Accessibility and Mobile Testing Tools
Abstract
Watch this on-demand broadcast as David Dame shares his personal journey with disability and his path to becoming a passionate advocate for accessible software. Discover how accessibility impacts everyone at some point, whether through aging, temporary illness, or everyday tasks like carrying a child while opening a door.
David highlights the power of an accessibility-first mindset in creating inclusive products that not only benefit users but also drive success and offer a competitive edge. Don’t miss this inspiring session on the transformative importance of accessibility in design and its role in building better experiences for all.
Accessibility Needs to be Continuous
Explore the importance of accessibility in design through a personal journey with disability, highlighting how an accessibility-first mindset creates more inclusive products and offers a competitive advantage.
Additional Resources
Speakers
Video Transcript
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good afternoon everyone welcome to the keynote
today what I’m going to be talking about today
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is accessibility needs to be continuous
we heard Matt talk about the complexity
0:00:18.400,0:00:24.360
of mobile development and mobile testing but as
somebody with a disability and I’ll give you a
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bit of my background in a second um there hasn’t
been any better technology than mobile devices
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to give Independence and agency to people with
disabilities it’s really allowed us to leave the
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home and be able to bring compute with us where
we’re not just Tethered to the desk or or near
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a computer device rather the technology that
enables us can follow us wherever we go so a
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little bit about who I am um I was born in 1971
and my parents were told Dave may not live past
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12 Dave may not be able to speak clearly if at
all and even if he does don’t expect much because
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there’s not much that someone like Dave can do in
this world they actually advised my parents to put
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me in an institution now that sounds harsh but in
1971 that was the status quo and luckily for me
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my parents were very blue collar and they didn’t
want to make that one single decision that was
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going to impact the rest of my life and I couldn’t
have been born at any better time in history with
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a disability because in about 14 years there was
going to be rights that would allow me to go to
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a normal school get a University degree and have
a career and there was going to be this new thing
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called technology that was going to enable me to
go further than anybody else could have done with
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a disability in years previous my parents fought
hard to get me into school before there was right
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so I got to school and I started using technology
because it wasn’t my sural poliy that held me
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back rather the mismatch in the environment to
accommodate my Cal poliy is what held me back
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but technology was going to close that margin and
I remember being in high school trying to decide
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if I wanted to go to business or technology for
University and I couldn’t make up my mind and my
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dad walked down the stairs and said David let’s
be honest being in a wheelchair you’re not going
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to be a fireman police officer or a construction
worker but you know what else you’re not going to
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be living under my roof for free the rest of
your life so you better figure it out and so
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I went to school I was in for engineering did a
lot of technology did a lot of testing and then I
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moved to product management I worked at numerous
companies adopting uh delivering product Market
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but for 14 years before I entered accessibility
I did agile where I helped organization
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deliver to customers quicker in all different
kind of sizes either startups that want to scale
