Once upon a time in an office not so far away, a bot was created to simplify your life. It was designed to keep an eye on your website, let you know if something went wrong, pages went down, links got broken, content publishers went rogue, or you...
Why Miss America Winner Emma Broyles Considers ADHD To Be Her 'Superpower'"She even shared that while sometimes having ADHD is a struggle, she sees some aspects of it as an advantage or "superpower." Artist Makes Prostheses With Darker Skin...
According to the Center for Plain Language, "Readability is about making your digital content clear and easy to understand. When you focus on readability, you increase the chance your target audience will actually read and interact with your...
Some of you may have noticed a new report available to you in DubBot. That’s right, the Web Governance Report. We are really excited about this one! The Web Governance report will combine Custom Checks (soon to be called "Policies") and...
3Jobs Edition Manager, Accessibility Center for Excellence (COE) - TwitterAs part of this team you’ll be using your knowledge of Accessibility and Disabilities to help integrate accessibility into Twitter’s...
Back in December, I posted an article A11Y vs Inclusion that discussed the differences and similarities between accessible and inclusive design practices. Here’s a short review: Definitions: According to Adobe...
Happy New Year! 3Things from 2021 Department of Justice reached settlement agreements related to digital and physical accessible with dozens of entities. Here's a few: Kroger Brown University Rite Aid (PDF) The disability...
According to Psychology Today, "a heuristic is a mental shortcut that allows an individual to make a decision, pass judgment, or solve a problem quickly and with minimal mental effort." Heuristics are also referred to as "a rule of thumb," which...
Happy New Year to you and yours from your friends at DubBot! 3 New Year's Resolutions Invite people with lived experience to the table.Systemic barriers in policy, practice or procedure mean that some people are excluded or receive less than...
What’s the difference between accessible design and inclusive design? Accessible design and Inclusive design, "Along with other human-centered concepts such as Ethical Design and Responsible Design, they [form] a vanguard of design...
3Things - Procuring Accessible ICT Asking the Right Questions for Procuring Inclusive, Accessible TechnologyPostsecondary institutions have obligations to ensure the accessibility of electronic content, especially content purchased from third...
3Things - User Testing Edition Why You Need to Do User Testing with Deaf and Hard of Hearing PeopleOne of the most powerful ways to ensure your content is accessible is to involve people with disabilities at all stages of development and...
What is the Accessibility Tree? Simply put, the Accessibility Tree is what all operating systems use to power assistive technology. It is a modified Document Object Model (DOM). A browser takes the DOM and modifies it into a form that is useful...
WCAG 3.0: What you need to know about the future of accessibility standardsWCAG 3.0 will be here soon and it will represent a significant shift in how accessibility is measured. Apple’s IPad Gets Assistive Technology BoostBy...
Before emojis, there were emoticons. Emoticon is short for "emotion icon." Emoticons are "pictorial representations of facial expressions using characters — usually punctuation marks, numbers and letters — to express a...
Introducing updates to make it easier for guests with disabilities to travelUnder our new accessibility review process, Hosts simply submit photos of the accessibility features in their home, which are then manually reviewed by a specialized...
Those of us in the digital accessibility field can spot an accessible video at 20 paces. But what about an inclusive video? What does one look like? Producing an inclusive video means designing with accessibility in mind — captions,...
3Things - Thanksgiving Edition How to Be a Good Thanksgiving Host to Guests with DisabilitiesWhile disabled needs may not be as familiar as non-disabled needs, they’re not...
CVS withdraws Supreme Court case on disability rights, announces new partnershipThe plaintiffs objected to changes to the company's terms that meant they could not opt out of mail-only delivery or utilize another pharmacy with experience...
It’s been said that disability is the "missing D" in diversity and inclusion discussions and initiatives. In December 2020, research conducted by The Valuable 500 showed that "only three percent of articles discussing diversity...
Lauren Ridloff, Marvel's first deaf superhero"[I] hope that, by bringing my story to the audience, people from marginalized communities will feel that there’s room for their own stories." Nyle DiMarco, deaf super model"I sent in my...
The 3 functions of alternative text: Screen readers announce alternative text in place of images, helping users with visual or certain cognitive disabilities perceive the content and function of the images. If an image fails to load...
The designers, programmers, and engineers at DubBot have been burning the midnight oil over the past several months and have released quite a few important updates. Let me tell you about the three most exciting (and requested) updates to be...
On November 2, DubBot’s own Blaine Herman will be joining other experts in accessible technology for the November Meetup of the NY Tech Alliance. The NY Tech Alliance was created in 2016 when the NY Tech Meetup and the New York...
3 Higher Ed Accessibility Professional Organizations Access Technology Higher Education Network (ATHEN)ATHEN is a professional association and network for Access Technology in Higher Education. The purpose of ATHEN is to collect and disseminate...
