a11y (digital accessibility)

This article highlights why it is important to include people within the disability community to help guide the development of new AI technologies.

"Meet Tim Doucette, a blind astronomer who built the Deep Sky Eye Observatory in rural Nova Scotia. Follow Tim as he welcomes a 9-year-old girl with the same visual impairment as him"

This article highlights the accessibility barriers found on websites promoting tourism for European smart cities. None of the websites conformed to WCAG 2.1. The web pages need to be more accessible and effectively communicate the physical accessibility features that the cities offer potential tourists with disabilities. They are losing potential customers because of these issues.

This study uses focus groups to explore the challenges people with disabilities experience when using kiosks and potential solutions. Some of the identified accessibility barriers include that they can be difficult to locate. The kiosk's placement can make it difficult to use or touch screen buttons can have a small target size. The kiosk can lack accessibility features like voice support, text alternatives, or screen reading software. Kiosks need to be developed to be accessible to all.

I appreciate the work TeachAccess is doing to infuse digital accessibility into college curriculum courses. Their goal is to educate college students about digital accessibility because they can use these skills when they join the workforce, which will lead to companies producing more accessible products. Hopefully, more institutions will follow Michigan State's lead and become a TeachAccess hub.

Steven Aquino (@[email protected]) writes:

For my latest story for my column, I went deep into the need for building more accessible, inclusive playgrounds.

This is a good reminder that the ADA goes only so far. To comply with the law is really a low bar. Compulsion is not volition.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenaquino/2024/07/03/how-building-more-inclusive-playgrounds-means-more-playtime-for-every-child/

This article explores the complexities behind digital accessibility such as technology consistently evolving and outdated legislation. There are also issues promoting digital accessibility including a lack of awareness, training, and inherent inaccessible digital or physical technology. Digital accessibility must be a clearly defined legal requirement.This will make dominant technology platforms prioritize ensuring their devices and software are accessible. #accessibility

Utah State University's Disability Research, Policy & Practice is receiving a 7.2 million dollar grant to open the National Center on Accessible Digital Educational Materials and Instruction (NCADEMI). The grant will provide $1.8 million each year for the next four years. Cynthia Curry will be the director of the organization. NCADEMI will work with the Technical Assistance for Excellence in Special Education (TAESE) and Web Accessibility in Mind (WebAIM). NCADEMI will develop new materials targeted at governmental agencies, public schools, and universities to help them comply with the government's update to the ADA, which requires web content and mobile applications to be accessible.

This article explores different ways to create an accessible sortable table. It is important to use aria attributes to convey that the table has sorting capabilities and the sorting options available. Another tip is to include the table instructions in a caption attribute, which makes it available to all users.

I recommend signing up for WebAIM's newsletter because it offers many different articles related to digital accessibility topics. Check out the articles included in the June Newsletter.

This article provides a summary of the new Health and Human Services rule that applies an accessibility standard to Section 504 for digital content. Institutions receiving funds from HHS will need to be compliant by May of 2026 if the entity is small and May of 2027 if the entity is large. There are exceptions for archived content and content posted by third parties.

This article explains why accessibility is important. For example, considering the wide range of people with disabilities that will benefit if the digital content is accessible and how that improves usability. It also points out the need for manual accessibility testing and the legal reasons why it is important to create accessible content.

Yelp's new accessibility features like being able to search for an ADA-compliant entrance or a sports bar with closed captions on the TV should benefit many people with disabilities. Hopefully, they ensure that the features claimed by the restaurants are accurate. Also, I think the AI-generated alt-text description should be shown to the user who has taken the photo so it can be edited. AI-generated alt-text is prone to errors like auto-generated captions.

The Digital Library Federation has many work groups including the Digital Accessibility Group. They provide resources and recommendations for testing the accessibility of digital applications. They also share information about applications they have tested including Zotero, Doodle, AirTable, Zoom, Google Workplace applications, Pressbooks, and Scalar.

This systematic literature review explores how artificial intelligence is being used to foster access for people with disabilities and augment digital content to make it more accessible.

This article explores Success Criterion 1.4.11 Non-Text Contrast.

The Library Accessibility Alliance evaluates the accessibility of different library databases. They make their reports and testing publicly available. Their data can help institutions determine, which databases are the most accessible. This can be an especially good resource for smaller libraries or institutions that have limited digital accessibility resources.

This literature review explores the history of libraries, current laws, and studies. It examines digital accessibility and physical accessibility issues impacting libraries. A major issue is library webpages and PDFs having accessibility errors. This article overlooks third-party library databases. I hope that more academic journals and databases offer their published works as accessible HTML pages. This can make library resources accessible to all. #accessibility

This article and interview explore the unique story of Andres Gonzalez. He was born in Cuba and became blind at the age of 7. Andres was gifted at math and had a very supportive family that read him books. Eventually, Andres got his master's degree and then came to the US. He worked his way up in the tech field. Andres is now a Senior Software Engineer for Apple where he works on assistive technology applications like VoiceOver and Safari's Webkit

This webinar by the DO-IT Center of the University of Washington explores how to make digital accessibility part of the procurement process. It includes sample language around digital accessibility for an RFP, highlights the parts of a VPAT, and provides strategies for creating a digital accessibility policy at a higher education institution.

I think this article does a good job of highlighting the limitations of automated testing. This is because WCAG is complex and requires human interpretation and testing to identify all the different errors. It also highlights how automated testing is good at preventing regression by tracking progress over time. This is why lots of companies and higher education institutions are using automated testing to track the number of errors on a webpage over time.

This systemic review explores digital accessibility studies related to Morocco. These studies provide digital accessibility recommendations and align with WCAG Guidelines.