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First Rule of ARIA: Don’t Use ARIA
By:
Ashleigh Lodge
Last updated: Wednesday, October 23, 2024
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2024 - November/December
As an accessibility tool, ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) can be mystifying. Ashleigh emphasizes the importance of prioritizing native HTML elements for web accessibility before resorting to ARIA. She explains that ARIA should act as a last resort, filling gaps in HTML semantics only when necessary, and highlights ARIA's complexity and potential for misuse. The article outlines foundational ARIA concepts—role, relationship, and state—while stressing the importance of testing and validating ARIA implementation. Lodge cites studies showing ARIA's frequent misapplication, advocating for thoughtful, minimal use to maintain web accessibility integrity.
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Easy Accessibility Wins: Better Accessibility in Five Minutes or Less
By:
Last updated: Saturday, November 25, 2023
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2023 - November/December
The list of things a company can do to make their website more accessible for people with Vision challenges or ADHD can be long, but there are small changes that many websites can make that will address the common problems, and they don't require a lot of buy in from your company. Ashleigh Lodge notes that several are improvements that you can make that most people won't notice, but if you use a screen reader, they make a big difference.
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Accessibility Guidelines and Tools: How Do I Know My Website Is Accessible?
By:
Last updated: Friday, March 12, 2021
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2020 - January/February
You can improve accessibility in your application, making it easier for people with disabilities to use it. Use the How to Meet WCAG Quick Reference to get started.
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POURing Over Your Website: An Introduction to Digital Accessibility
By:
Last updated: Wednesday, March 17, 2021
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2019 - November/December
Everyone knows that there are standards when it comes to building apps. And most people know that there are standards for accessibility. But did you know that writing accessible apps is better for everyone? Ashleigh shows you what to think about the next time you sit down to create something.
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Introducing jQuery Mobile
By:
John Petersen
Last updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2012 - January/February
The newest member of the jQuery family of projects is jQuery Mobile. A good way to describe what jQuery Mobile is to think of it as jQuery UI for mobile devices. If you have wanted to write mobile-optimized UIs over your applications, jQuery Mobile is a library that you will want to add to your bag of tricks. Like jQuery UI, jQuery Mobile is themeable. This article makes two assumptions. First, you are familiar with jQuery and second, you are familiar with jQuery UI. If you are not familiar with jQuery or jQuery UI, I suggest that you take a moment to familiarize yourself with those libraries. Fortunately, the websites for these projects (jquery.com and jQueryUI.com respectively) are replete with comprehensive documentation and code examples. jQuery Mobile is no different. The official website for jQuery Mobile is jquerymobile.com. As of this writing, jQuery Mobile 1.0 Beta 3 has been released. Its beta status notwithstanding, jQuery Mobile is ready for primetime and has been incorporated into many applications already. In this article, I will cover what you need to get started with some simple examples that illustrate how to create one page and multi-page apps. In addition, I’ll touch upon the theming capabilities in jQuery Mobile.
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A Letter from the Director of Accessibility at Microsoft
By:
Sinclair, Rob
Last updated: Wednesday, February 20, 2019
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Accessible technology eliminates barriers for people with disabilities and it enables individuals to take full advantage of their capabilities."-Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft CorporationAccessible technology eliminates barriers for people with disabilities and it enables individuals to take full advantage of their capabilities."-Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft Corporation
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A Pragmatic Approach to WPF Accessibility
By:
Bruney, Alvin
Last updated: Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
As is often the case, applications are not typically designed with accessibility in mind.Usually, applications are designed to satisfy business requirements. If those business requirements do not include accessibility, more likely than not, the application as a whole will be inaccessible to important segments of users. There are, however, steps you can take to mitigate this common lack of foresight in requirements analysis.
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Accessibility 101
By:
Linn, Jennifer,
Perkins, Annuska
Last updated: Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
We know what you’re thinking: Why should I read an article about the fundamentals of accessibility?Well, if you already know the percentage of computer users who have disabilities, can name at least ten different categories of assistive technologies, and can describe the key concepts involved in designing an accessible application, then you can probably skip to the next article. However, if you’re unsure what accessible technology is, then take a few minutes and keep reading. You’ll learn about the main concepts around accessible technology, the people they help, and things you can do to help them interact smoothly and successfully with each other.
