Universal Access (Accessibility)

Terms:

• Accessibility: being able to access something (implies disability)
• Universal Access: making sure everyone can use something (inclusive of all)
• Inclusive design: designing to covere the needs for everyone, keeping in mind any special situational, temporary, or permament accomodations
  • Microsoft has an amazing document (PDF) on this exact topic.

Resources

• MDN Accessibility overview
• WebAIM
• Section 508
  • HTML checklist:
    • HHS section 508 checklist
    • WebAIM section 508 checklist
  • Section508.gov Accessibility improvement
  • Development Methodology for Section 508 Compliance (pdf)
• Testing accessibility with real people
• Simply Accessible articles

Specific

• Tabindex

  • summary: use 0 or -1, but nothing higher

• Skip link

• Landmarks: HTML5 vs. ARIA

• AIRA tabs (danger!)

• Integration into the testing framework

  • aXe: https://www.axe-core.org/
  • Accessibility Developer Tools: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/accessibility-developer-tools

• Browser add-ons

  • aXe Extension: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/axe-devtools/
  • WAVE (WebAIM): https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/wave-accessibility-tool/
  • Tota11y: Accessibility toolkit: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tota11y-accessibility-toolkit/
    • Based on Tota11y by Khan Academy: https://khan.github.io/tota11y/

• Desktop screen reader: Orca, included in GNOME

  • speech-dispatcher-flite adds a better voice for Orca (which is used once it's selected)
  • orca -s lets you configure Orca, including the voice used

• Screen reader for the Web (on Linux)

  • Epiphany (GNOME-Web) can use Orca
  • Chrome has a plugin called ChromeVox

A quick guide to ChromeVox

ChromeVox is an extension for Chrome, made available directly by Google. has one of the nicest sounding voices on Linux for screen reading, as it uses the Google voices you're possibly familiar with on Android devices.

ChromeVox's default action key is shift+alt. All commands require usage of this key combo. (It can be changed if you prefer another shortcut.)

After installing ChromeVox, it is enabled. It can be disabled or re-enabled by using the shortcut key and the a key (shift+alt+a).

Use shift+alt+arrows to jump around on the page. Often, but not always, the unprefixed arrow keys can also work.

shift+alt+n, letting go of keys, and then a special key like ; lets you jump to the next ARIA landmark. Likewise, shift+alt+p jumps back to the previous item. (You can jump to links with shift+alt+n,l; tables with shift+alt+n,t; headers with shift+alt+n,h; and so on…)

Start reading a page with shift+alt+r. You can then navigate with shift+alt+arrows to jump around spatially. In reading mode, you're also able to directly click items to jump to that area.

Note: Knowing how to use ChromeVox, especially the reading mode and toggle shortcuts, is useful if you want to have any web page read out loud, even if you're not specifically using the tool for accessibility reasons. (This is actually an excellent example of inclusive design.)