Quick Tip: How to Convert Image Text to Text If you have an image with text and want to retrieve the text from it without typing it all out by hand, you can upload the image to Google Drive. Once uploaded, “Open with Google Docs” (by right-clicking and selecting the option from the contextual menu)…. [Read More]

Cleaning our way to accessibility A post from the good folks at leeds.gov.uk, describing how they’ve been working through the 9,800 inaccessible PDFs on their site. Making them all compliant would cost huge amounts of time and money. Instead, they’re assessing each document on its own merit and asking if it serves a user need…. [Read More]

Video game accessibility aided by consultants who say it’s not about compromising game design Article about how accessibility consultants are working behind the scenes to create a more inclusive video game industry. A common argument against accessibility adjustments is that they’ll ruin the ‘creative vision’ of the game. In reality, lowering difficulty settings is a… [Read More]

The First U.S. Web Accessibility Agreement was Signed Twenty Years Ago On March 14th, 2000, Bank of America was the first US company to sign an agreement to make its website accessible, referencing WCAG 1.0 (only a few months old at the time). It was the output of a ‘structured negotiation’ between the bank and… [Read More]

On Voice Coding Dusty Phillips shares his experience of using his voice to code, triggered by a carpal tunnel syndrome diagnosis a few months ago. He invested around a thousand dollars in his setup, which includes Dragon Naturallyspeaking, a Windows machine and a high-end microphone. Dusty uses Caster, which is built on top of Dragon,… [Read More]

How I disclose my disability during a job search Haley Moss describes the experience of applying for jobs and wondering when and whether to disclose her autism, for fear of being treated differently. Haley suggests disclosure should generally happen only when you realise you can’t perform an essential function of your job because of your… [Read More]

That Time I Tried Browsing the Web Without CSS Jon Kantner describes his experience of disabling CSS, for checking accessibility standards like like headings, form controls, visual hierarchies, content order and images existing as <img> rather than background images that get lost. It’s not just theoretical: 12.5% of users who rely on assistive tech use… [Read More]

16 Things to Improve Your Website Accessibility Bruce Lawson describes the most common errors sites make & how to remedy them. The main one: too much content, which should be broken up into sections with headings and bulleted lists, and should be in plain English and a legible font. Avoid reCAPTCHA (or use reCAPTCHA v3;… [Read More]

New media queries you need to know Article by Kristofer Selbekk, suggesting several up-and-coming media queries you can use to cater for all users. There are some useful boolean ones: prefers-reduced-motion, prefers-reduced-data, prefers-reduced-transparency, prefers-contrast. But there are also some variable ones: light-level to accommodate people in bright sunlight or in bed at night, for example…. [Read More]

Why videos on GOV.UK use the YouTube video player Anika Henke explains how GDS investigated 20 different video players for their usability, performance and accessibility, by using keyboard only, increasing font sizes and trying it with screen readers. Their conclusion was that the native YouTube player was the best (and more sensible than building their… [Read More]