The Monarch could be the next big thing in Braille A collaboration project between HumanWare and the American Printing House for the Blind (APH) has resulted in the Monarch: a “multipurpose” Braille device. Refreshable Braille displays have existed for years, but have been expensive, slow to refresh, and fragile. A new “braille pin mechanism” created… [Read More]
Flexbox and the Screen Reader Experience A Webaim article that reminds us that whilst CSS flexbox can be used to change the visual order of content, it often has no bearing on how the content is consumed by a screen reader. This can lead to major accessibility issues if the intended reading order differs from… [Read More]
Brief Note on Buttons, Enter, and Space An interesting article by Adrian Roselli, sharing something I didn’t know: A native <button> fires on key down when that key is Enter. If you hold down the Enter key, it continues to fire for as long you hold Enter (or something crashes). A native <button> fires on… [Read More]
Accessible front-end components: claims vs reality Hidde de Vries shares his tips for finding accessible components, warning that many components that claim to be “accessible” actually aren’t. Hidde’s checklist:
Face-off: Should kit colours be catered to colour-blind fans? Anyone who’s ever played FIFA on a game console will at some point have ended up playing a game where both sides have really similar looking kits. It becomes difficult to know who you can pass to, and makes the game less enjoyable. This is an… [Read More]
The Surprising Truth About Pixels and Accessibility Josh Comeau dispels the myths around using px, rem and em in your designs. He introduces these with no assumed knowledge, gradually explaining when to use each one, using inline interactive examples to aid learning. It’s really worth checking out. My takeaways: It gets more complicated: should you… [Read More]
After a few weeks off, the frequent11y newsletter has returned! A Practical Approach to Automated Accessibility Mark Steadman writes a mini series on automated accessibility. In this introductory article, Mark introduces his three-step plan for introducing automated accessibility checks into your pipeline: There are a lot of different testing approaches and tools out there, so… [Read More]
Progress Over Perfection: The Better Way for Communication and Accessibility Advocacy This article by Meryl Evans really resonates with me. Accessibility is big and daunting. It needs to be considered in every facet of an organisation: “HR needs to ensure the hiring and employee benefits processes are accessible. Procurement needs to ensure the company buys… [Read More]
10 Ways Designers and Researchers Can Meaningfully Engage With Disabled People in 2023 A thought-provoking article with some really useful takeaways. Some tips are practical/logistical: Others are a change in mindset:
It’s been a little while since my last dai11y, partly because Mailchimp have recently upped their prices, meaning I’m no longer within the free tier. I’ve been procrastinating moving to a different provider, but will give that some more thought. I’ll also be on annual leave for a while now, so you won’t hear much… [Read More]