Accessibility Accessibility (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) Tickets in 4.8
These are the current accessibility related tickets slated for the 4.8 release:
- #35566 removes the title attribute in the tag cloud widget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user.
- #38768 adds the site title as the alt attribute to the custom logo
WordPress 4.8 introduces a few new media widgets as well as the ‘Nearby Events’ widget. Testing should continue to be sure that new accessibility issues aren’t introduced.
Future Releases
If you would like to have an impact on future WordPress releases join us during our bug scrubs! During bug scrubs we go through the “awaiting review” and “future release” reports.
Gutenberg The 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/ Editor
The Gutenberg Editor is slated for a big reveal at WordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. Europe.
Let’s keep testing for accessibility related issues as development continues.
You can find installation instructions here: https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md
Note that it is not a conventional plugin A 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 so there are some specific steps to follow.
Accessibility Tasks
There are several ongoing tasks with the goal to improve accessibility in the Admin area.
- Proximity
- Add widgets screen
- Menu screen
Widgets and menu screen
It’s not a secret that there are many issues in the Add Widgets and Menu screens. What to do? @juliemoynat has suggested some improvements in this ticket: https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/40677
Proximity
In web design, the principle of proximity states that related items should be placed close together. By the same token, if things are spaced farther apart they appear to have less relation to one another.
This principle is so powerful, that it overrides similarity of color, shape, and other factors that might differentiate a group of objects.
Proximity is especially critical for users with low vision. It will even be addressed in the next draft of the WCAG WCAG is an acronym for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. These guidelines are helping make sure the internet is accessible to all people no matter how they would need to access the internet (screen-reader, keyboard only, etc) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/. guidelines! https://w3c.github.io/low-vision-a11y-tf/requirements.html
An initial ticket has been created, feel free to join in! https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/40822
#weekly-meetings
