The problem with automated accessibility tools

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Do you all know what is an automated accessibility tool? Automated accessibility tool is a piece of software which can evaluate a web page, or even an entire website for accessibility purpose. Furthermore, automated accessibility tools are useful because they can save a huge amount of time.

But are these tools a little too good to be true?? Can you really assess a website for accessibility so easily? Unfortunately the answer is NO. There are a number of underlying problems associated with using just automated tools to check for accessibility.

The problem are as below :

1) Can't check many coding issues
The vast number of accessibility guidelines tend to be related to how the site is coded. Automated accessibility tools are unfortunately unable to check for many of the coding too. For example, HTML-related accessibility considerations which these tool's can't check for the coding as well.

2) Outdated guidelines are used
Automated accessibility tools generally uses the W3C accessibility guidelines, which by now are over five years old. As such, a number of guidelines were outdated and do not apply on it anymore. In fact, some of them are now thought to hinder accessibility rather than help, so it is better to totally ignore these outdated guidelines.

3) Most guidelines aren't properly checked
Automated accessibility tools can check for a number of guidelines, and can tell you when a guideline is not being adhered too. However, when the tool claims that a guideline is being fulfilled this may in fact be a false truth as automated accessibility tools were hardly recognize outdated guidelines.

4) Warnings may be misinterpreted
The reports generated by the automated accessibility tools provide warnings, as well as errors. These warnings are basically guidelines that the automated tool can't check for, but which may be errors. Often they are not, and in fact they are often not even relevant to it. However, some people reading a report may try to get rid of these warnings message by making an appropriate changes to their site for precaution. By doing this, they may be implementing guidelines that needn't be implemented and inadvertently lowering the website's accessibility.

As a conclusion, automated accessibility tools can be useful sometime as they can save a large amount of time in performing some very basic check for accessibility. However, they must be used with caution and they cannot be used as a stand-alone guide for accessibility checking. Indeed, some expert accessibility knowledge should always be applied in evaluating a site's accessibility not only replying on an automated accessibility tool itself.

Source: http://www.webcredible.co.uk/user-friendly-resources/web-accessibility/automated-tools.shtml

Accessibility tips

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Do you all know what are the best tips for making the web accessible? Most of you will think by making the text larger will be accessible for people with disability. But there are more tips for making a web site accessible. The tips as below :

1) Web Accessibility is designed to promote access by individuals with limited environments.

Following are things that keep in mind about potential users from W3C web content accessibility guideline :

• They may not be able to see, hear, move or understand easily
• They may have difficulty reading or comprehending text.
• They may not have or be able to use a keyboard or a mouse.
• They may not have an early version of a browser.
• They may have a slow connection, a small screen, a text-only screen.
• They may not speak or understand fluently the language in the document written.

2) Use the markup and style sheets properly

Avoid from using the structural markup for the visual result given by popular browsers. Documents that contain orderly and appropriate structural markup can be transfer to almost any type of user agent or display device and stand still on their own easily.

3) Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes

Not everyone can read information at the same pace. If you have scrolling or changing information, be sure there is a mechanism available for the user to pause or stop the flow of data so that it can be more easy for the user to get what the information within their time.

4) Ensure direct accessibility of embedded user interfaces

If an embedded object such as ActiveX control is used, the interface for that object must also be accessible so that other user with different browser can also see the object that posted by the writer.

5) Design for device independence

Not everyone has a mouse, and not everyone has a keyboard at home. Keyboard shortcuts, tabbing order, and event handlers all contribute to the accessibility of forms and elements. Keep in mind that people with a variety of input devices may interact with your documents.

6) Use the W3C technologies and guidelines

Adhere to W3C recommendations for markup and content development guidelines ; this provides greater security that the writer documents degrade gracefully to software that may not fully implement the most recent technologies.

7) Provide a clear navigation mechanisms

The most frequently used feature of any web site is the navigation system. No matter on a site a user may be, there should be a way to return to the home page with only one or two steps. This will create conveniences for various of users.

This are the 7 tips of making a web site accessible for various of users and I believe that, there are more tips on making a web site accessible as the technology now is getting more and more modern which would soon becoming the generation Z!

Source : http://www.paciellogroup.com/resources/tips.htm

Policy Relating to Web Accessibility

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The web's emergence as a pivotal form of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) raises interesting questions about application of existing laws and policies to the new medium, and the importance of all members in the society, including people with disabilities.

There is a growing body of national laws and policies which address accessibility of ICT which include the internet and the web as well. There is also a great variety of approaches among these laws and policies : some take the approach of establishing a human right to ICT ; others to approach that any ICT purchased by government must be accessible ; others that any ICT sold in a given market must be accessible and there are still other to be approach.

