Mark @mark@a11y.social

Huge feature comparison of #Mastodon clients, by @runevision et al. HT @craigdietrich

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/1/d/1De5KRwqMIdwEryfoeBLARgxF7QgKkeOQBCilKuIdAXE/htmlview#

There's a certain kind of techbro who thinks it's a knock-down argument to say "Well, you haven't built anything". As if the only people whose expertise counts are those close to the machine. I'm reminded (again) of
@timnitGebru 's wise comments on "the hierarchy of knowledge". >>

I'm excited to announce that egui (https://github.com/emilk/egui) is now the first pure-Rust GUI toolkit to implement platform accessibility APIs (most mature on Windows, with macOS catching up), via AccessKit (https://github.com/AccessKit/accesskit). This was just merged in egui's master branch. New versions of egui crates should be published to crates.io soon. Thanks to the Google Fonts team for funding both the development of AccessKit and the integration in egui.

Want to learn more about careers in digital #accessibility? Join me for a panel conversation with three professionals who are making tech more equitable for people with disabilities. 📆Tues, Dec 6 from 10:30-11:30 PT. Hosted by UCI Informatics and the Division of Career Pathways, as well as Access Computing and Teach Access. 👉Register here: https://tinyurl.com/career-panel-fa-22

#Writers of the #Fediverse! Looking for a writing exercise/writing prompt? Join the #ALT4you and #ALT4me mutual aid effort to provide #ALT descriptive text to images in the #fediverse

ALT descriptive text is used by blind and visually impaired people to understand and process photos and images that they otherwise cannot see. So please add ALT to any images you Toot.

Putting an image into words can be a very creative exercise that forces you to look at images more deeply and then convey their content and meaning in words.

Also follow the #ALT4me hashtag. It's used by blind and visually impaired tooters (is that even a word?) to request mutual aid when they encounter an image that does not have ALT.

Respond to #ALT4me by replying with the ALT text.

Here's a great example of #ALT4me in action:
https://universeodon.com/@groo79/109451400586037596

The first toot is a request for ALT and the comments provide them.

Read more about it here: https://fedi.tips/mastodon-and-fediverse-accessibility-tips/

The founder of Post said today that the company is explicitly *not* focused on accessibility. Disappointing to read something like this in 2022
#tech #technology #Disability #twitter #postnews #twittermigration

I've launched a #Mastodon instance focused on #AudioDescription. This is a space where professionals and fans can come together to learn, advocate, and work together towards the goal of quality AD in all environs. The server is bare-bones right now, so your patience is requested as we build things out. You can also make an impact by boosting this news across your networks. To join, head over to https://adforward.org/auth/sign_up
#blind #a11y #LowVision

This article on what the author calls the "antiviral" design of Mastodon is a good explanation of why Mastodon feels different from Twitter, and why, if you're looking for a 1:1 Twitter replacement, Mastodon might not be what you're looking for.

https://uxdesign.cc/mastodon-is-antiviral-design-42f090ab8d51

I've seen a number of posts go by asking about screenreaders and Mastodon compatibility. If looking for a screenreader's guide to Mastodon, this post by @ChangelingMx may be of interest: https://www.starshipchangeling.net/changelings-guide-to-using-mastodon-for-screen-reader-users-chapter-one-introduction/ #DisabledCommunity #screenreader #FediTips #disability

If you are interested in improving the #accessibility of Mastodon, take a look at the issue queue https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues?q=is%3Aissue+is%3Aopen+label%3Aaccessibility+

If there are issues you've found that aren't there, are they part of the instance of Mastodon that you are using, or part of the core open source project? Custom themes can get in the way.

Posting #a11y bugs is important in moving ahead any open source project.

Did you know that if you capitalize each word in a multi-word hashtag, #ScreenReaders can read them as words, but if you leave them lowercase, they can't? Well, now you know! So, for #accessibility, please capitalize words when there's more than one in a hashtag.

Btw, if you've not spent much time exploring open source software before and are trying to work out how this works, strong recommendation for Nadia Eghbal's Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software, which explains really well the model of a few people volunteering to maintain infrastructure used by pretty much everyone https://press.stripe.com/working-in-public

An interesting side effect of joining mastodon and seeing how things work here is that I have a greater sense of how twitter and other commercial social media ordinarily (and by design) provoke anxiety/distress in me and others.

This #a11y review of Mastodon iPhone clients is great, but four years old now. Anyone know of any similar reviews that might be more recent?

https://firewally.net/post/mastodon-client-accessibility-comparison/