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Re: "for Chrome devs: intro to accessibility course"

for

From: Bryan Garaventa
Date: Sep 13, 2013 11:10AM

Emotional responses aside, George does bring up valid points, and it's not a
matter of condemning Google or anyone else for exploring efforts in
accessibility.

The range of responses to this topic are sort of interesting, going from
instant support without verification to, as you said, condemnation.

The first one seems to indicate that people are more likely to support what
is most popular instead of what is most accessible; the bandwagon effect,
and the second muddies the waters by focusing on a company rather than a
solution.

The biggest problem here is the assertion that accessibility can be
accurately determined using only one browser with one AT, and this is simply
incorrect.

For example, a year ago, I discovered some ARIA bugs using an iPhone that I
wished to report to Apple using their bug tracking system.
To do this, I needed to sign up for an account on their system, and as it
turned out, it was literally impossible to do using IE, Firefox, or Chrome.
I tried to do it in all three, and every time the form would not submit
properly, throwing an error.
I contacted support and opened a trouble ticket, providing precise steps to
reproduce and including the browser and versions I was using at the time.
After a few days, I received a response from one of their agents asking me
to use Safari.
I responded that I was blind; using JAWS as a screen reader, and that it was
literally impossible for me to use Safari on a Windows machine, because
there is no accessibility support.
We went back and forth a few times, and the agent kept saying that they
could not reproduce the issue with the registration form.
Finally, the last response I got was this: "We only test using Safari"
If anyone here is from Apple, they are welcome to verify the ticket, it was
submitted last September.

My point is this, it is not reliable, accurate, or consistent to rely on
only one browser and AT combination to conduct comprehensive and definitive
accessibility test results.