Accessibility — Your Next Legal Nightmare

Why you needed to start thinking about your users, yesterday.

Written courtesy of Deep Bhattacharyya, Notes from FIT3175 at Monash University, Week 9.

Apple’s original magic mouse

Accessibility Doesn’t Just Apply for the Disabled

Yes, you heard that right. Not only do we need to design websites capable for being used by everyone, organisations should also be contributing to research in accessibility, which brings benefit to everyone, since it leads to better software. That being said, accessibility does focus on ability of disabled to get access to all features and information in the software or website.

No, this is not just Usability

Accessibility doesn’t just include usability testing either. You may finish all your fancy A B Testing and heat map techniques, spending thousands of dollars, yet it doesn’t stand a chance against a court order. Accessibility looks at the ability FOR AS MANY PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE to use features of your product. Usability, however, only sees whether the TARGET USERS can use features of product. Keep in mind, it only takes one user who is partially disabled in any shape or form trying to use your product before you have a lawsuit for discrimination at your door.

Two Design Approaches for Accessibility

Before we get into the legal side of things, we must understand how to make accessible applications. To do this, there are two ways designers look at the problem

Universal design: maximise number of people that can use it well

• Equitable use — Doesn’t disadvantage anyone
• Flexible use — accomodates range of individual preferences
• Simple and intuitive
• Perceptible info — disabled users can get important info

Inclusive design: minimise the number of people that cant use it

This design philosophy focuses on understanding users. It doesn’t have any design principles and instead suggests that:

• Every user’s abilities will differ
• Systems made for disabled are better for normal users as well
• If we give disabled users more independence, it increases their self esteem
• Usability and aesthetics can both be achieved

The Social Issues

Now that you know the basics of how to meet usability requirements, lets examine the social issues that open up if there is a lack of accessibility.

First, there are those who have a permanent disability. These individuals need the most care, and we should ensure that we cater the application for a range of disabilities.

Other forms of disabilities should also be considered. These include:

• Temporary disabilities
• Ageing population - Remember that as more people get older, there will be a higher incidence of blindness, slow motor function and blunt memories.
• Fear of change and a fear of computers will increase. Remember that most users blame themselves for errors.
• Old technology — we will also need to support slow internet speeds, old browsers and Operating systems.

The Law

This is the part you have been waiting for. Legally, as any private or public corporation, we cannot discriminate against anyone with disability. This means that:

Website must be able to be passed through an accessible reader so information to disabled readers is the same as the information provided to abled readers.

So What Do I Need To Do?

As a business, here is what you need to know

All sorts of disabilities must be taken into consideration. Think about:

• Motor impairments — Users may be unable to double click
• Visual impairment — Users could struggle to see the contrast between different colours in the layout
• Hearing impairment — Provide transcripts for verbal communication
• Cognitive impairment — Too much jargon used on the web page could perplex readers and therefore prohibit them from gathering the information form the page.
• Seizure — Avoid blinking text as it may trigger some users.

Not only that you must also balance taking care of these users with other requirements, such as users that may be:

• Working in a distracting environment
• Have a slow computer/internet connection
• Are using a phone browser

Assistive Technologies

To make it easier, companies have made assistive technologies to help. What are some common types of assistive technologies?

• Software (screen magnifier, reader, voice recognition)
• Hardware (braille keyboard, special mice)

These should be used wherever possible and support should be provided on getting started using these tools with your application.

Overall, Our Main Goal Should Be To Make Content More Accessible

As a company, we should look to follow web content accessibility guidelines (WCAG) and apply the guidelines set by W3C to help us make better applications. On W3C’s website, these guidelines are split into 4 Principles, each of which consist of different guidelines to help experts make a great experience for users with any type of impairment.

Perceivable — information should be presentable

• Text alternatives for media
• Time based media (provide alternatives)
• Adaptable (content able to be presented differently)
• Distinguishable (distinguish foreground and background content)

Operable — user should be able to navigate

• Keyboard accessible
• Enough time (users get enough time to read)
• Seizures
• Navigatable (search needed)

Understandable — user should understand

• Readable
• Predictable — follow conventions
• Input assistance — correct mistakes

Robust — can be interpreted by all user agents (assistive tech)

• Compatible

This way, all users can enjoy a unified experience with all the information presented to them in an accessible manner.