibility in User-Centered Design
- Henry, Abou-Zahra & Brewer: MIT Libraries: The role of accessibility in a universal web
- United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UN CRPD)
- Australian Human Rights Commission: Disability Rights
- W3C WAI: Web Accessibility Laws & Policies
- Has your country accepted the CRPD?
- CRPD and Optional Signatures and Ratifications Map.
- WCAG 2.1 at a Glance
- Why Standards Harmonization is Essential to Web Accessibility
- Web Accessibility Laws and Policies
- World Wide Web Consortium Process Document
- Captions and other alternatives for multimedia (in Accessibility Principles)
- Making Audio and Video Media Accessible
- A11y Rules podcast
- A11y Talks video series
- Content is easier to see and hear
- Content is available from a keyboard
- Users have enough time to read and use the content
- Content does not cause seizures and physical reactions
- Users can easily navigate, find content, and determine where they are
- Users can use different input modalities beyond keyboard
- Text is readable and understandable
- Content appears and operates in predictable ways
- Users are helped to avoid and correct mistakes
- WAI-ARIA Overview
- Introduction to Web Accessibility and W3C Standards [videos]
- Web Design Events page
- Web accessibility related meetups
Tools/Process
- Easy Checks – A First Review of Web Accessibility
- Web Developer for Chrome, Firefox and Opera
- WAVE Browser Extensions for Chrome and Firefox
- WAI Before and After Demo (BAD) (for testing/demoing)
- Text alternatives for non-text content
- Images Web Accessibility Tutorial
- Making Audio and Video Media Accessible
- Content can be presented in different ways
- Page Structure Web Accessibility Tutorial
- Tables Web Accessibility Tutorial
- Color Contrast Analyzer Tool
- Color Contrast Checker
- Carousels Web Accessibility Tutorial
- Karma Chameleon
- Photosensitive Epilepsy Analysis Tool (PEAT)
- Forms Web Accessibility Tutorial
- WAI-ARIA Overview
- How to Meet WCAG (Quick Reference) this looks extremely helpful
- Planning and Managing Web Accessibility
- Easy Checks — A First Review of Web Accessibility
- Website Accessibility Conformance Evaluation Methodology (WCAG-EM)
- Tips for Getting Started
- 5.2.8 Create your accessibility policy [revisit this; must login to course]
- Developing an Organizational Policy on Web Accessibility
- Example of a simple policy
- Example of a comprehensive policy
- Policy template
- 5.2.9 Create your accessibility statement [revisit this; must login to course]
- Developing an Accessibility Statement
- accessibility statement generator tool
- Example of Minimal Accessibility Statement
- Example of Complete Accessibility Statement
- 5.2.11 Create a monitoring framework [revisit this; must login to course]
- Your Role in Accessibility
- Australian Broadcast Corporation’s accessibility statement
- The Accessibility Tips for Teams posters
- Roles
- Role Definition Document (draft)
- Role Based Decision Tree (draft)
- Note: both draft documents are seeking feedback to help improve them before formally releasing them. Any comments or clarifications you might have would be welcome via e-mail to the publicly-archived list [email protected].
- Tips for Getting Started with Web Accessibility
- 5.3.7 Create accessibility [revisit this; must login to course]
- Web Accessibility Tutorials
- Developing Web Accessibility Presentations and Training
- 5.3.8 Involve users [revisit this; must login to course]
- Involving Users in Web Projects for Better, Easier Accessibility
- Involving Users in Evaluating Web Accessibility
- Engage with stakeholders
- Contacting Organizations about Inaccessible Websites
Notes
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- Disability is caused by a mismatch between the design and the person.
- Way back in the 1990s, Tim Berners-Lee said: “The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect.” — that’s coming from the guy who invented it.
- Accessibility is essential for developers and organizations that want to create high-quality websites and web tools, and not exclude people from using their products and services.
- Assistive Technologies refer to hardware or software that enable people with disabilities to interact and engage with the digital environment e.g. using a screen reader or a switch control.
- Adaptive Strategies are techniques that people with disabilities use to interact with the digital environment such as adjusting platform and browser settings or resizing browser windows.
- Keyboard accessibility; lack of visible focus; focus order; skip links; target size; movement
- Switch controls for alternative input: sip and puff; buttons; cameras; eye tracking
- Clear headings, lists, paragraphs, data tables, and form labels are key to understanding the layout and structure of content.
- Screen readers are not just used by blind people, however. Some people with cognitive or learning disabilities find it useful to have the contents of a web page read out. It can help with focus and concentration as well as comprehension of text and images.
