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Re: mouseover/hover and keyboard accessible expandablemenu?

for

From: deblist@suberic.net
Date: Nov 6, 2009 11:35AM

> From: < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>>
>> As a hands-free (and therefore keyboard-only) disabled user
>> myself, I strongly disagree with this.

On Fri, 6 Nov 2009, Al Sparber wrote:

> Imagine you are a regular visitor to this imaginary site and your objective
> today is to access either of these 2 links on that page:
> ...
> If you still disagree strongly, no problem. Everyone has a different
> perspective - but we have done a very large amount of user testing on this
> and our perspective is as I stated in my previous mail.

Al,

Imagine you are a web developer with a focus on accessibility.
Imagine you set up a couple of artificial test pages and run
focus groups and ask people which they find easiest to use in a
hypothetical situation. Now imagine a Real Live Disabled Person
comes to you and says "In my Real Live Web Browsing, I have a
different preference. I browse the web all the time and this is
what I've found to be the most useable."

Do you say:

1. But try my hypothetical situation and see if your experience
is the same.

2. Well, everyone's different. Our focus groups report something
different.

3. Hmm, interesting data point. Maybe we should get more
feedback from Real Live Disabled people about Real Live Web
Browsing and see if their preferences differ from the test
situation.

One of the major roadblocks in accessibility is accessibility
advocates who don't listen to people with disabilities when we
speak up about our experiences. I understand you mean well, but
I beg all accessibility-oriented folks to incorporate listening
into their process.

-deborah