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Forms for All: Building Accessibility into UiPath App Design
- 1. Forms for All Building Accessibility into UiPath Apps Design
- 2. 2 Meet today’s speaker: David Kroll Solutions Engineering, Product Marketing, Sales Enablement Recovering Application Developer (8 years) @ Ashling Partners
- 3. 3 1. Introduction 2. A Story from My Career 3. Cautionary Tale for Enterprises (Section 508 and ADA) 4. Disability Statistics 5. WCAG 2.0 and the POUR philosophy 6. Accessibility within UiPath Apps Forms • Considerations 7. Techniques for Building More Accessible Apps • For hearing impaired • For visually impaired & colorblind • For the physically disabled 8. Questions Agenda
- 4. 4 Making digital applications and websites usable by everyone, regardless of their abilities or disabilities. Broader Reach • Ensuring that all users, including those with impairments in vision, hearing, mobility, and cognition, can still effectively use an application. Legal and Ethics • Not just a good practice, this is often a legal requirement to prevent discrimination. Benefit for All • Designs that are accessible for people with disabilities often provide a better user experience for everyone What is accessibility, at its core?
- 5. 5 Accessibility in the Real World
- 6. 6 Accessibility in the Real World
- 7. 7
- 8. 8
- 9. 9 Under the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act), in 2021: What is Section 508? According to Seyfarth Shaw, more than 11,400 people have filed a lawsuit within the USA: • California saw 5,930 filings • New York saw 2,774 lawsuits • Florida had over 1,050 cases Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, as amended in 1998, is a federal law that requires agencies to provide individuals with disabilities equal access to electronic information and data comparable to those who do not have disabilities, unless an undue burden would be imposed on the agency. Section 508 applies to all federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology (EIT). It also extends to organizations that receive federal funding to ensure non-discrimination. A Cautionary Tale Source: https://www.seyfarth.com/services/practices/advisory/ada-title-iii-and-public-access.html • Online Learning Platforms • Healthcare Websites & Portals • Public Transportation Sites • E-Commerce Websites • Banking and Financial Services • Job Application Portals • News and Information Websites • Library Websites and Digital Archives • Municipal and Local Gov Services • Voting Information & Campaign Sites • Entertainment and Media Platforms • Social Media Platforms Accessibility is Crucial For:
- 10. 10 For every 100 people picked out of a crowd… 14 have difficulty with mobility 11 have cognitive disabilities 7 struggle to live independently 6 are deaf or hard of hearing 5 are blind or struggle to see 4 struggle to perform self-care Disability Statistics Image Source: https://pixelplex.io/blog/guide-to-section-508-compliance/
- 11. 11 Has one arm due to injury Is legally deaf Has colorblindness Is legally blind Jane Doe Greg Larson Chris Jeffries Melinda Smith How can we help those with disabilities? Ensure our applications can be used through pure keyboard operation that doesn’t require mouse interactions Ensure that our application shows subtitles on video content so that they can follow along Create alternative color palettes for our forms that may be selected during operation Ensure that screen readers like Windows Narrator or JAWs can read the forms we create to blind users Starting to sound challenging… are there guidelines to help us out?
- 12. 12 The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), published by the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the main international standards organization for the Internet. They are a set of recommendations for making Web content more accessible, primarily for people with disabilities—but also for all user agents, including highly limited devices, such as mobile phones WCAG 2.0 Guidelines and Classifications A AA AAA https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG22/quickref/?versions=2.0 Minimum level, addresses most basic accessibility features This is the target standard for most modern websites, as it adds greater requirements for even great accessibility The highest and most stringent classification. Aimed at making the website or app as accessible as possible for the widest set of users
- 13. 13 WCAG accessibility is based on four principles: Perceivable Operable Understandable Robust Information and user interface components must be presentable to users in ways they can perceive. User interface components and navigation must be operable. Information and user interface components must be presentable to users in ways they can perceive. Information and user interface components must be presentable to users in ways they can perceive.
- 14. Building Accessibility into UiPath Apps Demo
- 15. 15 What can YOU do to drive accessibility? • Educate other developers on WCAG principles • Include users with disabilities in testing • Tell your boss when a public facing app isn’t WCAG 2.0 or Section 508 compliant • Educate your organization on the liability of not respecting ADA and Section 508, if relevant. • Make accessibility a part of your requirements, not an afterthought.
