Newsletter

As is so often the case in life: if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. This certainly applies to most of the claims made by those selling these overlays. It's almost like witchcraft.

Regarding the European Accessibility Act, I must correct my statements from the last newsletters: It is expected to be published as German law this summer. This makes sense, as it allows for a longer lead time for implementation. The Act is intended to obligate parts of the private sector to ensure accessibility.

TU Dresden has published guidelines for creating accessible documents. Information from TU Dresden

A testing procedure for accessible software – the BITI test – has recently been revised. Information about the new BITI test

New on the blog you will find aCriticism of the BITV testas well as aAssessment of the Web Accessibility Specialist certificate.

Onward in English. Designer Sarah Horton also demonstrates on her blog how difficult it is to obtain good accessibility statements from software vendors. In Germany, it would be even more challenging. In the US, there's a template called VPAT, which is particularly important in the public sector. VPAT is a structured way to describe the accessibility of software. In Germany, I'm not aware of anyone—not even among the major vendors who primarily work for the public sector—who provides such statements in a structured format. This isn't exactly customer-friendly; the vendors seem to have missed the boat. And some things you just don't want to hear. Not it! A game of accessibility hide-and-seek with technology vendors

What does accessibility mean to you? Blayne Phillips has created a small model to illustrate this. The foundation is the strategy, the design is built upon that, and the third element is implementation – this is where accessibility all too often fails.
The 3 levels of accessibility

Caitlin Brisson hat 7 Best Practices zur Umsetzung von Barrierefreiheit zusammengefasst
Accessibility: 7 best practices to get you started – Gusto Design – Medium

Auf Bighack wird gezeigt, mit welchen Hilfsmitteln behinderte Menschen das Internet nutzen.
Assistive technology devices: How disabled people use the web

Two particularly interesting events are coming up in March: the DeafIT conference and the online inclusion congress. And of course, our regular informal meeting on digital accessibility, which will next take place on March 11th.

Regarding the events on accessibility

Und natürlich möchte ich wie immer auf unsere anstehenden Schulungen zur Barrierefreiheit hinweisen.
Anstehende Schulungen zur Barrierefreiheit

It doesn't always have to be a sophisticated accessibility tool. Sometimes a simple piece of code wrapped in a bookmark, a so-called bookmarklet, is enough. Industrious people have created numerous bookmarklets for various purposes. They are very easy to use: First, you create the bookmark in your browser. Then, you open the page you want to test and then the bookmark you just saved. With these bookmarklets, you can display the semantic structure, alternative text, and many other properties. 48 Accessibility Bookmarklets

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