3 Things, 3 Jobs WatchOS Accessibility Engineer - Apple, Inc. - Santa Clara Valley (Cupertino), CaliforniaApple's Accessibility team is looking for a motivated Software Engineer to help develop and enhance features that make watchOS more...
Happy National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM)! This year's theme is "America’s Recovery: Powered by Inclusion." As our nation begins the process of recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s more important...
3 Things, 3 Disability Activisits Marilyn Golden"Radicalized" after an accident left her disabled, she became a "linchpin" in the fight for the Americans With Disabilities Act as a leading policy analyst. Robert Marx"We had a common experience...
Ensuring that your organization utilizes appropriate alt text for images within your website is pretty much considered Accessibility 101. For those readers who are not familiar, alt text or alternative text is the text version of an image read to...
Colorblind Accessibility ManifestoBefore designing a website, or even making a small change to an existing one, ask if your design choices consider the needs of people with color blindness. Changing the button color on your website may seem...
Carousels. Some people love ‘em, and some people hate ‘em! Yet they are one of the most popular ways of displaying content. One reason for that is carousels are a quick way to appease multiple stakeholders who want their...
A case for accessibility statements in app storesIn Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play Store, apps can have certain bits of meta data. Categories, localisations, price, privacy policy URL… but where is the meta...
Back in 2018, I met quite an amazing young man. His name is Tyler. He was attending the university where I work and was in the last semester of his last year. I had actually sought him out. I desperately needed an expert in the use of screen...
3 Things - 3 TED Talks Edition Simple Hack for a Life with Parkinson's Mileha Soneji is a trained strategic product designer, originally hailing from the city of Pune in India. The Cost of Failing to Design AccessiblyKings Floyd is a...
3 Things - 3 Paralympic Games Highlights Oksana Masters Is One of the Most Decorated Paralympians in History Surprise wedding proposal melts hearts on the track at 200m 2020 Tokyo Paralympics: Moments to Remember
The war in Afghanistan has been officially declared over with approximately 116,700 people evacuated, according to the latest information from the White House. Among those evacuated are scholars, students, faculty, and higher education personnel...
Closed Captioning vs. Subtitles: What's The Difference? OPEN vs CLOSED Captions - Why & How to Add Them to Videos Online Transcription Vs. Captioning | What's the Difference?
Why are web content writers, designers and managers still using "Click Here" (or "Read More," "Learn More," etc.) as link text when it has been shown repeatedly it's just not best practice? Maybe it’s time for a refresher course on...
3Things 3 Conferences Edition Inclusive Design 24 (#id24) - September 23, 2021This is a free 24-hour online event for the global community. It celebrates inclusive design and shares knowledge and ideas from analogue to digital, from design to...
Accessibility and SEO ~ The A11Y ProjectSearch engine optimization and accessibility have a lot more in common than you would think. Many of the same practices that we use to enable everyone to enjoy our digital experiences also open...
The Summer Paralympics, sometimes referred to as the Games of the Paralympian, are held in the same host city as the Olympics, with two weeks between the close of the Olympics and the opening ceremony of the Paralympics. The first official...
PDF Accessibility Remediation Software Tools: A Detailed ComparisonThis article compares the top PDF remediation tools: CommonLook PDF, Adobe Acrobat Pro DC, axesPDF, AccessibilityNow® Remediate, and Equidox. The article should help you...
3Things 3 Jobs Edition Disability Specialist - University of PennsylvaniaThe Disability Specialist advocates for the inclusion of students with disabilities and assists the university in maintaining compliance with federal disability...
Creating an accessible PDF from InDesign is a relatively simple process, but depending on the file size, it can be time-consuming. To keep me on track, I keep a list of accessibility "must do's" when preparing an InDesign document for export to...
3Things, 3 Screen Readers Using VoiceOver to Evaluate Web Accessibility Using NVDA to Evaluate Web Accessibility Using JAWS to Evaluate Web Accessibility
Some History on Disability Pride Month Did you know July is Disability Pride Month? I admit it wasn’t until last week when I read an article in Diversability Magazine that I learned about it. In July of 1990, when the...
'I am not ashamed': Disability advocates, experts implore you to stop saying 'special needs'Most experts and advocates vehemently oppose the term "special needs," and believe we need to eliminate it from our vernacular. Furthermore, they say...
What is ALT text? ALT text (ALT being short for alternative) is referred to in several different ways: ALT text, ALT tag, ALT attribute, ALT description and simply, alternative text. ALT text serves several purposes: It is read by screen...
'I am not ashamed': Disability advocates, experts implore you to stop saying 'special needs'Most experts and advocates vehemently oppose the term "special needs," and believe we need to eliminate it from our vernacular. Furthermore, they say...
