The AccessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) Team provides accessibility expertise across the project to improve the accessibility of WordPress coreCoreCore is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. and resources.
The WordPress Accessibility Coding Standards state that “All new or updated code released in WordPress must conform with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 at level AA.”
This is the proposed agenda for the weekly accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting on Friday, December 6, 2019, 16:00 UTC.
Proposed times for the Global WP Accessibility Day initial planning meeting
These are the weekly notes for the accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting that happens on Fridays. You can read the full transcript on our Slack channel and find the meeting’s agenda here.
Notice to discourage use of IE11
The team discussed this Trac ticket that proposes to encourage users, through a message or notification, to upgrade from IE11.
The team agreed that having a permanently dismissible notice is a good idea but we should however be mindful of folks who can’t upgrade due to work requirements or version of assistive technologyAssistive technologyAssistive technology is an umbrella term that includes assistive, adaptive, and rehabilitative devices for people with disabilities and also includes the process used in selecting, locating, and using them. Assistive technology promotes greater independence by enabling people to perform tasks that they were formerly unable to accomplish, or had great difficulty accomplishing, by providing enhancements to, or changing methods of interacting with, the technology needed to accomplish such tasks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assistive_technology being used. Ending support for IE11 should be a separate issue.
Remove aria-label from links
We also discussed this GitHub PR that is attempting to fix a problem when creating a link in the blockBlockBlock is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. editor and is set to open on a new tab.
Currently, the link gets an aria-label with the link’s label and a string appended that indicates that the link will open in a new browser tab. The issue is that the appended string is not being set to the document’s language, but to the language wp-admin is set to.
The team agreed that removing the currently broken functionality to add the aria-label is good first step, but would like to see a solution implemented as well.
We think that making the string visible would be ideal, since all users would benefit from this piece of information. It should also be set to the document’s language, because this string will be used in a public context.
Advancing the block interface
This recent GutenbergGutenbergThe Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/GitHub issue that explores refinements to the block toolbar was shared with the team for awareness. It’s a long read, so we’ll revisit the item next week once everyone has had time to digest it.
Since this was discussed a while ago, we ask those who had already signed up to confirm their participation, or remove themselves from the spreadsheet if they won’t be participating anymore.
Anyone who’s not on the list and wants to participate is welcome to add their details.
The organizing team will be coordinating to set up a planning meeting. Folks are also welcome to join the #accessibility-events channel in the Making WordPress SlackSlackSlack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. (requires registration).
This is the proposed agenda for the weekly accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting on Friday, November 29, 2019, 16:00 UTC.
Global WP a11yAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) Day
If you have any additional topics to propose, please comment below.
There will not be an accessibility bug scrub this week.
These are the weekly notes for the accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting that happens on Fridays. You can read the full transcript on our Slack channel and find the meeting’s agenda here.
Initial focus on GutenbergGutenbergThe Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/ blocks
The team continued the discussion about where initial focus should land on the different types of blocks available in the blockBlockBlock is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. editor. For example, some blocks such as text-based blocks have a clearly defined editable area, which makes it obvious where focus should land. This however is not the case with a variety of blocks where text is not the primary element.
The team agreed to investigate and document initial focus on all the available blocks in coreCoreCore is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. and post findings on a newly created spreadsheet that contains a list of all the blocks. We’ll revisit the list during the next meeting and evaluate our progress.
5.3.1 scope
The team’s goal for 5.3.1 is to address any immediate regressions introduced on 5.3. The tickets that need special attention are #48585, #48598, #47142, #47069 and #48420. Help with testing, patches and providing feedback is welcome.
Accessible color schemes
The team continued the discussion from the previous meeting about having color schemes in wp-admin that address specific accessibility needs. We think this could be a great feature proposal for 5.4 or 5.5.
The team agreed that we should start with a pluginPluginA plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party that will reside in the accessibility team’s GitHub repository.
This is the proposed agenda for the weekly accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting on Friday, November 22, 2019, 16:00 UTC.
Path forward for a11yAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) color schemes
@nrqsnchz and @audrasjb were nominated and elected to represent the AccessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team for 2019-2020.
Thank you to @joedolson who represented the team during 2018-2019 term and congratulations for his nomination as WordPress CoreCoreCore is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. Committer ⭐️
Assign new team and contributor badges
As a reminder, Team badge is reserved for people who have a high level of activity and contribution; Contributor badge is given to people who have helped occasionally or are new to the team. Each badge is permanent; there’s no requirement of continued activity.
Badges assignment were publicly discussed during the meeting.
WordPress 5.3 releaseReleaseA release is the distribution of the final version of an application. A software release may be either public or private and generally constitutes the initial or new generation of a new or upgraded application. A release is preceded by the distribution of alpha and then beta versions of the software.
@afercia and @audrasjb are currently addressing concerns raised by some users in the Admin CSS changes dev note’s comments. Team members are welcome to help to answer these comments. The majority is not very constructive comments but as a team, there is a need to properly answer them.
For the moment, the complaints don’t seem to be statistically significant (a dozen of individual commenters).
@afercia seen at least 3 major plugins releasing new versions with minor adjustments for the admin CSSCSSCSS is an acronym for cascading style sheets. This is what controls the design or look and feel of a site. changes so it seems communication worked well.
Twenty Twenty submenus
@poena raised a concern about Twenty Twenty horizontal navigation menuNavigation MenuA theme feature introduced with Version 3.0. WordPress includes an easy to use mechanism for giving various control options to get users to click from one place to another on a site.: “On desktop you hover over the parent menu item to show the (first) submenu. But on tablets you have to click the parent menu item link to show the submenus, and then click the same link again to access that menu item. There is no button to toggle the submenus, it is an icon which is part of the link.”