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up or large companies that want to act more like a
startup whatever it was I helped change them and I
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actually before I joined Microsoft I became a vice
president at a global financial institution think
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about it as a visible disability I was able to
break the glass ceiling and when the pandemic had
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like most of us I really thought about what is
it I want to do with my life you know I’ve done
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a lot of great things in technology now what
um and I did a leadership talk for Microsoft
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and they started pursuing me and this position
came up where it was to lead the accessibility
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portfolio for Windows and devices although I’m
in a wheelchair I never really advocated for
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accessibility in my early years uh CU I never
seen others like me so I didn’t know and I and
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I always thought how ironic would it be the dude
in the wheelchair preaching about accessibility
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so I avoided it but now that I became an industry
leader and have done so many things been married
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had a lot of great things traveling the world now
my wife convinced me to join she said if you join
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Microsoft you’re going to help others like you
achieved the things you did hopefully with a lot
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less effort because at my age I was the canary and
a cave so let’s think back to the 70s 80s and 90s
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there was a time where there wasn’t even ramps to
get in the building architecture was terrible and
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you know what you even had to get off the chair
to turn your own channel it was before remote
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controls but the world was about to change we’re
going to see what the power of diversity would be
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crucial so why I like diversity it’s not for an HR
play but I think if you hire all different people
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with different backgrounds disability ability
different cultures different whatever you build
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a more resil resilient team that really gives you
multiple perspectives different experiences new
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ideas and a dynamic tension let me share with you
an example from my career after I graduated from
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University in the 90s the first job I could get
was a training Logistics coordinator at a major
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automotive company and my first job was a lot of
paperwork if you see my hands paperwork wasn’t
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made for them so what was taking my peers eight
hours a day to be able to uh sign up students and
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put them to the logistics was taking me 12 hours
a day so it took me four hours longer each day and
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I would work that overtime just to keep up with my
peers but you know in the 990s think back that was
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before there was a computer on every desk I was
the first one to get a computer on the desk and
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there was this new thing called the internet that
I thought was going to be a big deal so I designed
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a website where people could sign up for their own
training and the places I wanted to host it could
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sign it what was taking me 12 hours a day was now
only taking me three hours a day I was like who’s
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disabled now and it wasn’t like I was smarter than
anyone else but because it was a problem for me
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first I decided to solve it which made it better
for everybody so I became from being the outlier
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to creating an organization where they were all
the out buyers because I used technology to really
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transform in the things we did but that was the
start the beauty is technology was moving from
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less stationary to more mobile so now how do we
bring this innovator this huge thing that allows
