Testing for
Accessibility
Before You Hit
Publish

Brian DeConinck

OIT Design & Web Services

NC State University

View these slides:
go.ncsu.edu/a11y-helper-unccause

The WordPress community likes to talk about
democratizing publishing...

On the OIT website, we have
~300 OIT staff
who can edit and update content.

More generally at NC State,
anyone could be building a website!

• Admin assistants updating departmental websites
   
• Faculty updating course websites
   
• Grad students updating research group websites
   
• Undergrads updating student group websites

All Students + All Faculty + All Staff
means we have

52,000+ potential
content creators

and that's really cool!

This is AWESOME 
because...

• We have lots of websites
   
• Minimal training required for new users
   
• Anyone can create new web pages!

This is TERRIBLE 
because...

• We have lots of websites
   
• Minimal training required for new users
   
• Anyone can create new web pages!

As a developer, I can do a lot to
make a theme accessible...

But I don't have any control over
what our users put in the page!

So I can't prevent things like...

Images with no alt text

So I can't prevent things like...

Insufficient
color contrast

So I can't prevent things like...

Misused
heading tags

How do you get
300 OIT
content creators
to not make
inaccessible content?

How do you get
52,000+ potential
content creators
to not make
inaccessible content?

WordPress
helps us solve this problem!

• Literally - I built a WordPress plugin using useful WordPress functions
   
• Figuratively - The "democratizing publishing" ethos is going to help us here!

Let's make
accessibility testing
part of the
content creation process

NC State
Accessibility Helper

• Homegrown WordPress plugin
• Uses aXe accessibility testing engine by Deque Systems
• Additional custom tests by us

View (and steal!) my code at:
go.ncsu.edu/a11y-helper-github

Generates an
annotated preview highlighting detected accessibility issues

Modal dialog gives a
brief description
of the detected issue, with links to a learning resource
and the Help Desk

Custom tests give reminders to keep thinking about accessibility

What this isn't

What this is

• Rigorous compliance testing
• A substitute for accessibility training
• A fool-proof solution for everything!

• A way to engage your content creators in the accessibility testing process

Try it yourself:
go.ncsu.edu/a11y-helper-github

View these slides:
go.ncsu.edu/a11y-helper-unccause

Brian DeConinck

OIT Design & Web Services
NC State University

Twitter: @BrianDeConinck

Email: bpdeconi@ncsu.edu