• How do individuals with disabilities interact with and use the web? Understanding how assistive technologies work. • Understanding your legal requirements - Section 508, Section 504, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and other state, U.S., and international laws • Evaluating web site accessibility - automated tools, user testing, using screen readers, and understanding the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0

1. Web Accessibility
Manjeet Singh

2. Index
• Objective of the study
• Web Accessibility
• Web Accessibility Benefits
• Myths about Web Accessibility
• Accessibility Acts
• Scope of the Study
• Understanding Users
• Assistive technologies
• Web Accessibility Methodology
• WCAG 2.0/ Section 508 Guidelines Walkthrough
• Workshop
• References

3. Objective of the study
• The aim of this study is to introduce the concept of Web Accessibility. The study
will particularly concentrate on establishing what the need for accessibility is and
how any web developer/ designers/ testers could improve to make the content
accessible to more people.
• The study will establish what web users and, in particular, developers/ testers get
to know about this concept and what the need to teach people about web
accessibility is. It will also try to understand what can be called a disabled person
on the web and what the special needs associates with each disability are.
• The study will also introduce some of the techniques, tools and methods available
for the developer and for the user to improve Web accessibility. These range from
the use of simplified languages to the right choice of colors, including the structure
of the web page and its presentation.
• In other words, the purpose of this study is to learn the web accessibility and
identify problem areas and report the findings/ problematic areas using the
system by the person with the different abilities.

4. Web Accessibility
Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can use the Web. More
specifically, Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can perceive,
understand, navigate, and interact with the Web, and that they can contribute to the
Web. Web accessibility also benefits others, including older people with changing
abilities due to aging.
The Web is an increasingly important resource in many aspects of life: education,
employment, government, commerce, health care, recreation, and more. It is essential
that the Web be accessible in order to provide equal access and equal opportunity to
people with disabilities. An accessible Web can also help people with disabilities more
actively participate in society.

5. Web Accessibility Benefits
Conformance with web accessibility standards will improve audience reach by
increasing accessibility and usability. By adhering to the standards and guidelines we
will be able to:
– Improve download times
– Improve consistency in navigation flows
– Increase flexibility associated with device-independent code
– Improve search engine rankings
– Provide content that is more easily understood by your users
– Make services more accessible globally
– Reduce site maintenance costs
– Demonstrate commitment to social responsibility

6. Myths about Web Accessibility
– Text-Only Versions Are an Acceptable Solution
– Accessibility Makes Sites/ Application Dull and Boring
– Accessibility Is the Sole Responsibility of Web Developers/ Designers
– Accessibility Is for People Who Are Blind
– Evaluation Tools Can Determine Conformance to Standards
– Guidelines Are Not Sufficient for Accessibility

7. Accessibility Acts
The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) in 1997
has successfully raised awareness in the web design community about issues related to
access to information on the web by disabled users. It raises awareness about certain types
of barriers to receive information over the web and aims at proposing solutions that will
reduce the barriers significantly.
Barriers to receiving free information may fall under government discrimination acts in
many countries. For example,
- the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) in the UK (Hackett, Parmanto, & Zeng, 2005),
- Americans with Disabilities Act (Johnson & Ruppert, 2002) in the US, and
- the Australian Disability Discrimination Legislation (Wallis, 2005) in Australia consider
that web contents be equally accessible to all citizens of their nation.
- In Canada, the government has taken a step forward in creating any of its governmental
sites with accessibility features since 1995 (Slatin & Rush, 2003), thus making
compliance to accessibility guidelines a requirement at the government level.

8. Scope of the Study
For Level A conformance (the
minimum level of conformance),
the Web page satisfies all the
Level A Success criteria.
Level A Level AA Level AAA
For Level AA conformance, the
Web page satisfies all the Level A
and Level AA Success Criteria.
Level AAA and Touch Devices are out of
scope
According to W3C, during the first step of the accessibility evaluation,
the target conformance level of WCAG 2.0 should be set. The target conformance
level means either A, AA or AAA*.

9. Understanding Users
This introduction should help you understand how people with disabilities use the
web, the frustrations they feel when they cannot access the web, and what you can do
to make your sites more accessible. The internet is one of the best things that ever
happened to people with disabilities. You may not have thought about it that way, but
all you have to do is think back to the days before the internet to see why this is so.

10. Understanding Users
Though estimates vary, most studies find that about one fifth (20%) of the
population has some kind of disability. Not all of these people have disabilities that
make it difficult for them to access the internet, but it is still a significant portion of
the population.
A guy using pointer device to access web Screen reader program for blind users

11. Assistive technologies
In human–computer interaction, computer accessibility (also known as accessible computing)
refers to the accessibility of a computer system to all people, regardless of disability or
severity of impairment, examples include web accessibility.

12. Web Accessibility Methodology
Guidelines to be followed
– WCAG 2.0 accessibility standards
Techniques included as test cases
– General techniques
– HTML/XHTML techniques
– CSS technique
Defining Severity of the issues
– Critical: User is not able to complete the task successfully
or shouldn’t trigger unintended action
– High: User is able to complete the tasks with minor workaround involved
– Medium: User is able to complete the task with minor inconveniences
– Low: Primarily cosmetic in nature, good to have

13. Web Accessibility Methodology
Software Requirements
– NotePad++ (OpenSource): http://notepad-plus-plus.org/
– Code inspection and validation tools
• HTML mark-up/ CSS validators (W3C validator)
– Assistive technologies (ATs) – JAWS/ NVDA (screen reader)
– Colour contrast analyser 2.0
Browser Requirement
– HTML/CSS will be tested on different browsers and to be reviewed.
Internet Explorer IE 8+
Mozila Firefox FF 3.0+
Opera 12+
Safari 5+
Chrome 21+

14. WCAG 2.0 Checklist Walkthrough
Perceivable
• Our website can be visited by people with very different types of perceptive preferences
and needs, but also by robots (search engines, translators…). Our information and user
interface components must address this handicap. We must give alternatives if a user
cannot use one of her senses.
Operable
• Web developers must be aware of the different devices the users can manage to use the
website, so they must make the user interface components and navigation elements in a
way that everyone can “operate” with it. E.g. Don’t limit user input to “mouse” or
“pointers”.
Understandable
• If our user don’t understand what we are talking about, or we make her feel lost, we
have a problem. We must design our the system, including the information and the user
interface, in a friendly way.
Robust
• This is the most-technology-dependent principle of all. It relies on the capacity of the
system to be transmitted and interpreted by the user agents.

15. References
• http://www.uservision.co.uk/resources/case-studies/
• http://validator.w3.org/
• http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/
• http://www.totalvalidator.com/
• http://wave.webaim.org/
• http://webaim.org/standards/wcag/checklist

16. Workshop
– Select Website/ Application
– Select page to conduct accessibility evaluation
– Evaluate with WCAG 2.0/ Section 508 Checklist
– Test with JAWS/ NVDA
– Report Creation
– Report Submission

17. Thank You!
LinkedIn: in.linkedin.com/in/manjeetvaseer