- Low vision concerns: font size; poor contrast; relying on color; animations and moving content; point of regard/focus.
- Video supplemental options: closed captioning; subtitles (for non-audio languages); transcripts; sign-language version
- For many who are deaf, sign language is their first language, and they may have difficulty reading/interpreting written language.
- Limited speech may be caused by: mutism; speech impediments; degenerative disease; being deaf or hard of hearing; temporary illness; situational impairments (loud areas, quiet areas, other distractions, etc.)
- Cognition and learning is as broad as it is varied and can affect different people in very different ways. Given it covers neurological, behavioral, mental health disorders, and aging it can affect how well people see, hear, move, speak, and understand information.
- Commonly encountered challenges: complexity (in navigation, layout, visual density, word usage, etc.)
- Flexible design should allow for adaptive strategies e.g. font size; zoom; high contrast mode; resizable features.
- around 15 to 20% of people require accessibility — over 1 billion worldwide
- So many different people and groups benefit from digital accessibility including not only people with disabilities and older users
- The provision of digital access is often termed the ‘electronic curb cut’ [1]. The need of the person in a wheelchair to be able to navigate efficiently, is the same at that moment as the need of the mother pushing a baby in a pram, a person pulling a suitcase or a delivery man with a cartload of products. The design improvements made to allow for the curb cut for wheelchair users benefits many others at the same time.
- Older web users are an increasing market segment and an important target group for many businesses, governments, and other organizations.
- There are numerous instances of an overlap between the needs of people with disability and people who are older.
- Overlap: vision; physical ability; hearing; cognitive ability
- The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability was adopted in December 2006 and entered into force in 2008. The convention sets out the legal obligations on States to promote and protect the rights of persons with disabilities. It does not create new rights.
- People with disabilities have the right to access all aspects of society on an equal basis with others including the physical environment, transportation, information and communications, and other facilities and services provided to the public.
- The W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) defines four principles:
- Perceivable – Information can be presented in different ways; for example, in braille, different text sizes, text-to-speech, or symbols, etc.
- Operable – Functionality can be used in different modalities; for example, keyboard, mouse, sip-and-puff, speech input, touch, etc.
- Understandable – Information and functionality is understandable; for example consistent navigation, simple language, etc.
- Robust – Content can be interpreted reliably by a wide variety of browsers, media players, and assistive technologies.
- There are currently two stable versions of WCAG that are both supported by W3C: WCAG 2.0 and WCAG 2.1
- Guideline 1.1 Text Alternatives of WCAG: Provide text alternatives for any non-text content so that it can be changed into other forms people need, such as large print, braille, speech, symbols, or simpler language.
- Purpose of image: decorative? informative? actionable? Decorative should have alt=”empty”
- Guideline 1.2 Time-based Media of WCAG: Provide alternatives for time-based media.
- alternatives include: captions (includes what is being said but also descriptive information regarding the audio); subtitles (what is being said and relevant sounds, possibly a little description, translations); transcripts (text version of the speech and non-speech audio information); audio description (description so that people who are blind and others who cannot see the video adequately get the visual information needed to understand the content); sign language (box with person signing, as sign language is often the speaker’s most fluent language, differing largely from written language)
- Guideline 1.3 Adaptable of WCAG: Create content that can be presented in different ways (for example simpler layout) without losing information or structure.
- Guideline 1.4 Distinguishable of WCAG: Make it easier for users to see and hear content including separating foreground from background.
- Guideline 2.1 Keyboard Accessible of WCAG: Make all functionality available from a keyboard.
- Guideline 2.2 Enough Time of WCAG: Provide users enough time to read and use content.
- Guideline 2.3 Seizures and Physical Reactions of WCAG: Do not design content in a way that is known to cause seizures or physical reactions.
- Guideline 2.4 of WCAG: Provide ways to help users navigate, find content, and determine where they are.
- Guideline 2.5 Input Modalities of WCAG: Make it easier for users to operate functionality through various inputs beyond keyboard.
- Guideline 3.1 Readable of WCAG: Make text content readable and understandable.
- Guideline 3.2 Predictable of WCAG: Make Web pages appear and operate in predictable ways.
- Guideline 3.3 Input Assistance of WCAG: Help users avoid and correct mistakes.
- Guideline 4.1 Compatible of WCAG: Maximize compatibility with current and future user agents, including assistive technologies.
- International Day of People with Disability (3 December) and Global Accessibility Awareness Day (third Thursday in May)