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people to accomplish more in a mobile device so
you bring your computer with you wherever you’re
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out through the day but the challenge is is when
we’re designing sometimes we forget to design for
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accessibility up front and just like in pesting
we always want to move it left so too do we want
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for accessibility because if we don’t design
with it up front it becomes an afterthought so
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I’ve always lived the be barrier where technology
was starting to allow me to enable everything but
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then as technology evolved and of accessibility
wasn’t to the left or up front just like we want
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testing it became a Leger where I couldn’t use
it when the computer first came out it allowed
0:08:48.360,0:08:55.440
me to type use spreadsheets to move quickly it
was the greatest productivity tool ever but then
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the mouse came and the mouse was an input device
that I struggled with using so what was enabling
0:09:04.080,0:09:11.600
me now was limiting me I had to wait until we
thought of other multimodal inputs like a track
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ball or like now there’s other input devices that
allow to interact with the technology when you’re
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designing for mobile or technology the key is
multimodal input how do we find multiple ways
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for people the input where on the mobile device
it could be typing on a touchcreen or why not use
0:09:36.080,0:09:45.360
voice somebody like me uses voice anytime because
disability is complex you can’t find one solution
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that solves all the only way you can build and
test for accessibility is through multimodal input
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and this happens more than just productivity but
even in gaming I remember when I was a kid going
0:10:02.960,0:10:12.320
to regular school the beauty thing was was there
was an Atari 2600 it allowed me to be in a video
0:10:12.320,0:10:19.040
game so not just so I could play video games but
it gave me the social platform where I could make
0:10:19.040,0:10:27.040
friends I could play with them compete with them
and even score against them and I got really good
0:10:27.040,0:10:33.800
where I could talk junk with them but the problem
is as games evolved the controllers went from one
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joystick to a button to what you see in front of
you multiple buttons and switches it turned out to
0:10:41.520,0:10:48.880
be that I could play real hockey easier than video
game hockey because the controllers were leaving
0:10:48.880,0:10:56.840
me behind and this is constantly the mismatch
that always happens as we evolve technology if
0:10:56.840,0:11:03.920
we don’t think about accessibility of front it
becomes the lagger and on Microsoft that’s when
0:11:03.920,0:11:10.400
we designed the Xbox game controller so you’ll
look at that controller and go what’s the big deal
0:11:10.400,0:11:18.000
about that and how do you do it with multitudes
of disabilities of different mobile challenges
0:11:18.000,0:11:26.080
and maybe different interactions remember the only
way to solell for complexity is flexibility so as
0:11:26.080,0:11:33.640
you can tell all the buttons along the top of the
controller they actually allow input switches so
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people can customize the way they want to interact
and find the right input for them to be able to do
0:11:42.200,0:11:50.440
that and we were always told when we designed
this that we’re very Innovative and Innovation
0:11:50.440,0:11:57.240
comes with you know what do we always heard
about Innovation solof for problems that people
0:11:57.240,0:12:07.200
don’t know exist yet and that is the beauty of
disability because mismatches are easy to see if
0:12:07.200,0:12:15.920
somebody doesn’t have a disability and runs into a
challenge they’re easy to mask it because of their
0:12:15.920,0:12:23.000
ability they can compensate for it where they
don’t realize it’s a mismatch where if you study
0:12:23.000,0:12:31.440
with people with disabilities that becomes a fault
stopping issue that now we can study it understand
0:12:31.440,0:12:37.840
What’s blocking them and solve the problem
to make it possible for them but it makes it
0:12:37.840,0:12:46.600
easier for everyone else I always like to say if
accessibility is the solution then disability is
0:12:46.600,0:12:54.360
the opportunity and when we design for disability
that makes it possible through one means of input
0:12:54.360,0:13:02.680
