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Going Beyond WCAG

Going Beyond WCAG

Published on September 23, 2024

When it comes to accessibility for digital products, we look to the W3C’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) to point us in the right direction. WCAG carries with interaction guides to how users can expect a digital product to respond regardless of their method of interaction. This common language we use to make sure that a website, application, kiosk, mobile app won’t be confusing to new users. However, WCAG isn’t prescriptive in demanding things be done a specific way. And more importantly, just like accessibility isn’t a destination, neither is WCAG conformance. Its just the baseline we start from, we can go beyond it.

What does it mean to go beyond?

Keeping things generic for a moment, what does it really mean to go beyond a standard? This may not be clear of possible in all situations, but to go beyond a standard, we need to first achieve that standard, then add features that enhance the usability and user experience.

Let’s try an example

We’ll establish that this is an ecommerce site. During development, we add a link to the end of each product description. To meet the guidelines we’re working with we need to make sure it stands out from surrounding text. To make it standout, we underline it and use a different color. For this imaginary link, the color we choose has a 3:1 contrast with the surrounding text and 4.5:1 with our background. This meets the barest of guidelines laid out in WCAG. But we can do more than this.

We’ve already cleared WCAG 1.4.1 Use of Color as we have our link underlined. Next, let’s look at the text. Our link is in the middle of a paragraph describing a product by Acme MFG, inc. The link reads, “More information” immediately following the product description.

The Acme MFG Ultra Juicer 3000 is a state-of-the-art kitchen appliance designed for health enthusiasts and busy families alike. With its powerful 1000-watt motor and innovative cold-press technology, this juicer efficiently extracts maximum nutrients from fruits and vegetables. The Ultra Juicer 3000 features a wide chute that accommodates whole fruits, reducing prep time significantly. Its quiet operation and easy-clean components make it a convenient addition to any kitchen. The juicer comes with multiple speed settings, allowing users to customize their juicing experience . Acme MFG’s commitment to quality is evident in the juicer’s durable stainless steel construction and 5-year warranty. More Information.

Some of you are probably getting wound up by the name of the link, be patient, because the above link passes WCAG 2.4.4 as it has context before it. It is reasonable to assume the user knows this link will take them to more information on the juicer. However, if that link were brought up in a link list as most screen readers provide, it loses the context and reads, “More information” in a list of links that may or may not be unrelated. Most of would go back and revise the link to read, “More information on ACME Ultra Juicer 3000.” And this is great! It takes this particular issue and meets WCAG 2.4.9 AAA. But have we gone beyond WCAG?

A lot of times we provide controls to do something on the page. Most accessibility specialists will recommend that the control tells you what it does. Our link above will take you to the ACME website for details and service manuals.

WCAG doesn’t directly apply to this.

The industry as a whole agrees that if a link or button opens a new tab, window, or dialog that the user should be alerted that control will do just that. But WCAG doesn’t address this. We add icons (with alt text) or text saying “opens in new window”, “opens dialog”, or similar to inform the user what is going to happen. We do this to prevent surprises, confusion, and disorientation of the user.

Going Beyond WCAG means that you recognize that accessibility is the first step in a good user experience, but a good experience isn’t enough. Great products have great experiences, so combine your accessibility knowledge with usability and user experience. And if you are a designer, great accessibility is great user experience, don’t discount either.

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You Need Accessibility Testing

You Need Accessibility Testing

Published on January 5, 2016

This probably isn’t the first time you’ve heard it. Somewhere along the line somebody asked you how well your site or application works for people that are blind. You probably mumbled something along, “They don’t use our stuff,” or maybe, “I don’t know, does it matter?” The short answer is, yes it matters. And you want to pay attention to why.

Accessibility isn’t Just the Blind

Accessible products and websites are often built with the blind in mind, however what it means to be truly accessible runs much deeper than that. Accessible by it’s very nature means that anyone, anywhere, with any tool of their choosing can use it. This means the disabled, which is not just the blind, but those with hearing, neuro-diversity, mobility, physical, and learning disabilities; and it means the abled that are compromised by other means.

Economics plays a huge part in accessibility. AOL still has 2 million people using dialup internet. This is an economic issue. ISPs have decided it isn’t beneficial enough to run faster lines to these areas or they are on fixed incomes and can’t afford the rising cost of internet access. Developing nations don’t have access to the funds to buy the latest and greatest technology, so they use products released years ago to get online.

As developers we all cheer when we hear that Microsoft is dropping all support for browsers below Internet Explorer 11 next week, but how does someone in an African country who can’t afford to upgrade from XP going to feel when we don’t support IE9? And what if that great new mobile application you created only works on iOS 9+ and Android 4.4.4? Many lower income folks in the developed and developing worlds have phones that are 2, 3, 4, or 5 years old and don’t support the latest things we can do with the web or mobile.

Building accessible products and sites means taking all this into account. It is using responsive web design to make sure your content is readable on all devices regardless of size. It is using solid HTML to make sure the content is parseable by a variety of technologies on the client side from browser, to apps, to refrigerators and TVs. It is using progressive enhancement to make certain that the product is usable even when the CSS or Javascript fail to load. It requires building products that while that may be single page applications running on Angular, React, or Ember continue to be useful applications when the CDN doesn’t connect or the connection is slow. It means setting a performance budget so that we aren’t trying to load 3 megabytes of data to run a blog. Knowing to reduce images, minify scripts, use CDNs to load things faster, and trying your darndest to limit any single page to something that will load in under 4 seconds and be usable.†

But Why?

Getting back to the disability side of things, recently the DOJ has taken to pushing through that public websites are liable to be accessible to the disabled. There is recent legislation that is forcing airlines to improve their websites. Netflix, Target, H&R Block, and eBay have all been sued by disabled people because their websites weren’t accessible.

You probably have a good idea what a lawsuit brought in federal court would cost your company even before remediation and damages are incurred. Why get sued when you can save money fixing the problems first?

I’m Here to Help

Your competitors haven’t solved this problem yet. Many are in the same boat as you and don’t know where to start.

With over decade of experience in front end development, user experience design, and accessible development I can get you ahead of the curve. Working together we can do a proper assessment of your website in all the major assistive technologies to make certain any deficits are found before you end up in court. With an active assessment done and a remediation plan in place you can resolve many legal actions before they get started.

Once you know where the problems lay, I can work with or train your team on how to resolve those issues bringing your site up to par with WCAG 2.0 AA standards. This is the standard level used by the Canadian, United Kingdom, Australian, and Japanese governments to write their web accessibility legislature. The European Union has used it to craft theirs; and the United States has similar legislation based on WCAG 2.0 AA facing it for a vote.

Contact me to set up a time to discuss your needs so we can set your product or site off as a differentiator in your industry because it is accessible.

† 4 seconds is a magic number that will cause people to think your app is slow. If your customer is using dialup, then a 500kb page will take 1 minute and 13 seconds to download. Sure 3 megabytes is instantaneous on your home cable connection or 4G smartphone, but in the developing world it could be a minute.

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