Welcome to the 3Books Edition of 3Things Accessibility for EveryoneYou make the web more inclusive for everyone, everywhere, when you design with accessibility in mind. Let Laura Kalbag guide you through the accessibility...
Using automated scanning software, such as DubBot, and manual testing are two excellent ways to identify potential accessibility issues in your digital assets. There is one more tool you can add to the mix and that is analytics. Finding an...
HigherEdWeb Association - Accessibility SummitCheck out the Program Schedule and Meet the Presenters for this awesome gathering of accessibility professionals. Registration is open! The Summit will be online on Tuesday, July 20. Position...
Happy June to all! We’re excited to be edging closer and closer to summer. We’re even more excited to share information about our new feature, sharable reports. We added sharable reports as an optional way to view and share...
500 global firms put disability inclusion on boardroom agendas - The Guardian The Valuable 500 global disability network said it had reached its target to get 500 major companies to put disability inclusion on their boardroom agenda,...
Why We Need Universal Design | Michael Nesmith | TEDxBoulder Tech for disabled people is booming around the world. So where’s the funding? - restofworld.org Although the last few years have seen significant advances in...
Creating a business case for web accessibility can be difficult, especially when, as accessibility professionals, we just "get it!" We know why accessibility is important and that it should be baked into all of our information and communication...
Position Available: Digital Accessibility Consultant, University of ArizonaThe Digital Accessibility Consultant works to ensure that University of Arizona's technology-based teaching and learning software, applications, tools, and resources are...
#CovidAccessibilityBugBountyICYMI - To celebrate GAAD, BarrierBreak announced the #CovidAccessibilityBugBounty campaign, giving people across the world an opportunity to put their accessibility skills to use by testing COVID-19 websites and...
Happy Global Accessibility Awareness Day!! Participate! Spread Awareness! Talk about it! Think about it! Learn about it! Create digital access, opportunity and inclusion for everyone. GAAD website | ...
Recently, I was asked to review an email newsletter and report any accessibility issues that I found. Wow, was I surprised! I don't expect most people to know that they need to build digital communications with accessibility in mind. But I did...
A11YTalksVirtual meet-ups featuring speakers & conversations around digital accessibility. Blind people, advocates slam company claiming to make websites ADA compliant"Blind people say AccessiBe, which is supposed to automatically make...
United in Accessibility - podcast from the International Association of Accessibility ProfessionalsThe United in Accessibility podcast offers shared experiences, solutions, and barriers that impact diversity and inclusion in...
Each year on the third Thursday of May, we celebrate Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD). But how did GAAD begin? Who started it? What’s GAAD really all about? GAAD "started" on Sunday, November 27, 2011, when Joe...
Global Accessibility Awareness Day - May 20, 2021The idea of a Global Accessibility Awareness Day started with a single blog post written by a Los Angeles-based web developer, Joe Devon. See Joe’s Blog post that...
What is plain language? "A communication is in plain language if its wording, structure, and design are so clear that the intended readers can easily find what they need, understand what they find, and use that information." ~ Center for...
HighEdWeb 2021 Accessibility Summit - July 20, 2021The HighEdWeb 2021 Accessibility Summit is a one-day, online event focused on digital accessibility in higher education. Position Available: Access Specialist, Virginia Commonwealth...
IAAP and Fundación ONCE Launches a Spanish Chapter for Accessibility Professionals"The Spanish Chapter will provide accessibility professionals, who support equal access in both the built and digital environments by promoting and...
What are the components of a robust procurement process for technology that ensures accessibility needs are identified and addressed in the planning, requirements gathering, research and evaluation phases as well as the determination of...
FREE Promo for Higher Ed!CommonLook is providing a free, 6-month subscription to two of their best-selling PDF accessibility software solutions: CommonLook PDF and CommonLook Office. Promo runs March 26 through December 31, 2021. Chax Chat...
Introducing DubBots "3 Things." An every Tuesday, snack-size post featuring articles, book reviews, product info, quotes, events, freebies...all sifted through and curated into a 3 item list. Short, concise, digestible. Enjoy. Take the no-mouse...
DubBot automatically checks for website accessibility, SEO, and generally accepted website best practices. Although these checks are all beneficial as out-of-the-box functionality, one of the more powerful and flexible features in DubBot is the...
VPAT: Voluntary Product Accessibility Template A VPAT is a document used to describe the level of conformance of an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) product against the standards outlined in WCAG, Section 508 and EN 301 549. An ICT...
"A national emergency does not exempt federal, state, and local governments from providing equal access," wrote Mark Riccobono, president of the National Federation of the Blind, in a letter to the U.S. Health and Human Services...
