Overview

The term "Assistive Technology" (AT) covers a wide range of products & services. The content on this site focuses on the use of AT in relation to web technology, particularly for visually impaired users of web content / applications. It's primarily aimed at the web authoring community (Designers, Developers and QA), but may be useful to others.

Approach

A lot of factors come into play between the initial design / coding of a web page and the resulting User Experience (UX). Below is a high level summary of the major components. Each section outlines some of the main factors that can influence the final output (visual, speech, braille etc.). For the most part, each level has a dependency on the levels below it. Each section has a link with a further explanation, along with some useful resources. Some sections are straightforward, others are more complex, especially when applied to dynamic ("rich") web applications.

The order below is intentional. It aims to reflect the stages in a web page's "lifecycle", starting with the end user (or consumer) and working backwards all the way to the author (producer).

  1. User
    • AT Knowledge
      • Basic
      • Advanced
    • Budget
    • Support
  2. Input
    • Keyboard
    • Speech
    • Touch
    • Mouse
  3. Device
    • Desktop
    • Laptop
    • Tablet
    • Mobile
  4. Operating System
    • Windows
    • OS X
    • Linux
    • Chrome OS
    • Windows Phone
    • iOS
    • Android
    • Firefox OS
  5. Accessibility API
    • MSAA
    • UIA
    • IA2
    • AT-SPI
    • OS X Accessibility
    • UIAccessibility
    • Android Accessibility API
  6. Assistive Technology
    • Screen Reader
      • Settings
        • Default
        • Custom
      • Navigation and Edit Modes
        • Standard and Virtual Cursors
        • Mouse
        • Forms
        • Gestures
        • Voice
    • Screen Magnifier
    • Braille Display
    • High Contrast Mode
  7. Software
    • Web Browser
      • Type
        • Firefox
        • Internet Explorer
        • Chrome / Opera
        • Safari
      • Version
      • Settings
      • Plugins
    • Application
      • Desktop / Laptop
      • Mobile / Tablet
  8. Information Source
    • Accessibility API
    • DOM
    • Off Screen Model
    • Graphics Driver
    • Heuristics
  9. Accessibility Guidelines
    • Website
      • WCAG 2.0
      • WAI-ARIA 1.0
    • Browser
      • UAAG 2.0
    • Native Application
  10. Code
    • HTML
    • CSS
    • JavaScript
    • SVG
  11. Content
    • Website
      • Web Content
        • Text
        • Image
        • Audio
        • Video
        • Document
        • Captions
      • Web Application
        • Text
        • Native Controls
        • Custom Controls
        • DataGrids
        • Complex Forms
    • Native / Hybrid Application
      • Native Controls
      • Custom Controls
  12. Author
    • Design
      • Design Toolkit
    • Development
      • Coding Toolkit
    • QA
      • Test Toolkit