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Responsible Web Applications

An excellent collection of advice and examples for making websites responsive and accessibile (responsive + accessible = responsible).

axe-con Digital Accessibility Conference | Deque

This looks like it’ll be a good event: a keynote from Vint Cerf and talks from Val Head, Rachel Andrew, Sara Soueidan, and others.

Best of all, it’s free!

Web Almanac 2020

I spent most of the weekend reading through this and I’ve still barely scratched the surface—a lot of work has gone to the analyses and write-ups!

The sections on accessibility and performance get grimmer each year but the raw numbers on framework adaption are refreshingly perspective-setting.

The Importance of HTML – Jerry Jones

You’re not going to get a Webby Award or thousands of views on Codepen for how amazingly crafted your HTML is. You’ll need to be OK going unrecognized for your work. But know that every time I use a screen reader or keyboard on a site and it works correctly, I have a little spark of joy.

Daily diary for April 24, 2021 – A Whole Lotta Nothing

A blog post from the future. I’m on board with the subgenre of speculative blogging.

Playing with Envision Glasses - Tink - Léonie Watson

The street finds its own uses for things, and it may be that the use for Google Glass is assistive technology. Here’s Léonie’s in-depth hands-on review of Envision Glasses, based on Google Glass.

The short wait whilst the image is processed is mitigated by the fact a double tap is all that’s needed to request another scene description, and being able to do it just by looking at what I’m interested in and tapping a couple of times on my glasses is nothing short of happiness in a pair of spectacles.

An opinionated guide to accessibility testing /// Iain Bean

0. First impressions
1. The Tab key
2. Automated testing tools
3. Screen reader testing
4. Next steps

Not so short note on aria-label usage – Big Table Edition – HTML Accessibility

This is a very handy table of elements from Steve of where aria-label can be applied.

Like, for example, not on a div element.

Webbed Briefs

Heydon is back on his bullshit, making extremely entertaining and occassionally inappropriate short videos about web stuff.

WEBBED BRIEFS are brief videos about the web, its technologies, and how to make the most of them. They’re packed with information, fun times™, and actual goats. Yes, it’s a vlog, but it isn’t on Youtube. Unthinkable!

The pilot episode is entitled “What Is ARIA Even For?”

Accessibility Support

A very handy community project that documents support for ARIA and native HTML accessibility features in screen readers and browsers.

Van11y: Accessibility and Vanilla JavaScript - ES2015

Van11y (for Vanilla-Accessibility) is a collection of accessible scripts for rich interfaces elements, built using progressive enhancement and customisable.

How-to: Create accessible forms - The A11Y Project

Another five pieces of sweet, sweet low-hanging fruit:

• Always label your inputs.
• Highlight input element on focus.
• Break long forms into smaller sections.
• Provide error messages.
• Avoid horizontal layout forms unless necessary.

5 most annoying website features I face as a blind person every single day by Holly Tuke

Five pieces of low-hanging fruit:

• Unlabelled links and buttons
• No image descriptions
• Poor use of headings
• Inaccessible web forms
• Auto-playing audio and video

Top 5 things to review in an Accessible Design Review - Hassell Inclusion

Considering how much accessibility work happens “under the hood”, it’s interesting that all five of these considerations are visibly testable.

1. Think about accessible copy
2. Don’t forget about the focus indicator
3. Check your colour contrast
4. Don’t just use colour to convey meaning
5. Design in anticipation of text resizing

On not choosing WordPress for the W3C redesign project - Working in the open with W3C and Studio 24

The use of React complicates front-end build. We have very talented front-end developers, however, they are not React experts - nor should they need to be. I believe front-end should be built as standards-compliant HTML/CSS with JavaScript used to enrich functionality where necessary and appropriate.

Schedule / Inclusive Design 24 (#id24) 17 September 2020

No matter what time zone you’re in, you can tune in to some excellent-sounding talks tomorrow.

No sign-up. No registration. All sessions are streamed live and publicly on the Inclusive Design 24 YouTube channel.

Kokorobot — leanerweb

The problem is that most websites will adapt to the ever faster connections, which makes them gradually inaccessible for people with slower connections. Today, most websites are impossible to download with a dial-up connection, because they have become too corpulent.

This speaks to me:

Everything we do to make it harder to create a website or edit a web page, and harder to learn to code by viewing source, promotes that consumerist vision of the web.

Pretending that one needs a team of professionals to put simple articles online will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Overcomplicating the web means lifting up the ladder that used to make it possible for people to teach themselves and surprise everyone with unexpected new ideas.

There’s a list of links at the end of this piece to help you reach this goal:

It is vital that the web stay participatory. That means not just making sites small enough so the whole world can visit them, but small enough so that people can learn to build their own, by example. Bloat makes the web inaccessible.

Why you should hire a frontend developer - Technology in government

This is a really good description of the role of a front-end developer.

That’s front end, not full stack.

The difference between aria-label and aria-labelledby - Tink - Léonie Watson

A handy reminder from Léonie (though remember that the best solution is to avoid the problem in the first place—if you avoid using ARIA, do that).

Solid Start

A four-point checklist for inclusive design:

Are you a person that makes digital things for other people? Awesome—because this page is all about making things for people. There are four ways you can improve your creation for everybody. All four are testable, fixable and they improve usability for everybody.