- 16. 16 Techniques for the Visually Impaired https://color.adobe.com/create/color-accessibility Use Adobe Color to build your color palette to ensure it doesn’t conflict with those who are colorblind. Bonus: You can also test against AA and AAA WCAG standards for contrast complaince!
- 17. 17 Techniques for the Deaf or Hard of Hearing Pro Tip: Use plain language, many deaf people have English as their second language. Avoid using jargon or words they may not speak. This will also help with localization. • Ensure subtitles are added to all video content within your app • Consider adding summaries to video content that can be read as an alternative • Provide volume controls for audio • Important notifications should have a visual element, not just a sound • Don’t just provide a support number on a website, offer email, IM, and live chat.
- 18. 18 Techniques for the Physically Disabled Pro Tip: Make sure your tab-order is correct for your controls! Ensure that your application can be completed without mouse interaction Do not flash repetitive images or screen elements that can cause seizures Limit use of “toast-notifications” and temporary popup notifications. These can be hard for users that have physical disabilities.
- 19. Any questions? BuildingAccessibility into UiPathApps Thank you!
Editor's Notes
- A little bit about me before we get started – my name is David Kroll and I’m a UiPath Community MVP specializing on Apps and RPA. I have roughly 15 years of experience building and delivering applications to real-world businesses. I work for Ashling Partners, an intelligent automation services provider, where I currently do a mix of solutions engineering and product marketing, which is incredibly fun and keeps me on my toes. I’m also very passionate about apps and UX, so I’m going to dive into an important segment of UX today around accessibility.
- So why does accessibility matter and why is it so important to consider when building applications? Well, let me illustrate this by going back to a development project I worked on previously in my career. The application development project was for a solar power manufacturing company where we were building a document management system that would be heavily used by our quality control team on the manufacturing line. One of our key stakeholders was a very nice woman, we’ll call her Martha, and she was the rock star of the quality control team. Martha’s job was to make sure that the solar panels we were shipping to our customers were going to work on the first time with minimal warranty claims. A lot of this documentation was processed daily while on her computer. Martha had great attention to detail and found many gaps in quality – she was crucial to operations.
- During our project, Martha gave us many great requirements to make the document management system better – and after several months, the project was a huge success. We built a fantastic DMS which included approvals, notifications, and workflow – all the bells and whistles. But the most striking moment for me was when I witnessed Martha working on the new system after it had been deployed. She immediately squinted at the screen, and used a hotkey to open Windows Magnifier, an accessibility tool, to increase the text and image sizes, read through the documents, and get about the application interface. You see, this is something Martha did every single day while she crushed her job.
- See, believe it or not… Martha struggled to see clearly, even with her glasses it was a challenge for her to work with the small fonts and blended colors we had put into our DMS. None of this came through in requirements because she didn’t think it was important – an issue that “just affected her” she said as she told us to focus on the bigger picture. See, Martha was used to struggling with applications and trying to read them. But for me, as an interface designer – I was heartbroken. Watching someone struggle so hard on something they had to do every day when I could, with a few simple changes, make things so much easier for her or make her feel more included really made me feel guilty. We started several sprint cycles to take into account our end user, and we added multiple accessibility features into the backlog for Martha after watching her work.
- I started to have regular chats with Martha and discussed how we might make the images larger, the text sizes bigger, and reposition the elements to make her life a little easier – and we rolled those changes out in subsequent updates. Interestingly enough, we saw improved usability scores for the application across all users… not just those had visual impairment. They liked how much easier it was to take in the interface. It wasn’t convoluted anymore, like a lot of the early systems we used to see back in the 2010 era. In the end – I believe Martha and I were able to help each other. She enjoyed an incredible jump in work quality, and I learned an incredible lesson as a junior developer to carry forward into the next 30 years of my career. That lesson was – never assume everyone has the same abilities to use a computer, and always include a wide range of people in your UAT. When we think about accessibility, we might think adding these features in is just being kind… but many businesses have learned the hard way that not thinking about people like Martha can lead to very expensive lawsuits under ADA legislation.
