I had the great pleasure of delivering a talk about Microsoft’s strategy towards Progressive Web Apps at Build. You can view the slides or watch the recording of this talk, but what follows is a distillation of my talk, taken from my notes and slides.
Dispatches From The Internets
Progressive Web Apps and the Windows Ecosystem
The Unbearable Inaccessibility of Slideshows
Carousel’s and slideshows are the red-headed stepchild of the web design world, but they are still used (and useful) in many scenarios. That said, they are often horribly inaccessible. This article offers a step-by-step walkthrough of common accessibility issues with this interface and details how to address them.
Accessibility Checker for CKEditor
Do you use CKEditor? You should really grab the new Accessibility Checker.
PWAs + Desktop = Equity, Opportunity, and Reliability
Next week I’ll be giving a talk on Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) on Windows (and desktop) at Microsoft Build. While researching folks perspectives on PWAs for the desktop, I stumbled on this post from Justin Ribeiro. In it, he makes a solid case for why discussions of PWAs should not be limited to mobile contexts: > As web developers we use the desktop browser different than an average user. We use the desktop to develop and we sometimes fall prey to assumptions about the platform from that experience.
What Non-Disabled People Get Wrong About Accessibility
Yes, yes, and yes!
How to use -ms-high-contrast
An excellent response to Patrick Lauke’s post on High Contrast Mode in Windows. Greg makes seem great points and provides a clear use case using system color keywords.
Does anyone actually use (or even know about) Microsoft’s Edge browser?
Edge usage is growing. NetMarketShare.com puts it above Safari usage on macOS and the U.S. government websites have seen more than 98 million visits in the last 3 months alone. If you’re not testing on Edge you should be.
- PS - You can test on Edge for free over on Browserstack.
Screen readers and web browsers – what’s the best pairing for testing?
This post offers exactly what it says on the tin: 7 screen reader/browser combos you should be using in your testing work.
How to choose the right look for your portfolio
A good overview of considerations here. In particular, this bit particularly resonated with me:
I also secretly judge [agencies/freelancers] based on whether or not I would actually hire them for work. Many designers with a strong sense of aesthetics are lacking in the UX department, and their site is nearly impossible to navigate. Sometimes the the UI is easy to navigate, but there are possible functional problems. Sometimes they’re issues that could easily be solved with progressive enhancement, but no one bothered.
There are two reasons for this: bandwagon-hopping, and misplaced experimentation.
A Todo List
An excellent overview of how to create an accessible ToDo list from the one and only Heydon Pickering. This is a great project, we should all support him so we get more amazing content like this.