and output it gives everybody else a multiple
ways to choose from what they prefer depending on
0:13:02.680,0:13:12.640
the situation now we’ve seen a lot of problems we
solve for disability become kind of common place
0:13:12.640,0:13:21.320
for everybody else to use now Clos captioning was
originally designed for death people now if you go
0:13:21.320,0:13:29.120
into a bar your environment can prevent you from
listening but you can still follow the game on TV
0:13:29.800,0:13:36.400
when close captioning is on what if you’re a new
parent and you’re trying to put your children to
0:13:36.400,0:13:44.680
sleep now you can follow your TV shows with Clos
captioning without wakening the house or the Y
0:13:44.680,0:13:52.840
The Young Ones voice commands voice commands were
originally made for someone like me with a mobile
0:13:52.840,0:14:02.320
or dexterity challenges where we used it to really
dictate large volume of text to get content now I
0:14:02.320,0:14:09.920
watch all of you on your phones dictating and you
get just as frustrated as I do when you’re when
0:14:09.920,0:14:17.320
you’re dictating and they get it wrong that’s what
I call equality now we can be equally frustrated
0:14:17.320,0:14:24.440
and even texting texting was originally made for
dep people to have conversations we can argue that
0:14:24.440,0:14:32.120
teenagers are hard to hearing but texting is
became for everybody and I bet half the people
0:14:32.120,0:14:41.240
here today use Audi books or podcasts that was
originally made for people that were blind but now
0:14:41.240,0:14:48.000
everybody uses audio books when they can’t move
their eyes from what they’re doing for example if
0:14:48.000,0:14:55.400
you’re commuting to work and you want to keep up
on your on your books now you can play your audio
0:14:55.400,0:15:03.480
books because your eyes are supposed to be on
the road now you’re able to do multiple things by
0:15:03.480,0:15:10.160
using these things that were once accessibility
features now are wide open for everyone
0:15:10.160,0:15:23.400
else and this is how I like to really kind of
outline how we see disability and opportunity
0:15:23.400,0:15:30.760
there are people with pernament disabilities
through the way they think speak here see or
0:15:30.760,0:15:38.400
touch that you’re either born with it or you get
an accident which makes a pernament for example
0:15:38.400,0:15:46.120
for touch you could have one arm right you’re
born or you lost a limb throughout your life so
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we always got to make sure we have multiple ways
to interact that might not require two hands or if
0:15:53.640,0:16:00.320
it’s a temporary solution you could break your
arm hurt your elbow so temporarily you have a
0:16:00.320,0:16:08.400
disability but you still need a multimodal way to
do it there’s maybe situations where your one arm
0:16:08.400,0:16:15.560
isn’t available like if you’re rocking your baby
to sleep or maybe you’re in court and you got to
0:16:15.560,0:16:22.800
find a different way to do your paperwork and
come up with a way to do a lot of tax so when
0:16:22.800,0:16:32.400
we design for the pernament or temporary we also
get uh the situation you heard me about um being
0:16:32.400,0:16:40.240
able to see so either you’re born blind or you
might you know have a cataract but then you know
0:16:40.240,0:16:48.840
what you might need your Siri or your Android bot
to be able to speak to you because you can’t take
0:16:48.840,0:16:56.440
your cars off while you’re driving so when you
design for accessibility you’re giving users the
0:16:56.440,0:17:03.520
opportunity to be able to inter interact with
your technology no matter what the situation
0:17:03.520,0:17:12.160
and no matter what the environment is and we call
this inclusive design and inclusive design is one
0:17:12.160,0:17:20.360
of the principles is you design for one and
extend to many so that’s like looking at one
0:17:20.360,0:17:29.080
person with one type of disability really study
it and really figure out what the uniqueness is
0:17:29.080,0:17:36.600
the exclusion of it is and then you design and
build for it and then you adapt to it then you
0:17:36.600,0:17:43.360
use the inclusive design process and tools
to know that we’ve solved it for one what are
0:17:43.360,0:17:51.920
other diverse perspectives accessibility tools
and participation can we do to really extend
0:17:51.920,0:17:59.240
that with solving for one and extend to many like
what I shared before whether it was an audio book
0:17:59.240,0:18:05.760
whether there was many different things how
do you get it to enable everyone and that’s
0:18:05.760,0:18:12.200
the power of using an inclusive design process
you start with one you begin to understand the
0:18:12.200,0:18:19.240
problem look at the problem in a whole different
lens and then look at a broader beneficial impact
0:18:19.240,0:18:26.960
where everybody can use it just like what we
shared previously now when you’re advocating
0:18:26.960,0:18:34.720
for designing a accessibility and invest in it
