Grouper Developers Forum

[Thomas Barton <>]

Thanks Gary. One organization that might offer us the service of helping our accessibility conformance is Fluid. If not today, then for our next call let's decide how we will ensure conformance for the 2.2 UI.

Tom (mobile)

-----Original Message----- 
From: GW Brown, Information Systems and Computing []
Received: Wednesday, 26 Oct 2011, 3:16am
To: Emily Eisbruch []; Grouper Dev []
Subject: Re: [grouper-dev] Draft Minutes: Grouper-dev Call 12-Oct-2011

--On 19 October 2011 13:06 -0400 Emily Eisbruch <> wrote:

> [AI] (Gary) will email the Grouper-Dev list with specifics on UI
> accessibility issues

Apologies for the delay:

The original admin UI aimed to be accessible and deliberately avoided the
use of _javascript_, partly because of cross-browser compatability issues,
but also because of accessibility constraints. We have subsequently added
_javascript_ for tooltips, and the Lite UI is AJAX-based.

With the Grouper UI redesign slated for v2.2 extending _javascript_ use, it
is important to ensure that the UI is accessible. This is mandated by
legislation in various countries and, in particular, is an important factor
for adoption in some HE institutions.

Fortunately, accessibility standards have developed, and there are many
cross browser _javascript_ libraries which are designed to facilitate the
creation of accessible applications. So, in addition to the original W3C
standards <http://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG1AAA-Conformance>, the new UI should
aim to comply with WAI-ARIA  (http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/aria).

It looks like validation tools are a bit thin on the ground - partly
because WAI-ARIA is supported in HTML 5 which is still being finalized,
however, <http://about.validator.nu/> and <http://validator.w3.org/> have
some support.

I've always thought that there are two parts to accessibility:
1) the box-ticking conformance with standards
2) actual usability by real individuals who rely on accessibility

Even if we make the effort during the re-design to ensure conformance with
standards it is hard to know how 'successful' we have been. Also,
compliance often drifts over time as new features are added (as has
happened with the current UI). Ideally we could do with some external
agency (or someone with a real interest) to check our compliance and its
effectiveness.

Gary

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GW Brown, IT Services