A separate document, addresses issues which frequently arise when establishing policies on web accessibility. There include, for instance, simple and comprehensive sample policy statements ; conformance levels for web sites as well as web related software ; defining the scope, milestones, and monitoring processes for web accessibility.

Source : http://www.w3.org/

ColorBlindExt – Better Web Accessibility for Colorblind Users

LINK TO US : http://snipr.com/umor8

Have you ever wondered, if you can’t see certain things on a website because of your color blindness? This time is over now—at least for colorblind Firefox users.

The Firefox add-on called ColorBlindExt was released just recently and is a great support to discover things which you couldn’t see up to now. The developers describe it as follows:

His extension helps color blinds while browsing the web, by processing images and text on the page according to the type of user’s color blindness. Color Blindness detection test is included for creating awareness among people.

After installation (see further down) as a first step you should take the color blindness test available through the newly added menu called ColorBlindExt. The test is based on Ishihara plates and will tell you, which type of color blindness you are suffering from. It detects protanopia, deuteranopia, tritanopia and even monochromacy, which means you are completely colorblind.

After taking the test the filter will be set according to your results. This can be changed at any time. Also the filter can be completely enabled or disabled however you like.

Image obtained from : http://www.colblindor.com/2007/06/20/colorblindext-better-web-accessibility-for-colorblind-users/

Personally I like the image filtering on demand. Through this option, which is also available on the context menu when clicking on an image, pictures and diagrams can be enhanced according to my type of color deficient vision.

The developers took the image filtering even one step further. Through the settings you even can adjust the level of deficiency and a choose from a noise reduction and sharpening option. This lets you play around and find the settings which fit the best to your personal color vision.

The tool also has some limitations, which don’t really restrict the usage to me when I look at them.

Page contents like flash objects, applets, media players can’t be filtered, it is out of scope.
Only elements accessed by DOM are processed.

Unfortunately the installation isn’t a single click and run. I tried to summarize all requirements including the links to get the latest software if you are missing some of them. I hope this helps you to get your colorblind webpage filter up and running without a hassle. Be aware that you need administration privileges if you have to install new software like the Java run time environment.

Hopefully this tool will help you to access some websites more easily than before or to read some colorful and up to now undistinguishable chart lines. And I also hope this tool isn’t used as an excuse for web designers to disregard accessibility, especially concerning color blindness.

Source : http://www.colblindor.com/2007/06/20/colorblindext-better-web-accessibility-for-colorblind-users/

Week 5 poll result

Link to us : http://snipr.com/uktbv

This is the result for week 5 poll. The question was " If we don't have any employee who are disabled,do we still have to make our intranet accessible? As you all can see, most of the readers agreed to make the intranet accessible which was 83.3% and 16.7% readers disagreed on the statement provided.

Why do most of the reader agreed? Because many disabilities are not visible and you therefore may not always know whether a person has a disability or not. In addition, the workplace infrastructure, including its technology infrastructure, should be accessible in preparation for future employees with disabilities so that they are able to be productive from the moment they begin their employment.

Accessible is important for everyone no matter people with disability or ability because its make thing goes smoothly without any error. Sometime there will be some error, with the technology nowadays, solution always there.

Podcast in Indonesian Language - Web Accessibility Guide

link to us : http://snipr.com/uka5w

You might wonder how a blind person can surf the net at all, is it with the visual or other things? Blind and other disabled today can surf the net as long as the web designer consider accessibility requirements when they were designing the web site.

(Anda mungkin bertanya-tanya bagaimana orang buta dapat menjelajahi bersih sama sekali, adalah dengan visual atau hal lain? Buta dan cacat lainnya hari ini dapat menjelajahi bersih sepanjang mempertimbangkan aksesibilitas web designer persyaratan ketika mereka merancang situs web.)

For example, Blind people can surf the net using speech or braille browsers. These browsers either can speak out the text on page or convert it to braille which only read text, so you need to be careful when using image maps as navigation bars or the blind may not be able to navigate your site.

(Sebagai contoh, orang-orang buta dapat menjelajahi bersih pidato atau Braile menggunakan browser. Browser ini juga dapat berbicara teks di halaman atau mengubahnya menjadi Braile yang hanya membaca teks, sehingga Anda harus berhati-hati ketika menggunakan peta gambar sebagai navigasi bar atau buta mungkin tidak dapat menavigasi situs Anda.)

A partially sighted person might need to view your site in larger font size or with more contrast between the text and also background. Most browsers will allow these people to adjust the text size and colours, that is why, you need to ensure your page allows their browser to do this.