there’s three usually things I look at there’s
0:18:34.720,0:18:42.480
the responsibility which everybody gets there’s
Equity what everybody gets and before I was in the
0:18:42.480,0:18:50.360
field I noticed those were the two things people
wait on but remember I came from product and other
0:18:50.360,0:18:57.920
non-accessible products I also want to talk about
the return on investment for when you design for
0:18:57.920,0:19:05.200
accessibility you’re extending your user base and
you’re getting to reach more and more you more and
0:19:05.200,0:19:13.640
more users but you need the ability to influence
I always like to say there’s storytelling that
0:19:13.640,0:19:19.480
might convince the hearts and Minds to invest
in it but there’s also data I always like to
0:19:19.480,0:19:26.400
say stakeholders speak two languages PowerPoint
and money so you need to be able to talk about
0:19:26.400,0:19:36.120
the hearts and The Logical sense to do it but
here’s the real business case to do it in 2030
0:19:36.120,0:19:44.760
there’s going to be two billion people that
actually identify as having a disability two
0:19:44.760,0:19:53.800
billion people let’s think about that that’s two
billion customers that’s two billion users if we
0:19:53.800,0:20:00.040
found another country on the planet with two
billion people but we haven’t sold Hardware or
0:20:00.040,0:20:08.160
software to we would instantly be going after
that market right away but the the truth is we
0:20:08.160,0:20:14.720
have a two billion people all around us that if
we don’t think about building for inclusively
0:20:14.720,0:20:24.600
and accessibility we’re leaving two billion people
two billion potential customers to the side that’s
0:20:24.600,0:20:33.040
money which we could be having and really there’s
a benefit of really the same product metrics why
0:20:33.040,0:20:40.920
we invest in accessibility there’s acquisition
right the more open we are to be able to our
0:20:40.920,0:20:47.040
software and Hardware to handle people of all
abilities or people with disabilities and everyone
0:20:47.040,0:20:53.440
else we get higher acquisition numbers because
we’re not excluding them from the beginning and
0:20:53.440,0:21:01.720
then if we make it good they activate and we keep
them and a great retention and they refer people
0:21:01.720,0:21:08.120
to the product because they see them using
it how it enables their life and it brings
0:21:08.120,0:21:16.560
Revenue we’ve all heard about the lifetime
value of a customer right that if you get
0:21:16.560,0:21:24.760
a customer early the longer you have a customer
the more profitable it is and less effort it is
0:21:24.760,0:21:32.240
to keep that customer happy there was the same
I once said when I first joined Microsoft an
0:21:32.240,0:21:40.240
executive went to me and said Dave why should I
give a damn about accessibility and I said we’re
0:21:40.240,0:21:46.080
all going to be disabled someday just some
of us beat you to it so when you design for
0:21:46.080,0:21:52.560
someone like me today you’re actually designing
for your future selves so if we know this is
0:21:52.560,0:21:58.680
where the Market’s going if we know this is
where every user is coming if we have techn
0:21:58.680,0:22:04.360
ology that meets their needs throughout
their whole ability life cycle we can
0:22:04.360,0:22:12.320
build that customer loyalty and keep them and
make them our most profitable customers as we
0:22:12.320,0:22:20.120
go and this is why I always say we’re all going
to be disabled someday it’s just a matter of
0:22:20.120,0:22:29.680
time we’re all there with it when I was a product
maker the first thing I was told was designed for
0:22:29.680,0:22:38.040
the masses so if we look at this par we look at
the center we’re always told to design for where
0:22:38.040,0:22:47.640
the majority of the users are that was false if
we design for the edges we get everybody else in
0:22:47.640,0:22:57.280
the middle so when we design develop and test for
the extreme we get everybody along the middle and
0:22:57.280,0:23:05.080
when I used to work at at a financial institution
they were going to build a banking nap and I was
0:23:05.080,0:23:12.840
leading the teams that were designing and building
it and they said Dave we put accessibility is a
0:23:12.840,0:23:21.360
version 2.0 and I’m like you know what I have
svel py but my money doesn’t so if you want my
0:23:21.360,0:23:28.880
money you better build a product from day one that
I can use or I’m going to spend my money elsewhere
0:23:28.880,0:23:36.560
it’s good business designing developing and
testing for accessibility because that’s a
0:23:36.560,0:23:43.520
market we need to go after there’s an aging
population we need to go after and I always like
0:23:43.520,0:23:51.200
to think about the pandemic we all had those older
relatives that used Zoom our teams for the first
0:23:51.200,0:23:58.120
time and they were using it and we could all see
up their nose as they were holding the screen if
0:23:58.120,0:24:06.680
we didn’t design technology to really enable them
