Google has posted numerous sessions from Google I/O on YouTube. This one looks specifically at making your web apps more accessible:
The sessions starts with testing for accessibility, followed by advanced screen reader accessibility, then ChromeVox extensions, and APIs for low vision.
The description explains, “This session will help you learn through code samples and real world examples how to design and test your web apps for complete accessibility coverage. We will review APIs such as the Text-to-speech (TTS) API, tools like ChromeVox and ChromeShades and how Google products implement solutions today for users with disabilities.”
As long as we’re on the topic of Google and accessibility, the company has also added some more accessibility features of its own to the latest version of Android (Jellybean), which was unveiled at Google I/O.
According to Jellybean’s version page:
New APIs for accessibility services let you handle gestures and manage accessibility focus as the user moves through the on-screen elements and navigation buttons using accessibility gestures, accessories, and other input. The Talkback system and explore-by-touch are redesigned to use accessibility focus for easier use and offer a complete set of APIs for developers.
Accessibility services can link their own tutorials into the Accessibility settings, to help users configure and use their services.
Apps that use standard View components inherit support for the new accessibility features automatically, without any changes in their code. Apps that use custom Views can use new accessibility node APIs to indicate the parts of the View that are of interest to accessibility services.