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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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).…
Sorry folks, Internet Explorer is not going away on January 12. See, January 12 is the date that Microsoft will stop providing tech support and security updates for any version of Internet Explorer below IE 11. This doesn’t mean that the copy of IE8 on your client’s computer will suddenly…
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…
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…
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…