As builders and creators we want to maximize our impact. There's a lot of talk about ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance). Which for most us is pretty abstract and something only really big companies invest a small % of their revenue into to attract certain kinds of investors (there are exceptions).
One way we can all directly make impact is making a commitment to make our software accessible to all, starting with educating ourselves about common mistakes folks make when designing UI that produce software that can't be used by folks who have temporary or long term low vision, low hearing, neurological, and other disabilities.
There are a ton of free educational events on accessibility going on today, and if you don't have time today, find a recording, or listen to a podcast, there is a huge opportunity to make impact once you better understand the challenges.
A couple of years ago while doing research on accessibility I came across the Global Accessibility Awareness Day, and the GAAD foundation (https://accessibility.day/) - there are many such orgs, but if you consider yourself accessibility curious, today's a good day to get curious.
/PSA
by fwr on 5/18/23, 4:42 PM
Accessibility is easily overlooked but in my opinion provides a much more direct and widespread impact than the mentioned ESG - and often provide value to more people than originally intended - I'm thinking of subtitles in videos that immensely helped me learn English, and public infrastructure adaptations for wheelchair users which also greatly benefit others - like mothers with strollers.
I wish more things were designed with an accessibility-first mindset - enabling edge cases might seem like overkill at first, but it could bring unforseen advantages.
by m1n1 on 5/18/23, 5:20 PM
I mentioned to a police officer recently that pounding on someone's front door while yelling "Police!" doesn't always succeed in communicating. Some people are hard of hearing. Some get distracted by the noise and therefore can't hear the words (they may have their own noise on their side of the door). Some have a fight/flight/freeze response to any loud noise, regardless of the context, and can't think straight.
I figured he'd be interested in suggestions on how to raise the likelihood the occupants would know it's the police and not some gang bangers. Especially since it could save lives on both sides of an incident, including his.
He wasn't personally interested in yet another thing to carry/deploy/remember when he knocks on doors, and said we can't worry about every "edge case". Whatever I said, he tended to push back.
But after I pressed him some more, he said I could email a suggestion to my state's peace officer standards and training "POST" org. (usa)
by hiidrew on 5/18/23, 7:05 PM
Love this! We had a department-wide meeting where we showcased a usability test with a participant using a screen reader. Had a lot of engagement and was enlightening of the many issues screen reader users face when navigating relatively straight forward web pages.
A good ethos for accessible design is that making designs accessible and inclusive often the raises the bar for the average non-disabled user.
99% invisible has a good podcast on this with the development of the curb-cut. Oriignally it was for wheelchairs but it turns out to help parents with strollers as well!
Also love to point to the disability persona spectrum. Shows how disabilities can vary from permanent, temporary, and situational. I think the Microsoft's Inclusive Design Toolkit is partly responsible for it (but doesn't appear in the deck).
- https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/curb-cuts/
- https://infinum.com/handbook/img/accessibility/Persona_spect...
- https://scope.bccampus.ca/pluginfile.php/52293/block_html/co...
by malfist on 5/18/23, 4:44 PM
Accessibility is for more than just disabled people!
I've recently had surgery on my shoulder, and have to have my left arm in a sling with no use for 6 weeks. I've made heavy use of my phone's one handed mode, and window's sticky keys
When my partner goes to bed at night, I can keep watching Star Trek TNG with subtitles.
by yakshaving_jgt on 5/18/23, 4:35 PM
Frankly, every web developer should be excited about accessibility. It's not just about obscure tag attributes that are invisible to most users. Following the WCAG will actually make your design better by guiding you towards text with sufficient contrast, and to not neglect to add labels to form inputs, etc.
by 98codes on 5/18/23, 6:57 PM
> educating ourselves about common mistakes folks make when designing UI
The main issue I see is that most devs simply do not care, and/or dev management not prioritizing it unless required by regulations.
The biggest problem I see is that isn't likely ever going to change.
by y-curious on 5/18/23, 4:42 PM
Thanks for sharing! I will look at these resources. Our app is made for people that definitely have vision (it enables doctors that read EEGs) but we can still improve for other levels of accessibility.
by unix_fan on 5/18/23, 8:19 PM
I think the open source community has failed screen reader users. You cannot use Linux with a desktop environment without major accessibility issues layered throughout. It’s particularly frustrating when bug reports are ignored for years and are never fixed at all. This is why I continue to prefer windows or macOS over linux.
Stuff like Jupyter notebooks are also not accessible, making it a little bit harder for visually impaired people in stem
by bitwize on 5/18/23, 9:00 PM
I've started training myself on Emacspeak, so if my vision ever goes away or is severely compromised, I am still able to operate (and write programs for) a computer. I found it pretty amazing that I could write and test a short program with my eyes closed. Emacspeak is an outlier in the open source ecosystem when it comes to accessibility, however, and that's to everyone's detriment. It comes from an old-school Unix mentality of "let's write programs in such a way that loosely coupled bits and bobs can be attached and integrated to suit custom needs" rather than the GNOMEish "we've already thought of the common case and developed a comprehensive solution, you will use it and like it, fuck your obscure little corner cases".
by kindawinda on 5/18/23, 6:10 PM
by WaitWaitWha on 5/18/23, 6:24 PM
Question, why is this different than a proper usability study? If I am not mistaken, Jacob Nielsen has been proselytizing this for decades.
by jph on 5/18/23, 5:43 PM
Accessibility is the lynchpin of my current work-- I'm applying for a UK Global Talent Visa to create pro-bono mobile apps for people with cognitive/motor/vision impairments. Accessibility improvements can have enormous benefits for people in need.
See BoldContacts.org, and you can email me at joel@joelparkerhenderson.com. I'm seeking help with app dev, healhcare outreach, and the UK visa.
by gnicholas on 5/18/23, 6:27 PM
There are GAAD gatherings in various cities, and online gatherings. You can browse the listings here, [1] and in future you can also submit your own gathering to be included as well.
1: https://accessibility.day/events/
by butz on 5/18/23, 6:24 PM
Any decent enterprise oriented (datatables and similar controls) UI frameworks, that have decent accessibility? JS framework agnostic solution is more welcome, but ReactJS or VueJS frameworks are welcome too.
by trenchgun on 5/19/23, 4:51 AM
I wonder when LaTeX accessibility is fixed
by neets on 5/18/23, 5:18 PM
So who comes up with all these [X] days?
by ilrwbwrkhv on 5/18/23, 5:48 PM
The reality is to keep up with all this is a waste of time for most small and medium businesses.
Unfortunately there are more customers who aren't handicapped.
by zmnd on 5/18/23, 5:55 PM
For people with more accessibility expertise, why instead of pushing all websites to be accessible, there's no push for a better accessibility AI? I would imagine that having a better interpretation model, implemented by a couple of tech giants, would be a more productive use of our time than ensuring that all aria labels are in place? Is it because nobody is working in this problem space? It sounds fairly straightforward problem to solve, comparing to some recent achievements.
