Author Archives: dnw

National Gallery’s Tom Roberts’ Auslan captioning app helps hearing impaired art-lovers

Visiting an art gallery would seem a predominantly visual experience, but while most art-lovers can expand their knowledge with an audio tour, people who are deaf or hearing impaired usually miss out. Thanks to new captioning and Auslan tours for the National Gallery’s Tom Roberts’ exhibition, art-lovers of all abilities can find out the secretsContinueContinue reading “National Gallery’s Tom Roberts’ Auslan captioning app helps hearing impaired art-lovers”

Effectively including accessibility into web developer training – Karl Groves

Today, I’d like to follow “Your computer school sucks” with some actual guidance for web developer training schools and bootcamps. Do not treat accessibility as its own topic A few years ago, I wrote a series of blog posts under the theme Selling Accessibility. The content for many of those posts was driven by interviewsContinueContinue reading “Effectively including accessibility into web developer training – Karl Groves”

Grand Rapids YMCA first building to adopt universal design standards

…how do you design a new building to ensure that it serves the needs of all users? Inclusive design can make that happen. UB’s Center for Inclusive Design and Environmental Access (IDeA Center), in collaboration with the Global Universal Design Commission, has developed the first set of universal design certification standards for commercial buildings, lookingContinueContinue reading “Grand Rapids YMCA first building to adopt universal design standards”

Accessibility Developer Tools – Chrome Web Extension

Accessibility audit and element properties. This extension will add an Accessibility audit, and an Accessibility sidebar pane in the Elements tab, to your Chrome Developer Tools. To use the audit: go to the Audits tab, select the Accessibility audit, and click Run. The audit results will appear as a list of rules which are violatedContinueContinue reading “Accessibility Developer Tools – Chrome Web Extension”

BraunAbility MXV: Accessibility done CNET style (CNET On Cars, Episode 87)

Something new for “accessibility news” … accessible vehicles. 2016 BraunAbillty MXV makes a Ford Explorer a cool accessible vehicle. VIDEO: BraunAbility MXV: Accessibility done CNET style (CNET On Cars, Episode 87) We’ve recently realized on this high tech show, we’ve never done a piece on wheelchair accessible vehicles. And that’s an oversight because they are anContinueContinue reading “BraunAbility MXV: Accessibility done CNET style (CNET On Cars, Episode 87)”

Links and accessibility – AccessibilityOz

An extract of this article appears on Sitepoint called ‘Making Accessible Links: 15 Golden Rules for Developers‘. Introduction – Links. It’s a lot more than just avoiding “click here”. And, to my eternal shame, WCAG2 even allows “click here” as a valid technique for link text (see Example 1 in Technique G53). WCAG2 is all aboutContinueContinue reading “Links and accessibility – AccessibilityOz”

The Accessibility Tree: A Training Guide for Advanced Web Development

Brilliant resource. At the top level, the first concept to understand is the platform Accessibility API, which is an integral part of each Operating System. This is MSAA/UIA/IAccessible2 on Windows, AT-SPI/IAccessible2 on Linux, the OS X Accessibility Protocol on Mac and iOS, and so on.It may not be obvious, but these top level accessibility APIsContinueContinue reading “The Accessibility Tree: A Training Guide for Advanced Web Development”

Wikispeech project aims to make Wikipedia accessible for vision impaired people

Swedish researchers are developing an open source speech synthesis platform to make Wikimedia-based websites more accessible to blind and vision impaired people. The platform will be optimised for Wikipedia and aims to provide access in 283 languages, starting with three initial languages next year. The Wikispeech pilot project is a joint effort between the KTHContinueContinue reading “Wikispeech project aims to make Wikipedia accessible for vision impaired people”

8 Website Accessibility Best Practices to Improve UX

Often, accessibility best practices are just best practices overall — simple interfaces, alternative user pathways to suit user preferences, etc. Below, we’ve listed the best practices that specifically aid handicapped users and don’t spell out hours of extra work. Curated by (Lifekludger) Read full article at Source: 8 Website Accessibility Best Practices to Improve UX

Samsung Electronics Honored for Innovations in TV Accessibility by Royal National Institute of Blind People in the UK 

Samsung Electronics was acknowledged by the United Kingdom’s Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) for outstanding progress in accessible technology for 2015 Samsung TVs. The RNIB’s prestigious “Inclusive Society Award” recognizes RNIB partners for innovations in technology that allows people with sight loss to live more independently. Samsung has closely worked with RNIB sinceContinueContinue reading “Samsung Electronics Honored for Innovations in TV Accessibility by Royal National Institute of Blind People in the UK “

Deaf News: Deaf woman is awarded e-Accessibility scholarship for mobile app for interpreters and carers | The Limping Chicken

A Deaf woman has been awarded an EDF-Oracle e-Accessibility scholarship for her project developing a mobile application to seamlessly connect persons with disabilities with caregivers, interpreters and assistants.Caroline Hurley is studying computer science at Open University in the United Kingdom. … THE AWARDED PROJECT Caroline’s project is to develop a mobile application to seamlessly connect persons with disabilities with caregivers,ContinueContinue reading “Deaf News: Deaf woman is awarded e-Accessibility scholarship for mobile app for interpreters and carers | The Limping Chicken”

