Ten Tools to Ensure Website Accessibility
As the web changes, web accessibility tools often struggle to keep up. The web is littered with defunct tools that were top of the line back in 2000 but for whatever reason were not maintained over the years. Fortunately, for every tool that falls behind, a new one seems to sprout in its place.
On today’s web, web accessibility tools need to do a lot more than validate HTML code. AJAX applications are spreading far and wide, and with them comes dynamic content. This means that all possible permutations of an application’s output need to be checked for accessibility, but such a complete accessibility checker doesn’t yet exist.
For now, most automated tools stick to checking the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 and 2.0 and the Section 508 standards. Though we’ll focus on a few of these tools, we’ll also branch out to other areas of accessibility that are sometimes given short shrift.
Here’s a list of ten accessibility tools with a description of each. This list is completely subjective based on how helpful they’ve been in detecting errors, their ease of use and their comprehensiveness.
1. Worldspace (price varies by number of pages): Though this tool is not free, it is the most comprehensive web accessibility tool out there. It’s highly customizable and can check AJAX applications and WCAG 2.0, along with Canadian Common Look and Feel, UK DDA and Japanese Industrial Standard. There’s nothing else out there with that kind of feature set. Plugins allow Worldspace to integrate with popular IDES, and its reports are easy to comprehend. It has specific algorithms designed for templates which prevent extraneous errors from being repeated throughout the site. Performing a periodic accessibility check is made easier with its ability to only check updated pages. Worldspace is a comprehensive accessibility tool, but its price may preclude all but larger organizations and those particularly concerned with accessibility from utilizing it.
2. Firefox Accessibility Extension (free): The Firefox Accessibility Extension brings an array of accessibility tools together in one extension. It stands out for its ability to validate dynamic content through Web 2.0 applications. In addition to integrating with other accessibility tools, it also supports the Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) standard and includes tools for creating accessible scripts. As a standard, it uses iCITA HTML Best Practices, which is a combination of Section 508 and WCAG 1.0. It also uses the Functional Accessibility Evaluator, a unique tool that is more concerned with the functional rather than technical accessibility of a web page. Once you register with FAE, (free of charge,) you can use its crawler to check an entire website, rare amongst free web accessibility tools.
3. WebAnywhere (free): When checking web accessibility, automated tools are never enough. WebAnywhere is a web application that simulates how a typical screen-reading program such as Window-eyes or Jaws would interact with a web page. It has some of the same commands used by screen-reader users to browse websites, so as a web designer, you can experience your site as a screen reader user would. Simply enter the URL In the location field, and WebAnywhere will read you the web page. You can navigate through the page by element, link or heading, as well as search for text on the page. Chances are that if your site confuses you when listening through WebAnywhere, it will confuse a visually impaired person attempting to access your site.
4. Web Accessibility Inspector (free): This is a desktop application that checks accessibility based on WCAG 1.0. Though not as up to date as the Firefox Accessibility Extension, this tool is easier to use, as it offers visual cues that point out where accessibility problems exist. It also supports multiple languages including Japanese and Korean, a feature not found in any of the web-based tools. Though it hasn’t been updated since 2008, it will still go a long way toward ensuring the accessibility of a basic (non-AJAX) website.
5. EvalAccess (free): This tool, developed by the University of the Basque Country in Spain, is one of the only free tools that lets you evaluate an entire website for compliance with the WCAG version 1.0. Results are displayed in an easy-to-read report. The tool gives you a brief description of each error detected, along with the line numbers in the source where it can be found. It’s not the most user friendly access tool, but it works well enough to help most designers and developers clean up their sites.
6. Vischeck (free): Vischeck is a visual simulator that can simulate how a web page looks to someone with either of three types of color blindness. There are millions of color blind people around the world who find it difficult to distinguish between certain colors. Vischeck is a quick way for you to tell if your images, navigation buttons or color selections may be confusing to these people. You can either upload a picture or have Vischeck analyze a specific web page.
