Who wants to be excluded? A good question to ask yourself when designing. We can experience the same challenges as people with disabilities, but for us, these challenges are situational.

1. I want to watch a video while listening to my music, but still get what's happening in the video, so I read the captions.
2. I can't see anything because the sun is shining on my screen.
3. Cognitive impairment due to, for example, medication for clinical depression.

There are also people with permanent disabilities. Think, for example, of people with ADHD.

When designing, think about who you might have chosen to exclude. You might consciously choose to use a GIF that isn't safe for people with epilepsy because "it's just fucking cool," as Pim put it. Yeah, basically that. It's something every designer/developer faces, and Pim tells us we're not alone in this; there are hardly any websites you can say are truly perfect.

What is Digital Accessibility?

WCAG: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. These outline how to do it right and include 50 criteria across four main categories. If these four areas are problematic on your website, it can be very harmful to the user. These are the four main categories.

The Big Four

• Perceivable
  • 1.4.2: Audio Control: Sound that lasts longer than three seconds must have a way to be paused/stopped or the volume lowered so people using a screen reader can still hear their screen reader. OR: You don’t realize your volume is at 100%, open an app, and can’t lower the volume.
• Operable
  • 2.1.2: No Keyboard Trap: When navigating with the keyboard, it should never happen that you get stuck in an element or part and can't navigate out of it.
• Understandable
  • 2.2.2: Pause, Stop, Hide: All moving, blinking, scrolling, or updating elements that start automatically; last more than 5 seconds; and are shown alongside other content; must be pausable, stoppable, or hideable.
• Robust
  • 2.3.1: Three Flashes or Below Threshold: No element on a webpage should flash three times or more within one second. Ensure it doesn’t play automatically, but ask for permission.

Tips for Managing This

• Low Hanging Fruit
  • Perceivable: Can everyone perceive the content? Does it work on all browsers? Can you zoom in to 200% without everything breaking? Is the color contrast good?
  • Operable: Can everyone access and use the content? Can everyone access everything with the keyboard? Do you have enough time to fill out a form, or is there a timer that makes you rush? Is the purpose of each link clear? (With a screen reader, you can get a list of all links, and if they all say 'read here', you're not getting far).
  • Understandable: Can everyone understand this content? Do you use specific jargon?
  • Robust: Is the technology behind my digital product semantically correct? Screen readers can also provide a list of all headings, but if you make a

    bold and use it as a heading, it won't appear in the list.

• The Best Tips of All: Listen to your digital product with a screen reader, use your keyboard, and test with your target audience!

Reflection

Wow. I feel like as CMD students we know a lot about accessibility but I feel like with every lecture we receive about accessibility, I realize more and more that I have so much more left to learn. Digitaal Toegankelijk named some situations that I would have never thought of myself where keeping the accessibility in mind is crucial. An example of this is the cases of temporary disabilities, for example this;

I want to watch a video while listening to my music, but still get what's happening in the video, so I read the captions.

There is so much more to keep in mind than we think. It's not just colorblindness and screenreaders. It's audio, it's flashing content, it's avoiding auto-play for video's on a website. All of these are equally important.

I even reached out about the possibility of an internship because of how inspired I felt. However, I learned that the internship primarily involves writing accessibility reports for websites and similar tasks, rather than the software development experience I am currently seeking. I heavily recommend taking a look at an internship though, for those who are interested!

Digitaal Toegankelijk opened my eyes to a new world of accessibility and I hope to be part of it, wherever I go.