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From: Erick Wilder
Date: Tue, Jan 21 2025 8:51AM
Subject: Tips for accessibility testing on a Apple Silicon computer
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Hello everyone.

I’m a software engineer and I’m planning to upskill myself with other
environments for accessibility testing other than macOS.
I have been working with macOS for many years now and I don’t own any PC
and I was looking for some alternatives of how I can setup an environment
with at least NVDA on a windows machine.

Do you have any recommendations around virtualisation (e. g., VirtualBox or
Parallels) versus me buying a native PC with Windows in it?

Thanks in advance for your support.

Erick

From: Steve Green
Date: Tue, Jan 21 2025 9:25AM
Subject: Re: Tips for accessibility testing on a Apple Silicon computer
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There's no "right" or "best" way to do it. I like to have a lot of kit, so I've got JAWS, NVDA and Voiceover on different machines side by side, ready to use instantly. I don't want to be switching between one screen reader and another. But I have the luxury of having dozens of machines and a lot of space. And I never work anywhere other than at home. Likewise with mobile phones and tablets, of which I've got dozens so I can test with different versions of mobile screen readers.

If you don't have space or you need to travel, you'll want something more compact. I would definitely buy a Windows machine, though. We have argued about virtualisation before, and many people are happy with it. I'm not. In my view it's ok for "developer testing", but I would not use it for "professional testing". Why take the chance when PCs are so cheap?

Steve Green
Managing Director
Test Partners Ltd

From: Christine Hogenkamp
Date: Tue, Jan 21 2025 12:48PM
Subject: Re: Tips for accessibility testing on a Apple Silicon computer
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Hi Erick,

I would argue you will probably get more meaningful results using a real
machine over a virtual machine, in terms of experiencing how an average
user might use a computer in their everyday life.

I agree with Steve that a cheap laptop is a good way to go, both in that
they are inexpensive to get one just for testing purposes but also if you
consider the average person's experience buying a laptop, a lot of people
will gravitate towards whatever is the cheapest model available at their
nearby Best Buy etc.

I would even suggest, if it's in your budget, getting both a cheap laptop
with full windows OS but also a cheap Chromebook to get an idea of how
those particular not-quite-laptops interact with assistive tech and web
browsing/apps etc. since they are very popular these days as a way to have
a "computer" for people who are not very good with tech, which is an
accessibility category in its own right and overlaps with other groups.
This will help put yourself in their shoes to see what they have to deal
with and what their machines can and can't do.

*x*
*Christine Hogenkamp (She, Her)*
Front-end Developer & Accessibility Lead
Context Creative – a Mod Op company
416.972.1439 | contextcreative.com


> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Steve Green < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> To: WebAIM Discussion List < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
> Cc:
> Bcc:
> Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2025 16:25:42 +0000
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Tips for accessibility testing on a Apple Silicon
> computer
> There's no "right" or "best" way to do it. I like to have a lot of kit, so
> I've got JAWS, NVDA and Voiceover on different machines side by side, ready
> to use instantly. I don't want to be switching between one screen reader
> and another. But I have the luxury of having dozens of machines and a lot
> of space. And I never work anywhere other than at home. Likewise with
> mobile phones and tablets, of which I've got dozens so I can test with
> different versions of mobile screen readers.
>
> If you don't have space or you need to travel, you'll want something more
> compact. I would definitely buy a Windows machine, though. We have argued
> about virtualisation before, and many people are happy with it. I'm not. In
> my view it's ok for "developer testing", but I would not use it for
> "professional testing". Why take the chance when PCs are so cheap?
>
> Steve Green
> Managing Director
> Test Partners Ltd
>
>