Notices by Accessibility Awareness (a11yawareness@disabled.social)

Some people have disabilities that are directly based on the way they understand and interpret numbers. In this post, Ricky Onsman explains some of these disabilities, who is affects and how, and what web creators can do about it.

https://www.tpgi.com/making-numbers-in-web-content-accessible/

Don't use headings to arbitrarily style text. If you apply “Heading 4” style, you add a <h4> heading tag to the item. When screen reader users navigate from heading to heading, the item will be treated as a heading. This will be confusing. Only treat actual headings as headings.

ANDI (Accessible Name & Description Inspector) is a free accessibility testing tool used by people testing for Section 508 compliance. ANDI can't detect everything, but can find some issues and give some suggestions to improve the issues it detects.

https://www.ssa.gov/accessibility/andi/help/install.html

Are you adding alt text to the images you upload on Slack? Here's how to do so.

https://slack.com/help/articles/4403914924435-Add-descriptions-to-images

The difference between closed captions and open captions: Closed captions are on a separate track that can be turned on or off. Open captions are captions that are burned into the video, so that they are always showing. The viewer cannot turn them off.

https://www.w3.org/WAI/media/av/captions/#positioning-and-styling-captions

If you're looking to hire people with accessibility knowledge and experience, the Accessibility Skills Hiring Toolkit created by Teach Access can help you. The toolkit provides language to use when writing job ads, and questions to ask when interviewing.

https://teachaccess.github.io/accessibility-skills-hiring-toolkit/

The No Mouse Challenge is a global effort to raise awareness about accessible web design. Try using your website without a mouse. Use the keyboard instead. Is it possible to access all features and operate all buttons, sliders, and other controls?

https://nomouse.org/

Beware of companies promising to make sites completely accessible, compliant, and immune from lawsuits with just a few lines of code. This just isn't possible. Disabled users have long said these tools don't actually help them, and can often make things worse.

"Can I Play That?" is a website focusing on the intersection of web accessibility and video games. The site is a resource of reviews, features, and news coverage of accessibility within video games. The site is aimed at both players and developers.

https://caniplaythat.com/

In charts and data visualizations, avoid overwhelming people with information. Keep the design simple and clear. Avoid animations as they can be distracting and disorienting. If you must include some type of movement or animation, provide a way for people to turn it off.

When considering rainbow text, don't forget to consider readability and legibility. Text filled with rainbows can be difficult to read. Same with complex rainbow backgrounds. Putting each word or letter in a different color of the rainbow could force readers to work harder.

When writing alt text, ask yourself if you would picture an approximation of the image if it was described to you over the phone using the alt text you've written. Doing that exercise can be a good way to determine if you're on the right track.

When creating PDFs, avoid using "Print to PDF." A screen reader user may still be able to access the text of PDFs created this way, but heading structure, alternative text, and any other tag structure will be lost. Using "Save As" or "Export" can preserve these tags.

Get in the habit of bringing up accessibility at meetings, in stand-ups, and in demos. Bring up things you've done to address accessibility. Likewise, don't be afraid to ask, "Have we tested this on a keyboard?" or "What's the experience like on a screen reader?"

Make sure that interactive elements that can be accessed by using a mouse, pen, trackpad or touch are at least 24 by 24 CSS pixels. This helps people with low vision and/or limited motor control select the intended element without accidentally selecting nearby elements.

Alt text should be as long as it needs to be in order to effectively describe the content. In some cases, this will be a few phrases. In other cases, it will take a few more sentences. Aim to be as efficient as possible without leaving out key details.

Manual transcription is more accurate than automatic transcription. Humans can catch errors that software may miss because of background noise or audio quality. Humans can interpret a speaker's tone and emotions, which can be lost in an automated transcript. Always review and edit before publishing.

You don't necessarily need to say "image of" in your alt text for users to know it's an image. Screen readers will announce that it's an image. But it can help readers to specify if it's a hand-drawn image, Polaroid, infographic, screenshot, chart, map, diagram, or so on.

Sharing a meme on social media? Don't forget to include alt text! This resource from Veronica With Four Eyes (Veronica Lewis) will help you.

https://veroniiiica.com/2018/11/29/how-to-write-alt-text-for-memes/

Many people would love to start a digital accessibility program at their organization but don't know how or where to begin. If you're feeling overwhelmed and want some tips on how to get going, this primer from TPGi can help.

https://www.tpgi.com/a-guide-to-creating-a-successful-digital-accessibility-program