that would have been the difference to be able to
0:24:06.680,0:24:16.240
talk to him during the pandemic to say I love you
one more time and regret so the best way to design
0:24:16.240,0:24:23.120
for accessibility like I showed in the process
earlier is designing people with the disability
0:24:23.120,0:24:30.600
and it’s also how do you do that you actually hire
and make sure you have diverse teams I always like
0:24:30.600,0:24:37.160
to say the people who build our products should
be reflective of those people who use our products
0:24:37.160,0:24:43.880
oops there’s a spelling mistake they out to
fix that but the thing is is we create Global
0:24:43.880,0:24:51.120
products now especially in mobile devices we’re
localized where we go everywhere but the thing is
0:24:51.120,0:24:59.400
is we need to be reflective of all our different
kinds of users so we build that from day one so
0:24:59.400,0:25:08.160
we make sure we build the product that everybody
wants to use can use with that up front because
0:25:08.160,0:25:16.280
it’s more than just designing accessible features
it’s about what people can achieve an experience
0:25:16.280,0:25:26.000
because that technology it’s not just my banking
app makes it accessible for me to you know use it
0:25:26.000,0:25:33.920
allows me to pay bills it allows me to live on
my own it allows me Independence it’s more than
0:25:33.920,0:25:42.080
the technology features it’s what people achieve
because of the technology and now we’ve enabled
0:25:42.080,0:25:49.440
I’ve been able to be where I am I’ve been able to
design but it’s all about really getting up front
0:25:49.440,0:25:58.240
early and designing it from the beginning because
it’s technology that all of you are going to use
0:25:58.840,0:26:06.360
so how do you get this from your stakeholders you
really kind of have to get buying from the top and
0:26:06.360,0:26:12.520
everywhere else we’re going to go and it’s really
connecting with everybody to be able to get them
0:26:12.520,0:26:20.280
involved and use start measuring the usability
start measuring the numbers that you have pre
0:26:20.280,0:26:28.480
accessible features and post accessible features
remember if you wait too late you might exclude
0:26:28.480,0:26:36.600
people from Ever trying your product again you
get one time to do a first experience and I know
0:26:36.600,0:26:43.480
this is really hard I know what I’m asking is
pretty much you know challenging for a lot of
0:26:43.480,0:26:50.600
people but you have to imagine the world what
it’s going to be because you know if I look
0:26:50.600,0:26:58.360
back to my life when I was born somebody like
me didn’t exist luckily my parents could have
0:26:58.360,0:27:07.160
imagine something different luckily I was able to
push through the challenges I had to struggle in
0:27:07.160,0:27:13.840
silence where hopefully no one needs to now and
whether you have a disability you recognize to or
0:27:13.840,0:27:21.200
not everybody knows what it is to struggle
everybody knows what it is to be excluded
0:27:21.200,0:27:30.160
but technology is the platform that is complex
challenging and brings everybody together it makes
0:27:30.160,0:27:39.080
what was previously impossible possible and if you
can look at the world differently if you can see
0:27:39.080,0:27:46.560
a different world then you’ll have a different
world available to you now I left some time for
0:27:46.560,0:27:54.960
Q&A because I would love to really discuss more
about how do we create a more inclusive workplace
0:27:54.960,0:28:00.920
how do we create more inclusive mobile products
and how do we make sure we’re doing it from the
0:28:00.920,0:28:08.240
beginning and testing at the end I’m going to look
at the chat here to see if there’s any questions
0:28:08.240,0:28:17.360
or Q&A oh thanks Cara designing for future self
so if you have any questions feel free to pop
0:28:17.360,0:28:28.400
it into the chat or is it the Q&A oh here we go
do you have a top three that some of us who may
0:28:28.400,0:28:36.880
not let me read more here I’m trying to learn
the tool too what are the three top things you
0:28:36.880,0:28:45.320
can focus on starting with great question Chris I
would say start with multimodal input and output
0:28:45.320,0:28:50.920
especially when it comes to mobile device I
know when I was designing one at a company
0:28:50.920,0:28:57.640
I was working for I came in because they were
um presenting it to me as a stakeholder and I
0:28:57.640,0:29:04.640
said did you guys try it with voice and they’re
like oh no we never thought of that and luckily
0:29:04.640,0:29:14.080
the iPhone IOS and dictation really handled it by
luck so when you’re designing mobile applications
0:29:14.080,0:29:21.400
try to think of is there multiple ways to input
keyboard and voice and different ways of output
0:29:21.400,0:29:28.040
can it be read and can the device uh read
the text so that way they can either read it
0:29:29.120,0:29:36.960
or listen to it um and think about different
ways to even visually see it what does your
0:29:36.960,0:29:43.480
app look like when it is on a high font