7. Juicy Studio (free): Juicy Studio, created by Jez Lemon in the UK, has several specialized accessibility tools. Primary among these is a color contrast analyzer Firefox extension that can analyze the contrast of the foreground and background colors of text nodes in a document. This helps you find areas with low contrast that could make your site difficult to read by color blind individuals as well as those with visual impairments. Juicy Studio also includes a table analyzer, readability analyzer and more.
8. Media Access Generator (free): MAGpie, the Media Access Generator, is a tool that creates captions and audio descriptions for various video formats. As Flash has now become more or less universal around the web, it is more important than ever that deaf and blind people alike are able to get the most from Flash videos and websites. Not only are captions helpful for translating the audio track of a video into other languages, they enable those who are deaf or hard of hearing to receive the same content as is heard on the audio track. Audio descriptions allow blind people to follow the action of a video by overlaying an audio track describing the action. MAGpie can create audio description and caption files for the major video formats including: Windows Media Player, Real Player, Quicktime and Flash.
9. WAVE (free): WAVE, the Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool, is a simple, free tool that can quickly check the Section 508 and/or WCAG 1.0 accessibility of an URL. It can’t crawl, so it’s not practical to use for checking an entire site, but if you want to quickly check an URL, a file or a code snippet, WAVE is a quick and comprehensive option. You can also download a WAVE toolbar for Firefox that lets you locally analyze web pages. This is particularly helpful if you have sensitive pages you don’t want to transmit over an unencrypted connection or you have a small, local site you need to analyze.
10. Web Accessibility Toolbar (free): The Web Accessibility Toolbar offers a suite of tools to manually check all types of possible accessibility problems, from low contrast areas to incorrect scripting. The toolbar works in both Internet Explorer and Opera. It doesn’t seem to have been updated recently, but its tools are still very useful for low-vision accessibility testing as well as to validate HTML for typical accessibility errors.
Other tools of note include Dreamweaver’s accessibility extension, which allows designers to check sites for accessibility within the editor, and ACTF aDesigner an accessibility extension for the Eclipse development platform.
This is by no means an exhaustive list. It was meant to encompass all areas of accessibility on today’s web, but no doubt, there are several tools that were left out. If you don’t see your favorite accessibility tool on this list, by all means let us know with a comment.
Although there are some very useful accessibility tools on the web today, there is clearly room for more, especially those that can check AJAX applications for compliance with the ARIA standard. As more and more sites use AJAX and other Web 2.0 capabilities, it’s critical that accessibility tools keep pace.
Ensuring Website Accessibility
Great post - thanks. You've mentioned a couple I haven't used before.
Another Firefox extension I've used a bit is Fangs which textually attempts to show what a Screenreader would voice (Jaws - Fangs - geddit?)
And don't forget that although a copy of JAWS will cost you a lot of money, you can download a demo copy for free. It gives you 40 minutes of use before you need to reboot your machine but if you're organised you can do all your screen reader testing in bursts.
Great list, but don't rely on tools alone.
Great list! We needed an updated one. Must add that these are tools to help test website accessibility. You cannot rely on tools alone. Things like link text, correct alternative text, proper heading text, and appropriate reading level must be checked by humans. PS: I posted a web accessibility tool list almost 4 years ago: http://webaxe.blogspot.com/2006_10_01_archive.html
Worldspace FireEyes
We love the fact that you've included Worldspace in your list. Not sure if your'e familiar with our free Firebug plugin called Worldspace FireEyes. If not, we would love to get your feedback or even see a review of it done by you.
http://www.deque.com/products/deque-labs/worldspace-fireeyes
Interesting plugin
Worldspace , thanks for stopping by. Your plugin Worldspace FireEyes seems like an interesting one. We are considering new section under Tools - Accessibility tools, we might include it there.
section508.gov
The link in the article to section508.gov doesn't work, it gives me following (very strange) error:
"It appears that you are trying to extract email addresses from this website or spider it. The site will abort process now. Thank you, have a nice day."
Temporary error
Thanks for the notification. Yesterday I got the same error, but today everything is okay, it was probably just a temporary error.
Post new comment