Introduction:
Welcome to the latest edition of A11y (Accessibility) with Ady. I hope you enjoy it and find something useful. I’m happy to hear any feedback or thoughts or anything you would like to hear more about from the world of accessibility.
Tip of the Month:
The world is full of acronyms, abbreviations and numeronym’s that might make sense to the person writing them but do they make sense to everyone? The first time you use an acronym or any of those shortening methods, make sure you explain what they are. This is important everywhere but especially if you use them on websites.
E.g. STD could mean ‘standard’ or ‘sexually transmitted disease’. Which popped into your head or was it something completely different? Go on, I won’t tell.
General:
The best people to test the accessibility of your website or application are people with disabilities. Fable is a company that provides a service connecting companies with people with disabilities to help improve their accessibility.
The American Foundation for the Blind has some excellent resources for developers, on inclusion and so many other areas. This link gives insight on how to include accessibility at the design stage focusing on forms in this article. For any designer looking to make great content please remember. There is no usability without accessibility.
https://www.afb.org/about-afb/what-we-do/afb-consulting/afb-accessibility-resources/accessible-forms
Technical:
When is a button not a button? When it’s a </div> of course. Or other reasons as this excellent cheat sheet explains. With code examples and great reasoning. One read and you will never assign role=”button” again.
https://www.buttoncheatsheet.com/
E-commerce sites and companies are there to make money. Encourage you to buy their wares and spend your hard earned. Yet as this Baymard blog points out, 73% of top-grossing e-commerce sites have accessibility issues with links. This piece shows you 3 methods of improving their use and visibility.
https://baymard.com/blog/links-accessibility
Disability:
I attended AccessibilityPlus 2021 and heard from Andrea Mocellin, founder and inventor of Revolve Air. He has literally reinvented the wheel initially to help with the issue of airlines damaging wheelchairs but his invention has potential to help in lots of situations. Well worth checking out.
https://www.revolve-wheel.com/
Accessibility advocate and strategist Emily Ogle shares her thoughts on language and life in Disability: let’s say the word. She discusses life growing up identifying as hard of hearing (HOH), how that’s not for everyone and more in this great post.
https://www.a11yproject.com/posts/2021-10-18-lets-say-the-word-disability/
Tools:
Who doesn’t love a good checklist? I know I do. This from the A11y Project uses the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) as a reference. You can digitally tick things off and each section comes with great easy to understand descriptions of what each item is looking to achieve. If you have been struggling to get your head around WCAG as I and many others did when starting out, this may well be for you.
https://www.a11yproject.com/checklist/