- Under the ADA, more than 11,400 people have filed discrimination lawsuits against organizations that do not follow accessibility compliance guidelines and legislation. More formally known as Section 508, a federal law that requires agencies to provide individuals with disabilities equal access to electronic information and data comparable to those who do not have disabilities. Many organizations receive federal funding and as such are subject to section 508, including healthcare institutions that receive MEDICARE or MEDICAID, and higher education that participate in federal programs and receive federal funding. When we think about accessibility – there are many scenarios where it is crucial [list them] - Online Learning Platforms - Healthcare Portals - Public Transportation Sites - E-Commerce Websites and Apps - Banking and Financial Services - Job Application Portals - Voting Information and Campaign Sites And many, many more.
- Let’s take a step back from the complexities of legislation and just look at disability figures. For every 100 people picked out of a crowd… 14 have difficulty with mobility 11 have cognitive disabilities 7 struggle to live independently 6 are deaf or hard of hearing 5 are blind or struggle to see clearly 4 struggle to perform basic self-care – like dressing or bathing If you add them up, that is nearly half of the people you pick that have abilities or disabilities that may make it difficult to use your app. This is a really big deal – so what can we do to help people out?
- Well, we have to start somewhere and the types of accommodations we can create will vary greatly depending on the disability. For example, for Jane – who only has one arm due to an injury, she can only use a keyboard… so we have to make sure our application doesn’t require a mouse. For Greg, who is legally deaf, we need to show transcripts and subtitles with all audio and video content. For Chris, who is colorblind, we need to pick a color scheme that doesn’t make it hard for him to use the application – or allow him to switch to one that he prefers. For Melinda, who is legally blind, we need to ensure that assistive software like Windows Narrator or JAWs can read the forms we create for those who can’t see the or struggle to see. This is a huge challenge, but thankfully, there are some guidelines that exist that we can follow to help ourselves out.
- Those guidelines are known as WCAG, or Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. They are published by the world wide web consortium who sets international standards for the internet. By following these guidelines, our apps and websites can achieve different classifications of accessibility from A, double A, and finally triple A. A is the lowest level, it’s not great – but it address most of the basic accessibility issues. Double A is the target standard for most websites, it addresses a much wider variety of accessibility concerns. Triple A is best in class, aimed at making a website or app as accessible as possible for the largest set of users and ability and disability breakdowns.
- So how do we build more accessible applications? We follow the following WCAG principals during our design phase, known as the POUR principles. POUR stands for Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, and Robust. Let’s break it down. First, we ask ourselves, are our apps Perceivable? Information and user interface components must be presented in ways that users can perceive. This means that users must be able to recognize and use the information, regardless of their sensory abilities. Techniques to make apps perceivable include: Providing text alternatives for non-text content (like images, videos). Offering captions and other alternatives for multimedia. Creating content that can be presented in different ways without losing information or structure (like simpler layout). Making it easier or simpler for users to see and hear content (or even anticipating color blindness with a specific set of color schemes) Second, we ask ourselves, are our apps Operable? User interface components and navigation must be operable. This means that users must be able to operate the interface—the interface should not require interaction that a user cannot perform. Techniques to make apps operable include: Ensuring all functionality is available from a keyboard for users who cannot use a mouse. Giving users enough time to read and use content. Not designing content in a way that is known to cause seizures (like avoiding flashing content). Providing ways to help users navigate, find content, and determine where they are. Third, we ask ourselves, are our apps Understandable? Information and the operation of the user interface must be understandable. Users must be able to understand the information and the operation of the user interface. Techniques to make app understandable include: Making text readable and understandable. Making web pages appear and operate in predictable ways. Helping users avoid and correct mistakes. Last, we ask ourselves, are our apps Robust? Content must be robust enough that it can be interpreted reliably by a wide variety of user agents, including popular assistive technologies like Windows Accessibility. As technologies and user agents evolve, the content should remain accessible. Techniques to make our apps robust include Maximizing compatibility with current and future user tools, like screen readers. Thankfully, UiPath has done a lot of the work for us here – but we still need to ensure that when we build our apps that we do things the right way
- What might this look like on a UiPath Apps project? Let’s crack open the case and show you!