"The Four Principles of Accessibility" is an informative presentation meant to shine a light on the benefits of building inclusive products and explain the four basic principles that serve as the foundation for accessibility. These four areas specifically target areas where users have the most trouble when accessing digital products and provide guidelines for understanding how to think and approach accessibility.

1. The Four Basic Principles of
Web Accessibility
Homer Gaines

2. 2
We hear about accessibility
but many don’t know why we should
worry about it or even where to begin.

3. 3

4. 4
ADA
Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990
(ADA for short)
Requires fair and reasonable access for all individuals with disabilities.
In the early 2000’s, this rule was extended to websites and other digital properties
even though Titles II and III had been around since 1991.
ada.gov

5. 5
WORLDMAP
World Population
~1 billion people globally
have a disability.
15%
disabilitystatistics.org

6. 6
WORLDMAP
Gen X & Y
11%
11% of the population between the age of
21 - 64 have a disability
disabilitystatistics.org

7. 7
Invisabilities

8. 8
Not all disabilities are permanent.

9. 9

10. 10
LawsuitsintheUSalone
Lawsuits in the US
California and Georgia are in the top ten for
Title III lawsuits.
#1 California
#7 Georgia

11. 11
LawsuitsintheUSalone
Recent high profile lawsuits in the US
● Beyonce
● Domino’s Pizza
● GNC

12. 12
USERTESTING

13. 13
WCAG2.1
WCAG 2.1 Success Criteria
Bare Minimum
A
https://disabledaccessdenied.wordpress.com/2014/05/09/accessibility-fails-or-when-idiots-design-wheelchair-access/

14. 14
WCAG2.1
WCAG 2.1 Success Criteria
Wut?
AAA
@erniesjourney

15. 15
WCAG2.1
WCAG 2.1 Success Criteria
Sweet Spot
AA

16. 16
Bare Minimum Sweet Spot Wut?
WCAG2.1
WCAG 2.1 Success Criteria
A AA AAA

17. 17
AXE by Deque
For Automated
Accessibility Testing
AXE

18. 18
NVDA JAWS
VoiceOver

19. 19
But How Do We Get There?

20. 20
Semantics
Semantics
Semantic
Markup
Design
Systems

21. 21
The Four Basic Principles
of Accessibility

22. 22
Perceivable
POUR
1
Operable
Understandable
Robust
2
3
4

23. 23
Perceivable
Users must be able to perceive the content
by using their senses. Until the day comes
where we can taste and smell digital content,
we must focus on the user’s ability to see,
hear, and or feel the available content.
● Focusable
● Error handling
● Closed Captions
Perceivable

24. 24
Operable
Because we all don’t use computers the same
way, users have a variety of methods for
accessing and interacting with digital content.
Keeping this in mind, developers need to
ensure the content is accessible to the various
input devices.
● Type aid
● Switches
● Sip and Puff
Operable

25. 25
Understandable
Understandable
Being able to understand content goes
beyond comprehending the words, it extends
to the UI and UX as well.
Presenting a well-structured navigation
scheme within a consistent theme allows for a
better user experience. Using alerts and
avoiding complex sentence structures also
play key roles in the overall experience by
reducing cognitive load.userinyerface.com

26. 26
Robust
Robust
Providing accessible content begins with semantically correct markup.
Doing so ensures the content will be compatible with the range of
devices used to consume digital content.

27. 27
It Starts with Empathy

28. 28
AskYourself
Visualizing Empathy blog post

29. 29
AskYourself
Ask Yourself
What can I see?
Perceivable
What can I do?
Understandable & Operable
How will I do it?
Operable

30. Turn the brightness or contrast down on your monitor.
Perform an action without a mouse.
Turn on a screen reader and close your eyes.
30
TryItOut
Try It Out

31. 31
BeMindfulofOverEngineering
Be Mindful of Over Engineering

32. 32
Thanks!!
Shout out to Mike Lawrence

33. 33
I’m Homer Gaines a Certified
Accessibility Professional and
Front-end Developer who works for
UserTesting and we are hiring!
@xirclebox

34. 34
Resources
WCAG 2.1 Quick Reference
https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG21/quickref/#top
WAI-ARIA
https://www.w3.org/WAI/standards-guidelines/aria/
If you’re interested in getting certified
https://www.accessibilityassociation.org/certification
Run your own test
https://www.deque.com/axe/