(Sebuah terlihat sebagian orang mungkin perlu untuk melihat situs Anda dalam ukuran font yang lebih besar atau dengan lebih kontras antara teks dan juga latar belakang. Kebanyakan browser akan memungkinkan orang-orang ini untuk menyesuaikan ukuran teks dan warna, itu sebabnya, Anda perlu untuk memastikan halaman Anda memungkinkan browser mereka untuk melakukan hal ini.)

A physically disabled person might not be able to use a mouse, and would perhaps use a keyboard or other device to tab down the links on the page. You can help by organised links in a sensible manner.

(Seorang penyandang cacat fisik mungkin tidak dapat menggunakan mouse, dan mungkin akan menggunakan keyboard atau perangkat lain ke tab di link pada halaman. Anda dapat membantu dengan diatur link dalam cara yang masuk akal.

Accessibility in a general sense is about making your site easy to use. This means having intuitive navigation and a clean layout. Visitors to the net are generally looking for information, and are more likely to stay on a site that provides this information in a quick and straightforward manner.

(Aksesibilitas dalam pengertian umum adalah tentang membuat situs anda mudah digunakan.IPengunjung ke net umumnya mencari informasi, dan lebih mungkin untuk tinggal di situs yang menyediakan informasi ini dalam sebuah cara yang cepat dan sederhana.)

PodCast in Mandarin- what is the opportunities has offered by web acccessibility?

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As we know, the internet is a great tool that is used by millions of people everyday. To accessing websites is very easy and straightforward process if you have great vision, good listening and all of your limbs. But still, at least more than 90 percent of the websites are inaccessible to a large portion of the population. Why? Because of the Internet, one of the best things seems that ever happened to people with disabilities.

(就像我们所知，每一天，都会有数不尽的人在使用着网际网络此工具.当你拥有着健全的视觉，听觉，及四肢， 网际网络的使用其实是非常容易而且也很直接。可是，为什么至少还有90%的网站是达不到那部分庞大数目的人口呢？是因为对残障人士来说，使用网际网络这样棒的工具是不可能发生在他们身上的。)

Did you know for example that someone who is blind can actually use the Internet? Yes. They can use some special software, known as a screen reader. It actually reads what's on screen to them. People with other types of disabilities use technologies to help them use the Internet as well. Example,before the internet, how did blind people read the newspaper? Most of them didn't, If they want to know, they could ask their friends or family member to read for them and if comparing with today's, blind people can actually know the news from internet.

( 你知道吗，其实视觉障碍的人士也可以使用网际网络？是的。他们可以使用一些称为屏幕助读员的特别软件，来帮助他们阅读屏幕上的资料。除了视觉障碍人士之外，他们也可以使用先进科技来协助他们使用网际网络。比方说， 在网际网络的诞生之前，视觉障碍的人，是如何阅读报纸呢？大多数的他们都没有阅读的机会，如果他们想知道关于报章的文字，就必须透过他们的朋友，家人帮忙阅读而跟如今比起来，视觉障碍的人，也可以靠自己透过网际网络阅读新闻。)

screen reader: 屏幕助读员

Most of the online news which publish already in a format which can read by "screen readers" which used by the blind. These software programs can read out the text loud.So,blind people can access any text content through the computers. Similarly, if the people with disabilities who cannot pick up the book and turn it to another page, through the technologies that adapt the computer interface to their own disabilities. Sometimes the adaptations are simple, such as having the person place a stick in the mouth and use it to type keyboard commands. In other cases, the adaptations are more sophisticated, as in the use of special keyboards or eye-tracking software that allows people to use a computer with nothing more than eye movements.

(大多数的网上新闻已经被格式化，视觉障碍的人士可以透过屏幕助读员来协助阅读。透过此软件， 它可以大声地读出文字 所以， 视觉障碍的人士可以使用电脑来阅读文字内容。同样的，面对着不可能将书拿起并翻阅的残缺人士也可以透过如今科技来配合使用电脑。有时候，残障人士面对着这些配合是可以很简单的，他们可以将笔咬着，并慢慢的在电脑键盘上打字。在其他的方案里，他们可以使用特别键盘或 “眼睛追踪”软件来方便一些只可以使用眼神交流的残缺人士。)

special keyboard:特别键盘

eye-tracking:“眼睛追踪”软件

From web accessibilities we know that they really offers unprecedented opportunities and increase more public awareness to everyone.

( 透过这可达性这么高的网络后，我们也知道，它除了提供了无数的机会给公众，更也提高公众对此的注意力.)