Steemit.com accessibility issues
I thought I'd write this post to point out current accessibility issues with the site. We can comment and I will edit it as appropriate.
General Resources
- WebAIM, great basic resource
- Web Accessibility Initiative
- Orca, Linux screen reader
- NVDA, open source Windows screen reader
- VoiceOver, Apple's screen reader
Web Site Issues
Generated Password
When signing up, I had issues navigating the screen containing the generated password. I could not focus or use the arrows to navigate. I had to copy and paste the generated password manually.
Follow and Mute Controls
On a user's profile, the Follow and Mute controls do not report as links. This renders them inactive. Preferably use standard HTML links or the appropriate ARIA role.
Modal Dialogs
When the screen updates, the assistive technology should receive a notification. This may involve the use of live regions, or moving the focus. The level 1 heading works well. Check the resources for some ideas.
Navigation Menu
When I wrote these notes, I had serious issues navigating the navigation menu. The tabindex comes into play here. Since I wrote my notes this has improved, so they may have fixed this.
General Keyboard Navigation
I always tell people to try accessing their program or web site using only the keyboard to test for basic accessibility. If you can't access it with a keyboard then you'll likely have problems with other assistive technologies. Try using steemit.com just using your keyboard, and note the results. I miss a lot of controls using the tab key, and many elements report as clickable but get skipped over. Links such as the Reply links on posts and comments only respond to mouse events.
Other Notes
I tested this with Firefox 53.0.1 running the latest Orca from git. Testing with other screen readers may yield different results.
I will file these in our issue tracker today or tomorrow and make sure we address them!
https://github.com/steemit/condenser/issues
Thank you for the useful feedback - we want to make sure the site is fully accessible to everyone.
Great, I've followed all of the issues.
I still find that with VoiceOver and Safari on the Mac, the "follow and Mute" controls are not accessible. THey show up as one clickable field. This means that I have no way to follow or unfollow.