Experios provides various features which can be used to make your publication more accessible.
These include:
Accessible Viewer Settings
When you publish or update your Experios publication, you will be presented with links to two separate versions of your publication – one for a standard version, and another for an accessible version.
You can alter the Viewer Settings for both versions independently of each other, allowing you to choose different sizes and colors for the navigation elements and dialog boxes.
By default, when you access the Viewer Settings options in the Project Settings panel, you will be editing options for the standard Viewer. To access the options for the Accessible Viewer, use the dropdown menu to the upper right of the panel.
The Accessible version of your publication also uses less scripts for animations, etc., resulting in faster load times.
Alt Text
Alt Text is used by screen readers, which are aids for those who suffer from visual impairment, among other things. The purpose of Alt Text is to allow a screen reader to describe what is on the image to the user. By neglecting to add Alt Text to images, users who depend on screen readers will be aware of the presence of an image, but may not be aware of the content or purpose of the image.
Another advantage to using Alt Text is that it is readable by search engines, enabling them to index the image in the same way as the rest of the text in your publication.
You can set Alt Text for an element in the Accessibility section of that element’s properties.
Aria Label
The Aria Label attribute functions in a similar way to Alt Text. It can, however, be applied to more than just image elements. In fact, any element can have an Aria Label to provide an accessible name for that element.
Examples of places where Aria Label might be useful are: textless clickable elements, videos, image galleries, html graphs or charts.
You can set an Aria Label for an element in the Accessibility section of that element’s properties.
Role
The Role attribute can be applied to Text elements, and describes the role of that element to screen readers, and those dependent on them. This means that a screen reader can differentiate between headings and paragraph text, and can determine which pieces of text are the most significant.
Available roles are headings 1-6, with heading 1 signifying the most important heading, heading 6 signifying the least important, and paragraph. You can set a Role for an element in the Accessibility section of that element’s properties.
By embracing the accessibility features that Experios offers, you can ensure that your publication can be consumed by as wide an audience as possible.
Accessibility Validator
Experios has a built-in accessibility validator to help you maximise the accessibility of your publication before publishing and distribution.
The Accessibility Validator must be run on each page individually. This can be done by navigating to the page you wish to check in the Experios Editor and clicking on the accessibility icon to the left of the undo/redo buttons. After a short wait, the Accessibility Validator will display a list of the accessibility issues present on your page. Clicking on one of the issues will scroll the Canvas to where you can see the problematic element.
The Accessibility Validator is enabled by default, but can be switched off if desired by accessing the Accessibility Validator options. You can find these by going to My Team and selecting Compliance from the dropdown menu at the top of the screen.
Available options for the Accessibility Validator are:
- Enable WCAG Validator
Check this box to enable the Accessibility Validator icon in the Experios Editor (enabled by default). - Enable WCAG compliance before publishing
When this box is checked, publishing is disabled until all accessibility issues have been addressed (disabled by default).
The accessibility checker checks for:
- Alt Text on images
- Missing Title Text on elements that are required to have a Title
- Contrast Ratio
- Invalid HTML created using Developer Tools