Look at the two images below. Both are the footer section of the White House website. The first one is dated Jan. 15, 2021. The second one, Jan. 25, 2021. Putting the obvious difference in the look and feel aside, what do you notice? Think A11Y....
What, exactly, are tags? In a PDF, tags provide the logical structure that controls how the content is presented or “read” by assistive technology. Tags identify the content type, such as Sect, P, Table, Span, to name just a...
What Is an Overlay? According to Dictionary.com, an overlay is: noun something laid over something else; covering. a layer or decoration of something applied: an overlay of gold. Accessibility overlays are very similar ... they are laid...
An accessibility statement is a public communication that reflects your organization’s policies, standards, methods, and goals related to the accessibility of your web content, web and mobile applications, and information communication...
Happy new year! We’re excited to announce that we’ve rolled out our new website. Most of you probably know the work that goes into a website redesign! We can’t deny that we did feel additional pressure being a web...
'Persona' Defined A persona is defined as "a single representation of a cluster of target users who represent similar behaviors, goals and motivations." ~ © Nielsen Norman Group More simply put, personas are models, usually...
Today’s websites and web apps can be very complex. Many consists of 1000s of code lines, multiple user interactions, custom color palettes, and video and audio content. Automated quality assurance tools, such as DubBot, are critical in...
Color blindness encompasses a large number of causes and conditions, and it's complicated and complex. Wait! Come back! I promise I won’t be talking about cones and rods...whew! When we talk about color blindness, we refer to the most...
One might wonder what digital accessibility has to do with the 75th observance of the National Disability Employment Awareness Month. According to Jennifer Sheehy, Deputy Asst. Secretary of Labor for Disability Employment Policy...
What’s the difference between 404 and 301? Simply put, an HTTP 404 status code indicates that your browser cannot find the page requested, “File Not Found.” When a user requests a nonexistent webpage, you should...
While improving color and color contrast to be accessible can prove technically to be some of the simpler changes to make within a website, there is often pushback on getting these changes in place. It is no wonder too! Color and color contrast...
Global Accessibility Awareness Day is a great time to reflect on the efforts of inclusion that we make with the work we put forward. It seems that the world changed in the last few months to focus less on experiences in a physical space and moving...
While priorities, resources, and timelines have shifted significantly over the past month, there is still a need to continue to iterate and improve website accessibility, user experience, and overall content availability. More now than ever,...
In my previous post, An Introduction to SEO and Why It’s Important, I explained what SEO is and why it is important for everyone tasked with managing a website. In that previous post, I explained that some time and consideration would...
As most of us enter a workweek that does not look like ones we have previously encountered, most DubBot users I have been in contact with are currently grappling with balancing three priorities simultaneously. While they continue with previously...
This is part one of a three-part blog series focused on SEO. In recent years, it has not become uncommon for the person tasked with SEO decisions and responsibilities to be someone with no formal SEO or website management training. After all,...
2019 was an exciting year for DubBot. In some ways, it feels like it has come and gone in the blink of an eye. 2019 was DubBot's second year on the market. As 2020 approaches and we plan for the new year, it seems like a fitting time to first...
...and OMG, 2020 is almost here! With the holidays fast approaching, I thought this article by Forrester Research geared towards people who manage retail websites was a great, short read with some useful tips for all website managers. Retailers:...
DubBot is packing up and heading to Milwaukee for HighEdWeb 2019 next week. We will have a booth, and we encourage anyone attending to swing by and say hello. HighEdWeb tends to be a highlight of our year because it is a fun time where a...
DubBot allows users to crawl websites via a specific domain and subsections off of a domain. In addition to these options, DubBot will now allow users to specify lists of URLs for crawling explicitly. This list may be provided via a URL to a...
With the amount of work that we all do in a day, it is no wonder that spell check and auto-correct are technology built into most tools that we use to communicate with each other. But often, spell checking is not enough. I know that when I am...
Alternative text is the textual alternative for media for people who have visual issues and utilize technology such as screen readers when browsing a website. Simply put: the alternative text is what supplements the media for someone who can not...
One of the most difficult processes that people responsible for a website take on is a website redesign. It is a necessary evil often spurred by a combination of some of the following factors: issues with the current design and...
Hello from DubBot in sunny, hot, and mostly humid Atlanta, Georgia! While summer is typically a great time for vacation and family get-togethers, we have been off to an excellent summer with a range of new features and improvements rolling out for...
In May, we observed Global Accessibility Awareness Day with a Lunch-and-Learn. We discussed different accessibility challenges and our takeaways from participating in one of the suggested ideas for raising awareness from the GAAD website. I am...
I am excited to announce that we will be providing a webinar for the Higher Education Systems & Services (HESS) Consortium members. Participants of the webinar can expect to learn how DubBot can be used to target areas of their website for...
