developing ios apps with emphasis on accessibility quality ......• worldwide laws are requiring...

IBM Accessibility Research © 2017 IBM Corporation

Developing iOS Apps with Emphasis on Accessibility QualityBrent Shiver, IBMRam Ramachandran, IBM


May 15, 2018 #AccessU2018


Session Agenda

• Motivation for Mobile Accessibility

• iOS Accessibility Overview • VoiceOver • Xcode Interface Builder • UIAccessibility API • Mobile Accessibility Checker • Hands-on exercises




Motivation for Mobile Accessibility

• Increasing Market Need• Aging population and number of PwDs is

estimated at 1.3 billion (equivalent tomarket size of China)

• Exponential growth of smartphones• Worldwide laws are requiring application

providers to assess and report on theconformance of iOS® and Android™mobile apps to accessibility standards

• Multiple platforms• iOS, Android• Native, Hybrid & Web applications

Existing Tool Limitations • Are geared toward manual vs. more automated inspection, causing accessibility verification testing to be time‐

consuming and inefficient • Make it more difficult to enable product teams due to limitations in integration with compliance systems • Are difficult to integrate into continuous development and business processes, and different phases of the

development life cycle

• Fall short in helping application providers comply with legal requirements

Increasing Market Need • IBM Mobile Business Insights blog post: People age 65+ will comprise 20% of population in most industrialized nations

by 2025 and the number of PwDs is estimated at 1.3 billion (market equivalent to market size of China) • Worldwide laws are requiring application providers to assess and report on the conformance of iOS® and Android™

mobile apps to accessibility standards

Internal / External Ecosystem Challenges • Android™ and iOS® platform vendors need to provide better tools for accessible mobile app development • Application Providers need to have easier and more efficient ways to produce accessible apps • Accessibility and quality assurance services providers need to be able to better serve a growing market need


Motivation for Mobile Accessibility (cont.)

Anywhere access creates new situational challenges for everyone … design for disabilities solves usability problems for everyone.

Outside light

Ambient noise

Single hand

Bumpy road

Eyes busy

Aging eyes


iOS Accessibility Overview

Designing for everyone • Blind and low vision • Deaf and hard of hearing • Physical and motor skills • Learning and literacy

Progressive improvements

• Continuously improved since firstaccessibility feature in iOS 3

• Integrated in iPhone • Powerful suite of accessibility

features and tools


Mention first time I met Tom Babinski, accessibility consultant with IBM when I first joined IBM. Explain conversation with Tom via iPad. Like a Swiss Army knife, lots of useful accessibility features and growing! Mention: Deaf users can enable flash for sound alerts


TTY Evolution

Photo credit: Governor Baxter School for the Deaf

Photo credit: DS International Inc.

IBM Accessibility Research © 2018 IBM Corporation Photo credit: Apple Inc.


Video Accessibility

• Apple has robust support for closed captions and subtitles

• User able to customize font, color, size, opacity on text and background

• Everyone benefits • Deaf and hard of hearing • Situational limitations • Multiple languages • English as second language • Learning and literacy

• No caption track = inaccessible video • Leverage YouTube captioning tools


Photo credit: iMore.com/Despicable Me 2

Apple VoiceOver

• Built-in (separate third-partysoftware not necessary)

• Voices what is on the screen and provides hints

• Multilingual support • Image descriptions • Works with Bluetooth-enabled

braille displays • Available on all platforms: iOS,

watchOS, tvOS, macOS


Image descriptions new in iOS 11. Wouldn’t it be cool if we could automate video captioning!?

Exercise: Key iOS VoiceOver Gestures

Action Gesture *Accessibility Shortcut Triple-Click Home Select Item Tap Select Next Item Swipe Right Select Previous Item Swipe Left Activate Item Double Tap Pause Speech Two-Finger Tap Scroll Three-Finger Swipe Screen Curtain Three-Finger Triple Tap

* Add VoiceOver via Settings > General > Accessibility > Accessibility Shortcut to quickly turn on/off


10 minute exercise Try out each. For the brave, try enabling screen curtain before doing each gesture!

Exercise: Accessibility Inspector

• Inspects target app • Utilize inspection pointer to check

attributes by hovering elements

• Open inspection details to view attributes, elements, and hierarchy and to perform actions

• Run audit to retrieve list of possible accessibility issues

• Manage settings to test common accessibility options including invert colors and font size changes


10 minute exercise Xcode > Open Developer Tools > Accessibility Inspector Xcode > Open Developer Tools > Simulator Apple takes pride in ensuring their apps are accessible. They are considered good examples of what to do. Tour the apps on simulator and pay attention to how the inspector responds. Run audit to see the issues. Try on your own app if you have one. Think about how you want to hear the VO.

Enabling Accessibility in Xcode Interface Builder

Advantages • Quick start with limited knowledge of

Accessibility API • Right off the bat, easy to use • Defaults

Limitations

• May not always do what we want • Requires manual work • Updating multiple elements could

become time-consuming and counterproductive

• Only works with static content not dynamic


Demo the IB Show how accessibility can be enabled and different elements – label, hint, identifier, traits.

UIAccessibility API

• Available iOS 3.0 and later • Built into UIKit framework • Enabled in standard UIKit views and

controls by default • Key properties

• isAccessibilityElement • accessibilityLabel • accessibilityTraits • accessibilityValue • accessibilityHint • accessibilityIdentifier


Informal protocol. Standard UIKit views: UIButton, UILabel, UITableView UIView and subclasses not enabled by default Show couple of code examples where I override defaults



Mobile Accessibility Considerations

Existing Tool Limitations• Manual testing• Difficult to integrate into continuous development

and business processes• Legal requirements

Internal & External Ecosystem Challenges• Android™ and iOS® platform vendors need to

provide better tools for accessible mobile appdevelopment

• Application providers require easier and moreefficient ways to produce accessible apps

• Accessibility and quality assurance servicesproviders need to be able to better serve agrowing market need


Mobile Accessibility Checker Performs automated accessibility assessments of mobile apps and content directly within mobile development environments, increasing usability and customer experience.

• Guides users through the testing process and recommends the necessary corrections to adhere to accessibility standards and government regulations.

• Ability to do rapid iterative testing and identify and remediate digital accessibility concerns during the development phase.

• Ensures that all users have the best possible experience when interacting with mobile apps and content.


Tests mobile web or native apps to verify how well they conform to web or software accessibility standards – WCAG, US Section 508, ADA.

Accessibility Standards Conformance Testing

•Mobile Accessibility Testing:

•Accessible Mobile Development:

IBM can perform accessibility assessments of existing mobile apps, and provide accessible mobile design, development and testing services. These services include:

IBM can test your mobile web or native applications to verify how well they conform to web or software accessibility standards (e.g. WCAG, U.S. Section 508, etc.). IBM employs best practices and tools such as code inspectors, mobile accessibility features (e.g. screen readers) and expert manual inspection to verify usable access. We can train clients to perform their own accessibility testing as well.

IBM can provide advise on the design and development of accessible mobile applications. We can train clients to design better user experience and develop standards‐conforming code.

These services can be delivered either by IBM Research: Human Ability & Accessibility Center (limited duration, strategic engagements) or by GBS IBM Interactive Experience.


Mobile Accessibility Checker Demo

• Automatic detection and reporting with Appium/Selenium support

• More information: https://www.ibm.com/able/mobile-accessibility-checker.html


https://www.ibm.com/able/mobile-accessibility-checker.html



Discussion and Wrap-up

developing ios apps with emphasis on accessibility quality ......• worldwide laws are requiring...

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