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Adrian Roselli
Outsourced Virtualization System IPA

All Posts Tagged: accessibility

CSUN 2016 Recap

I tried writing this on my return flight from CSUN (where I experienced both a temporary mobility impairment thanks to no elbow room in coach to type, and a visual impairment because I could not get the guy behind me to close the shade to prevent glare on my screen).…

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Tags: accessibility

Be Wary of Accessibility Guarantees from Vendors

In my ~20 years of responding to RFPs/RFQs, once organizations started to realize the value of accessibility (or fear of lawsuits), I saw more and more requests include a note on accessibility. In most cases this was just a single line item among many, often with nothing more than a…

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Tags: accessibility, overlay, usability, UX

Fringe Accessibility Slides from Booster 2016

I had the pleasure of giving a workshop at Booster Conference 2016 on accessibility. As it was the last slot of the last day, it ended up being more of an interactive talk than a hands-on session, but the audience seemed to appreciate that. Or view it directly on SlideShare:…

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Tags: accessibility, ARIA, css, html, slides, speaking, standards, usability, UX

We Know You Have Alt Text, Twitter

Users have repeatedly asked for a method to provide alternative text for images on Twitter. Since so many of Twitter’s features today are just codified versions of what the community invented on its own, many of us hoped Twitter would just build some proper support. Instead, Twitter pushes for more…

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Tags: accessibility, rant, social media, Twitter, usability, UX

Keyboard and Overflow

Imagine that as a user you regularly use the keyboard for non-data-entry tasks. Think about how frustrating it is to have to grab the mouse to hover over something on the screen just to see it. Now imagine that you are a keyboard-only user. That problem can be addressed somewhat…

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Tags: accessibility, ARIA, css, html, JavaScript, pattern, tables, usability, UX

Mobile Assistive Technology Gesture References

During a recent consultation on a mobile project, I broached the topic of gestures that are used by assistive technology on various devices. I gathered links to resources for my client and figured I’d share them here as well. Apple has gathered together the gestures used by VoiceOver on iOS…

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Tags: accessibility, mobile, standards, touch, usability, UX

Speaking at Create Upstate

This May I’ll be running an afternoon workshop for Create Upstate. Create Upstate rallies makers from Buffalo to Albany and everywhere in between in a celebration of design and community, and I’ll get a chance to promote accessibility to some of those makers. I’ll be taking my Selfish Accessibility talk…

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Tags: accessibility, ARIA, html, speaking, standards, usability, UX

Speaking at Booster Conference in Norway

I’m pretty excited to be returning to Booster Conference in Bergen, Norway this spring. Last year I presented a lightning talk on print styles. This year I opted to aim a little higher and submitted a workshop on accessibility. The abstract from my talk: If you’re familiar with accessibility, you…

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Tags: accessibility, ARIA, html, speaking, standards, usability, UX

Links, Buttons, Submits, and Divs, Oh Hell

Screen shot of the Zurb Foundation advice for accessible buttons, where it shows anchors and a div each with role=”button”. In short, a perfect example of everything you could do wrong. NOTE: This was version 5.5.3. Most of this is fixed in the current version as of this writing (6.1.2).…

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Tags: accessibility, css, design, html, Internet Explorer, standards, usability, UX

Avoid the Hamburger Menu for Desktop Layouts

This is, to some extent, a response to the article at Usability Geek titled Making A Case For The Desktop Hamburger Menu (which I had the Wayback Machine capture because I have learned my lesson). I left a comment on the article, but it motivated me to write something on…

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Tags: accessibility, design, mobile, usability, UX

10k Tweets Won’t Make Images Accessible

The Twitterverse exploded yesterday with rumors that Twitter is exploring expanding the limit on characters in tweets from 140 to 10,000 characters. In a great example of the hyperbole, The Guardian even reported that Twitter shares plummeted a whole 2% as a result. Seemingly in support of this move, Jack…

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Tags: accessibility, rant, social media, UX

Responsive Progressive Accessible Vanilla Search

I received a design for a project recently that called for a search field hidden behind a single icon — no visible label text, no visible field, no submit button. While I’ve seen this pattern on sites repeatedly, I feel they generally get it wrong. Relying on bloated HTML and…

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Tags: accessibility, pattern, standards, touch, usability, UX