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Creating Accessibility-aware Silverlight 2 Content
By:
Rideout, Mark
Last updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
If you haven't heard, accessibility is one of the most important aspects of a Web site experience.By using the accessibility features in Silverlight™ 2, you can provide the best experience for all users. Building a rich Internet experience can be a daunting task when you have to balance a cool visual design with usability.
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Creating UI Automation Client Applications
By:
Matthew Karr
Last updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Sometimes an application needs to interact with the user interface (UI) of a second application.The first application might be a test application that drives the UI of the target to run through some automated tests. It might describe the UI out loud, as an aid to users that are blind. It might be a speech application that allows users to give vocal commands. In each of these cases, the application needs a way to inspect and interact with the UI of the system and other running applications.
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Internet Explorer 8 New Accessibility Features
Last updated: Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Windows® Internet Explorer® 8 has a lot of cool new features that make Web page browsing more accessible.I’m going to cover Caret Browsing, Zoom Version 2, High DPI, Accessibility Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) support and User Interface Automation (UI Automation) support. Caret Browsing is particularly helpful for low-mobility users. Zoom 2 and High DPI support targets low-vision users, and the new ARIA and UI Automation support targets screen-reader users. Low-mobility users prefer to use the keyboard or devices that interact with a virtual keyboard. Some low-vision users require specialized assistive software to interact with computers while others can do well with features and tools shipped with the operating system.
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Making Custom Controls Accessible
Last updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
While custom controls are introduced every day, not all of them are easily accessible.This article provides a quick summary of Microsoft® technologies that help make Win32-based custom controls programmatically accessible. Techniques range from implementing UI Automation, to creating or overriding properties with Dynamic Annotation, to using the new IAccessibleEx interface to close the gap between UI Automation and Microsoft Active Accessibility®.
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Microsoft Accessibility Testing Tools vs. the Ten-ton Gorilla of Accessibility Guidelines Compliance
By:
Bridge, Karl
Last updated: Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Close your eyes, ignore your mouse, navigate with your keyboard, and rely on your ears alone. Now try to use an application you’ve built or tested. Can you?The few informal tests described in this article can expose a plethora of usability and accessibility shortcomings, oversights, and other issues in your application. But how do you test, assess, and rectify them?
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Open Accessibility
By:
Hodne, Norm
Last updated: Wednesday, February 20, 2019
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Creating a natural user interface requires designers, testers, and developers working in concert to develop the right support that makes multi-modal access to an operating system and applications possible.To assist in this work through the Accessibility Interoperability Alliance (AIA), Microsoft® released its UI Automation Specifications with a Community Promise and released testing tools as open source projects via CodePlex. Microsoft is committed to interoperable accessibility.
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What’s New in Windows 7 Automation API
By:
Zaman, Nazia,
Last updated: Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Windows® 7 offers end-to-end accessibility with better performance, seamless interoperability, and improved framework design.
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Windows Automation API 3.0 Overview
By:
Kaneko, Masahiko
Last updated: Wednesday, August 31, 2022
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
While general accessibility requirements (such as font colors in UI rendering) are important, programmatic access to the graphical user interface (GUI) is a crucial element to improving accessibility.On the Windows® operating system, Microsoft® Active Accessibility® and User Interface (UI) Automation support this programmatic access. This article provides a quick overview of Windows Automation API 3.0 featured in Windows 7.While general accessibility requirements (such as font colors in UI rendering) are important, programmatic access to the graphical user interface (GUI) is a crucial element to improving accessibility.On the Windows® operating system, Microsoft® Active Accessibility® and User Interface (UI) Automation support this programmatic access. This article provides a quick overview of Windows Automation API 3.0 featured in Windows 7.
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Writing a UI Automation Provider for a Win32-based Custom Control
By:
McKeon, Brendan
Last updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Published in: CODE Focus Magazine: 2008 - Vol. 5 - Issue 4 - Windows Accessibility Focus
Do you have a complex custom control that you want to make programmatically accessible, but you aren’t sure how? Custom controls, by their nature, tend to be very diverse: each is typically written for a specific purpose, making it difficult to generalize implementation details. How do you know what to implement? You should consider supporting accessibility for any custom control that performs its own rendering and input management-routing mouse and keyboard input-within the HWND that it owns.
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Articles filed in category 'Accessibility'