Facebook taps artificial intelligence for users with disabilities

Calif. — Matt King, a software engineer who has been blind since college, came to Facebook last summer with a mission: to make websites and mobile apps friendlier for people like him with disabilities. King, 50, uses screen-reader software that turns Web pages and documents into synthesized speech. The challenge he confronts every day: As many as half of websites are nearly impossible forContinueContinue reading “Facebook taps artificial intelligence for users with disabilities”

Changing Places: Meet Vaila Morrison, Architect and a woman on a mission to champion inclusive design and improve quality of life through better accessibility – Womanthology

Meet Vaila Morrison tells Womanthology about championing inclusive design through the Changing Places campaign … Vaila Morrison is an architect with a passion for inclusive design and sustainability. She is not currently practicing as she is also a mum and carer to a young daughter with significant disabilities (attributed to an undiagnosed neurological condition), andContinueContinue reading “Changing Places: Meet Vaila Morrison, Architect and a woman on a mission to champion inclusive design and improve quality of life through better accessibility – Womanthology”

How to Implement Web Accessibility Guidelines in WordPress

… WordPress Tools for Web Accessibility While the above info is enough to build an accessible website manually, there is no need to do so, thanks to a number of available tools that we will go over now. WordPress Themes First of all, a growing number of certified-accessible WordPress themes enable us to address thisContinueContinue reading “How to Implement Web Accessibility Guidelines in WordPress”

Accessible media preview from CSUN 

The annual International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference (commonly known as CSUN) starts on 21 March in San Diego, California. This year there is significant coverage around accessible media. Media Access Australia’s CEO, Alex Varley, previews some personal highlights. … A detailed program of the presentations covering technology for disabled people is on the CSUNContinueContinue reading “Accessible media preview from CSUN “

For Video Games, Easy Mode Equals Better Accessibility // Tiny Girl Tiny Games – Nintendo 3DS, Mobile, and More

I’m currently playing Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam, and largely enjoying it. It’s no Paper Mario: Thousand Year Door, but few things in life are. Like all games in the Mario RPG family, Paper Jam expertly mixes action with menu-based commands. … You’d think “The ‘A’ button controls Mario’s actions, and the ‘B’ button controlsContinueContinue reading “For Video Games, Easy Mode Equals Better Accessibility // Tiny Girl Tiny Games – Nintendo 3DS, Mobile, and More”

Reduction of Legal Risk as Web Accessibility Business Case – Karl Groves

In this post, I’d like to discuss risk. Specifically, I’d like to focus on list of litigation, primarily because although I have previously outlined a number of factors that fall under the umbrella of “risk”, it is legal risk that most people tend to gravitate toward when discussing accessibility. This is especially true in theContinueContinue reading “Reduction of Legal Risk as Web Accessibility Business Case – Karl Groves”

Being a deaf developer

I’ve been deaf since infancy. It is not profound; my hearing loss is described as moderate to severe and is mostly problematic at higher frequency ranges, the range at which most human speech happens. I rely on lip-reading and identifying vowel patterns to understand spoken language. Particular struggles are:recognising consonants, especially sibilants and unvoiced consonantsContinueContinue reading “Being a deaf developer”

Resources for creating 508-compliant content – Web Accessibility Group

Our goal is to share and discuss strategies, techniques and resources for meeting Section 508 compliance as it pertains to websites and web-based content. WAG also endorses conformance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 and provides accessibility training on both Section 508 and WCAG 2.0 Curated by (Lifekludger) Read full article at Source:ContinueContinue reading “Resources for creating 508-compliant content – Web Accessibility Group”

Make your single page apps work with screen readers | Web design | Creative Bloq

Single-page apps pose a significant accessibility challenge when it comes to communicating view changes. Without a page refresh, screen readers do not pick up these important UI changes, leaving vision-impaired users confused and unaware. curated by (Lifekludger) Read full article at Source: Make your single page apps work with screen readers | Web design |ContinueContinue reading “Make your single page apps work with screen readers | Web design | Creative Bloq”

Start Making Sense — Medium

This is the text of a quick talk I gave at Generate Conference in London on 17th September 2015. You can download the slides from Slideshare. You can find out more on SensoryUX.com. “I’m here to talk about sensory design and what I do: which is to try and make information meaningful. Meaningful to peopleContinueContinue reading “Start Making Sense — Medium”

Accessibility Concerns Delay $30M Amazon E-Book Contract in N.Y.C.

New York City schools postponed action on an Amazon contract for creating an online storefront where educators will buy e-books, after the National Federation of the Blind raised questions about it. The National Federation of the Blind is questioning whether its community would have full accessibility in the online platform that would be built for teachersContinueContinue reading “Accessibility Concerns Delay $30M Amazon E-Book Contract in N.Y.C.”

Why Your Links Need a Hover Effect – UX Movement

Links contain text, but they should never look like text. When users read a web page, they need to be able to distinguish what’s clickable. If your links don’t have enough contrast, users could miss them.Color is Not Enough for the Colorblind Most sites make their links a different color from their text. But that’sContinueContinue reading “Why Your Links Need a Hover Effect – UX Movement”

10 Free Web-Based Web Site Accessibility Evaluation Tools – Usability Geek

A simple Google Search for “Accessibility Tools” yields a number of lists and collections of tools. I could have very easily copied one or two such lists and voila, I have a new post. But, I wanted to add a personal touch to this post by writing about the tools I use in my dailyContinueContinue reading “10 Free Web-Based Web Site Accessibility Evaluation Tools – Usability Geek”