[WG: Accessibility] FW: [Sakai Jira] Issue Comment Edited: (SAK-8169) Accessibility: Alternative Content Presentation for Persons with Disabilities

Richwine, Brian L brichwin at indiana.edu
Wed Aug 18 10:18:55 PDT 2010 

Relative to SAK-8169 (http://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/SAK-8169), I am seeking input so I can understand how to proceed on developing a solution for this issue.


TEXT ENLARGEMENT
Modern web browsers handle magnification very well, so enlarging the text might best be left to the browser magnification features and/or features built into the client's operating system. Our requirements here would then be to:
  1. Make sure the accessibility documentation covers how users can perform text/display magnification in the browser.
  2. To put the appropriate specification in our accessibility guidelines (i.e.: UI designs must be usable at 200% magnification)
  3. Make sure the appropriate tests are in our accessibility review protocols.


HIGH-CONTRAST MODE
I've tested using Sakai with the built in high contrast modes in XP, Vista, Windows 7, and OS X 10.6. The results are pretty poor (see comments forwarded below - jira comments include link to screenshots). If we want to support a high contrast display mode, the one solution would be to provide a high contrast display mode from within Sakai. I imagine this would take form as a user preference where a high-contrast mode can be enabled. When the high contrast mode is enabled, Sakai would select a set of stylesheets which implements the high-contrast display mode.

With my current knowledge of Sakai 2, I'm not sure if this is possible. If it is, I can envision it requiring:
  1. Coding changes as required to implement UI changes to allow the user to set the user preference to enable/disable the high-contrast mode.
  2. Coding changes as required to select the high-contrast mode stylesheets.
  4. Development of the high-contrast stylesheets.
  3. A manual to assist institutions for skinning the high-contrast mode stylesheets and what to pay attention to to make sure they remain accessible.
  4. Documentation on how institutions can enable / disable this feature.

An alternate to the above solution would be to require all images are loaded as foreground images (i.e.: no CSS background images, no CSS sprites, etc.). This would be a big design change for both Sakai 2 and Sakai 3.

From my exploration of D2L and Moodle, they are going with supporting the Windows and Mac OS high-contrast modes and loading all essential images in the foreground.

Before I put much more time and effort into it this, I would like to get feedback on the above thoughts from the group. Does any of the above make sense? Is it possible to create user selectable stylesheets in Sakai 2? Should we focus instead on pushing for this in Sakai 3 using the Fluid Skinning System and say that moving to Sakai 3 is the fix?

Many UI libraries employ detection routines to detect if the operating system is operating in the high-contrast display mode and change their rendering appropriately (dojo is an example). I've also seen this technique referred to in the Drupal accessibility documentation. This approach seems overly complex and developing a solution based on it would probably be more difficult than the above solutions.

-Brian

-----Original Message-----
From: Brian Richwine (JIRA) [mailto:bugs-admin at sakaiproject.org]
Sent: Monday, July 26, 2010 4:55 PM
To: Richwine, Brian L
Subject: [Sakai Jira] Issue Comment Edited: (SAK-8169) Accessibility: Alternative Content Presentation for Persons with Disabilities


    [ http://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/SAK-8169?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel&focusedCommentId=103385#action_103385 ]

Brian Richwine edited comment on SAK-8169 at 7/26/10 1:53 PM:
--------------------------------------------------------------

Modern browsers handle text enlargement, and page magnification, very well. Zooming in on the page is only a combination away in most browsers. The Windows and Mac OS-X operating systems have built in high contrast modes as well. These facts have generated some discussion that this issue should be closed.

I tested Sakai 2.7 and the Sakai 3 Dev Server in operating system high contrast modes using Firefox 3 and IE 8 on Windows 7, and in Firefox and Safari in OS-X and found the results pretty unusable.

When Windows is in the high contrast mode, Firefox and IE both suppress the loading of background images (no more CSS sprites, icons that are really background images, etc.). Images that are displayed, undergo contrast enhancing image processing and may distort. Most background become solid black and some text (especially links, ironically) may become too dark to have sufficient contrast. The experience was best using IE 8 as it generally had better results rendering the text. Visited links in Firefox were especially difficult to see.

Screen captures showing effects of Window's high contrast mode can be found here:
http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/2ACC/Sakai+3+Dev+Server+Quick+Accessibility+Evaluation#Sakai3DevServerQuickAccessibilityEvaluation-UnusableWhileUsingOperatingSystemHighContrastModes

To enter high contrast mode in a windows machine (press Left Shift+Left Alt+PrtScrn)

In OS-X, the entire display undergoes contrast enhancing image processing. Ironically, text that is already low contrast (like gray text on a white background) tends to melt into the background and become illegible. Thin lines can disappear. The experience was the same across Safari and Firefox as the affect is applied indiscriminately.

      was (Author: brichwin):
    Modern browsers handle text enlargement, and page magnification, very well. Zooming in on the page is only a combination away in most browsers. The Windows and Mac OS-X operating systems have built in high contrast modes as well. These facts have generated some discussion that this issue should be closed.

I tested Sakai 2.7 and the Sakai 3 Dev Server in operating system high contrast modes using Firefox 3 and IE 8 on Windows 7, and in Firefox and Safari in OS-X and found the results pretty unusable.

When Windows is in the high contrast mode, Firefox and IE both suppress the loading of background images (no more CSS sprites, icons that are really background images, etc.). Images that are displayed, undergo contrast enhancing image processing and may distort. Most background become solid black and some text (especially links, ironically) may become too dark to have sufficient contrast. The experience was best using IE 8 as it generally had better results rendering the text. Visited links in Firefox were especially difficult to see.

In OS-X, the entire display undergoes contrast enhancing image processing. Ironically, text that is already low contrast (like gray text on a white background) tends to melt into the background and become illegible. Thin lines can disappear. The experience was the same across Safari and Firefox as the affect is applied indiscriminately.

> Accessibility: Alternative Content Presentation for Persons with Disabilities
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>                 Key: SAK-8169
>                 URL: http://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/SAK-8169
>             Project:  Sakai
>          Issue Type: Feature Request
>          Components: Accessibility, Global
>    Affects Versions: 2.2.0, 2.2.1, 2.2.2, 2.3.0, 2.3.1
>            Reporter: Mike Elledge
>
> Persons with disabilities should be provided with alternative renderings upon entering Sakai. Ideally, Sakai should remember their preferences, so they are presented as the default for subsequent visits. The choices, at a minimum, should include:
> 1. Enlarged text--100%, 200%, 300%, 400%
> 2. Reverse type (white on black or yellow on black)
> Additional options would be to:
> 2. Select their own foreground (text) and background colors (replacing 2)
> 3. Show <alt> text instead of images
> 4. View without CSS

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