WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

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Re: Monsido - Is this reliable?

for

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Jun 10, 2019 7:26AM

I can't say for this specifically, but here are some more generic tips.

I would rate an accessibility testing product on functionality, vendor
expertise and accuracy.

Functionality:
Can you use it to validate authenticated pages (usually you can only
do that through a scripting solution or a browser add-on)
can you use it to validate all your websites (a product like this is
often tied to a domain).
Can you configure the scans i.e. set the rule set (assess A, AA, does
it allow creationg of custom rules, if you expect to creat those).

Does it integrate with your issue tracking system (if you are using one).
Does it provide manual test guidance for accessibility issues?
Basically think of the scenarios you woul use an accessibility testing
product and figure out if the solution you are looking at fits with
your environment.

Expertise:
I want my product to be backed by experts.
Ideally the vendor would have experts who participate in a W3C
accessibility working group or have a similar record of accessibility
research, publication and innovation.
If the vendor is relatively new they should still have WAS or CPWA
certified experts on staff, you can check the list at
https://www.accessibilityassociation.org/
(CPACC is valuable and it is a great certification for program leads,
product owners and management, but I do not think it is sufficient for
technical expertise as you are looking for in a product).

Also the vendor should have experts with disabilities on staff.

We know the traditional vendors , WebAIM, deque, Level Access
(including Simply Accessible), The Paciello Group (including
Interactive Accessibility) and Tenon are product with either a lot of
history and all backed by superb expertise.

But there is a lot of innovation in this space and we see an influx of
new people and new ideas, innovation can be good but the vendor must
demonstrate sufficient expertise and commitment to accessibility.

Third is accuracy.
You need to carry out expert assessment of the quality of the product,
e.g. either run it on a website and compare the results to your
findings, or explore a website that the vendor claims to support and
claims is top quality.
If your assessments reveal a lot of false positives, missed issues
that can be tested by an automated tool, or that the product does not
understand techniques like ARIA, the product is no good.

I know nothing about this specific product, but I don't like the
homepage text much, e.g. it never states that level AAA conformance is
not required, or even expected.



On 6/9/19, Katherine Barcham < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> I'd be interested to hear what people think about this tool too.
>
> Katherine
>
>