9 August 2012Museum of Contemporary Art,

Sydney

Roger HudsonWeb Usability

Arts, Media and Technology at the MCA

How many?18.5% of all Australians (4 million people)

Age related8.6% of 25-34 year olds

18% of 45-54 year olds

40% of 65-69 year olds

Source: “2009 Disability, Ageing and Careers survey”Australian Bureau of Statistics

People with disabilities won’t / can’t / don’t

use the Internet

MYTH

Internet Usage53% of all people with reported disability

23% of people with ‘profound’ limitations

Social Inclusion

WHAT?

• Different input devices; mouse, keyboard, switches, etc.

• Different output devices, browsers, screen readers, magnifiers, etc.

Content of web pages should be accessible with:

Source:

“Refreshable Braille and the Web”

Device independence

Killing Bambi

Screen readers and Flash

Eclipse ACTF aDesigner http://www.eclipse.org/actf/downloads/tools/aDesigner/

Looking inside Flash

Accessibility = expensive

Accessibility = difficult

Accessibility = boring

MYTHS

Rules and regulations

Commonwealth Disability Discrimination Act 1992(Australian Human Rights Commission Advisory Note)

UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with DisabilitiesRatified by Australia in August 2009

Commonwealth (AGIMO) and state government web guidelines

• Government websites should be WCAG 2 AA by end of 2014

• All new websites should be WCAG 2 AA compliant. • Existing non-government sites should be WCAG 2 AA by

end of 2013

Four key principles of accessibility

1. Content must be Perceivable

2. Interface components in the content must be Operable

3. Content and controls must be Understandable

4. Content should be Robust enough to work with current and future user agents (including AT)

WCAG 2 Structure – POUR Principles

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0

http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/

WCAG 2.0 Recommendations

“WCAG 2.0 W3C Recommendation” contains:

• 4 Principles

• 12 Guidelines

• 61 Success Criteria that specify what is required to comply with the guidelines.

Three levels of conformance are defined for the Success Criteria (A, AA and AAA)

Testable

Success Criteria are statements that can be applied to different technologies and are testable by machines and/or humans.

WCAG 2.0 Techniques

Advice about how to satisfy the Success Criteria is provided in the W3C “Techniques” document

• Sufficient Techniques: Ways of meeting the Success Criteria.

• Advisory Techniques: Goes beyond what is required to help authors better address the Guideline.

• Failures: Known failures to comply with the Success Criteria

How do you know if something is accessible?

A few simple accessibility questions

• Can you use the page without images?

• Can you use the page with the keyboard?

• When using a keyboard, do you know where you are?

• Do headings use heading elements <H#>?

• How are form inputs identified?

• Is the colour contrast sufficient?

Accessibility testing tools can help a lot

http://www.aarts.net.au/audience-development/youth-arts-access/

But, tools can’t tell you everything

(Demonstration of the Web Accessibility Toolbar)http://www.paciellogroup.com/resources/wat-ie-about.html

Screen readers output the content of accessible pages as either synthetic speech or refreshable Braille.

Many different screen readers, including:

•JAWS

•Window Eyes

•NVDA (Great Australian technology that is FREE)

Quick introduction to screen readers

NVDA in action: Reading a web page

http://www.aarts.net.au/audience-development/youth-arts-access/

NVDA download: http://www.nvda-project.org/wiki/Download

Rapidly advancing web

Same old problems

Common problems 1 - 3

1. Failure to include text alternatives for imagesThe need to provide equivalent text alternatives for all non-text content is the first accessibility requirement of WCAG 2.

2. Use of CAPTCHAThe most common example of CAPTCHA is distorted images of text used as part of a login or registration process.

3. Failure to use HTML Header elements appropriatelyHeader element <h#> should be used to identify and present different sections and sub-sections of the page.

4. Failure to identify form inputs adequatelyAll form inputs should have explicitly associated labels or use the input title attribute for identification.

Common problems 4 - 6

6. Failure to mark-up data tables correctlyWith all data tables, users need to be able to associate the information presented in each data cell with the relevant row and column headers.

5. Failure to ensure sites can be used without the mouseNot all web users are able to use a mouse so it is important to ensure site pages can also be used with the keyboard.

Don’t forget older web users

In Australia

2005: 24% of 65 -74 year olds are online

2007: 38% of 65 -74 year olds are online

2011: 71% of 55 – 64 year olds (age group with the greatest increase in use)

Mature age ICT users survey 2011

48% - text size is a problem at least sometime

23% - use of colour is a problem at least sometime

‘web sites are designed by young people with good vision’ (Participant comment)

Where next?

Making exciting things accessible is

exciting

Thank you

Any questions

Roger Hudson

Email: rhudson@usability.com.au

Web: www.usability.com.au

Blog: www.dingoaccess.com