@afercia noted the issue was addressed in Twenty Seventeen by adding a separate, dedicated button to toggle submenus.
Given WP 5.3 is already released and Twenty Twenty already used in a large amount of websites, it is a pretty big change that would need some communication. It is not necessarily a top priority, as it’s not that the current pattern is inaccessible, it just may not be the best possible option.
WordPress CSS changes and color schemes
The color contrast changes are pretty solid in core, but cause problems with the core-provided alternate color schemes. This is not directly an accessibility issue, as the color schemes were not accessibility features, but it was caused by the accessibility team work, so the team should probably owns it to some degree.
The immediate issues will be fixed in the next minor releases.
However, the meeting attendees agreed that the entire purpose of color schemes should be reconsidered as it doesn’t make much sense to have only cosmetic changes in alternate color schemes. They should rather address specific purpose, like:
a dark theme to complement operating systems dark themes
a low contrast theme to help users who struggle with strong contrast
a theme with a good typeface to help users with dyslexia, preferably with options to adjust letter spacing and line-height
Current color schemes could be deprecated to a pluginPluginA plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party as design-only tweaks are plugin territory, and new alternate color schemes could be more focused on specific, relevant and useful features. The idea is not to remove existing alternate color schemes completely, since some users are using them, but rather to deprecate them and to stop maintaining them in WordPress core. @melchoyce also proposed having an auto-install of an eventual plugin with all the existing color scheme to support them if users had them enabled. There is already an existing plugin that could be used for this purpose.
This is the proposed agenda for the weekly accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting on Friday November 15, 2019 at 16:00 UTC.
Elect New team Representatives for 2019-2020
Assign new team & contributor badges
WordPress 5.3 releaseReleaseA release is the distribution of the final version of an application. A software release may be either public or private and generally constitutes the initial or new generation of a new or upgraded application. A release is preceded by the distribution of alpha and then beta versions of the software.: comments, concerns, updates.
If you have any additional topics to propose, please comment below.
This meeting is held in the #accessibility channel in the Making WordPress SlackSlackSlack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. (requires registration).
Discussed responsibilities of a team repTeam RepA Team Rep is a person who represents the Make WordPress team to the rest of the project, make sure issues are raised and addressed as needed, and coordinates cross-team efforts.. Since we failed to account for the time change prior to this meeting, we opted to delay the election until 11/15, to get back to a clear schedule and maximize attendance.
@nrqsnchz was not present at this point in the meeting.
If we end up with only two candidates, the vote will be a formality; but nominations remain open until 16:00 UTC on 15 November 2019.
Adjust meeting time due to daylight savings change
@joedolson proposed changing the meeting to 16:00 UTC instead of 15:00 UTC, shifting the bug scrub an hour later, as well.
Agreed unanimously.
Update team and contributor badges on profiles
Due to time, postponing until 15 November. Members who need badges given opportunity to state that; will discuss next week, then pass assignments on.
Twenty Twenty read more blockBlockBlock is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience.
Issue with the starter content in Twenty Twenty not conforming to WordPress accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility)-ready standards regarding ‘read more’ links.
Argument was that there is no meaningful text because they are demo links. Accessibility team agreed that demo links should have equivalent demo text describing their purpose. None of the content is meaningful, but it should still demonstrate best practices.
Briefly also discussed the problems with all caps text in screen readers.
Initial Focus on GutenbergGutenbergThe Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/ blocks
This is an old issue with no final decision. Not all blocks handle focus assignment the same way. Some blocks have clearly defined main editable areas, others don’t. Lack of consistency makes behavior unpredictable.
Couple proposals: Set initial focus on editable region for simple blocks (paragraph, heading) and set initial on focus on whatever wrapper is labeled with aria-label, in other cases. Alternately: do nothing. No artificial movements of focus on any blocks.
This is the proposed agenda for the weekly accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team meeting on Friday November 8, 2019 at 15:00 UTC.
Move Accessibility team meeting time according to end of daylight saving time
New team Representatives for 2019-2020
Discuss issues recently raised on accessibilitySlackSlackSlack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel:
Twenty Twenty Read more BlockBlockBlock is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. (raised by @poena)
Initial focus on GutenbergGutenbergThe Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/ blocks (raised by @gziolo)
If you have any additional topics to propose, please comment below.
The accessibilityAccessibilityAccessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) team plans to vote for new team representatives for 2020 on Friday 8 November 2019 at 15:00 UTC.
Current accessibility team reps are @joedolson, @audrasjb, and @arush. We last set representatives on October 2018, so it’s been a year with the current reps.
Team reps are responsible for posting agendas, publishing meetings summaries, and generally leading communications inside the team. They coordinate cross-team efforts and they represent the accessibility team within the WordPress project. It’s a set of tasks that needs to happens each week. One challenge of being a team representative is that they do need to keep on top of a lot of things that are simultaneously going on.
Anyone who is an active contributor in the accessibility team can be elected as team representative.
It’s a one-year term. We must have 2 team reps at least, to ensure duties are shared.
Existing reps are eligible to run for the election; there are no term limits. @audrasjb is still interested but wants to give priority to new people. Same for @joedolson who wants to give more time to his new coreCoreCore is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. committer status.
Feel free to comment to ask questions. If you are interested for being an accessibility team representative, please comment this post to nominate yourself to stand for election.