and high contrast so those are the three
0:29:43.480,0:29:50.680
things multiple input multiple output and
really validating that your design looks
0:29:50.680,0:29:58.040
properly in any different font size
hopefully that answered your question
0:30:01.800,0:30:07.360
Adam my friend do you have any questions yes I
wanted to pop in and just say thank you so much
0:30:07.360,0:30:13.680
I know I had a few people um direct messaging me
doing this saying it’s a it was a great session so
0:30:13.680,0:30:20.200
I think you have some new followers um I’m looking
at Woodrow’s comment here in the chat as well
0:30:20.200,0:30:24.680
worked for a company that didn’t care much about
accessibility until they wanted to get a contract
0:30:24.680,0:30:30.720
with the US government and then all of a sudden
they got to care well this is the thing too I want
0:30:30.720,0:30:38.240
to tell people um people think accessibility is
just compliance and I’m like just because I can
0:30:38.240,0:30:44.480
use your product doesn’t mean I would choose
it so no don’t build it just to Simply meet
0:30:44.480,0:30:51.200
compliance standards build it great that I want
to use it and I want to choose it that I want to
0:30:51.200,0:30:58.480
spend my valuable money to actually utilize it
and I know we get caught up in the comp iance
0:30:58.480,0:31:06.000
thing a lot but I think compliance is like the the
barrier to entry but if you start building a words
0:31:06.000,0:31:13.320
it’s exceptionally usable it helps everybody
yeah absolutely and I think you touched on
0:31:13.320,0:31:18.920
that with the slide too where even if you are an
able-bodied person you may have a temporary or
0:31:18.920,0:31:25.720
situational thing that has to be dealt with and
accessibility just really does help all of us I
0:31:25.720,0:31:33.160
like this do you recommend any tools for testing
accessibility I don’t really have a preference
0:31:33.160,0:31:43.120
on any automated tool that I think a lot of IDE
have naturally I’m a big I’m old school I rather
0:31:43.120,0:31:51.080
just you get users of different disabilities and
when you get to watch them use it because what
0:31:51.080,0:32:00.560
automation doesn’t show you is the cognitive load
or challenge it is for them to perform a function
0:32:00.560,0:32:08.520
because I think accessibility 1.0 and this is just
Dave opinion I think it stopped short of Simply
0:32:08.520,0:32:17.160
making it possible where I think in accessibility
2.0 we got to start making it a great experience
0:32:17.160,0:32:23.080
because we’re noticing a lot of accessible
features get abandoned and I think because
0:32:23.080,0:32:30.640
the automation shows is possible but we don’t
really appreciate even though we made it possible
0:32:30.640,0:32:38.440
we don’t see the user struggle that it takes
them now that it is possible so understanding
0:32:38.440,0:32:47.440
the cognitive load and the EAS of using it I
think really amplifies the need for human manual
0:32:47.440,0:32:54.840
testing I use automation like we do for all unit
tests to make sure you have your tab order your
0:32:54.840,0:33:04.520
tags and all those things for uh the compliance
standards but don’t ever shortcut the user testing
0:33:04.520,0:33:09.560
absolutely thanks Sean for your
0:33:09.560,0:33:21.280
comment yeah there were a couple questions I saw
in the chat as well let me try and find them um oh
0:33:21.280,0:33:27.960
wait Sean had a question when I extended it have
you seen accessibility needs ever framed out as
0:33:27.960,0:33:36.400
better UI and that has a better chance of getting
uh approved I beg borrow and install so I’ve used
0:33:36.400,0:33:43.280
that approach too to show that if we create
a user interface where the buttons aren’t too
0:33:43.280,0:33:51.080
close together it also helps people that might
be thick thumbed might have arthritis or you
0:33:51.080,0:33:56.640
know an easier Target to land you know not
that they should be using their device while
0:33:56.640,0:34:02.440
driving but if they happen to use their device
while driving it makes it easier for them to
0:34:02.440,0:34:13.520
multitask I didn’t mean to cut you off Adam oh
you’re good I think the Q&A comes first um yeah
0:34:13.520,0:34:20.320
so we had a couple questions in here from Tam
Lee uh the first one is uh what are some of the
0:34:20.320,0:34:25.840
challenges of mobile accessibility testing from
your experience and then the kind of follow on to
0:34:25.840,0:34:31.920
that is what are some best practices specifically
for mobile spe uh accessibility that you’re aware
0:34:31.920,0:34:43.440
of the biggest challenge for for mobile devices
is you’re limited to the multimodal inputs you
0:34:43.440,0:34:50.520
can do because of the portability of the device
sure you can connect Bluetooth peripherals that
0:34:50.520,0:34:57.800
would help but then it doesn’t make it any
portable right so I think the nature of the
0:34:57.800,0:35:04.800
portability it needs becomes the real challenge
so that’s why you have to use everything the
0:35:04.800,0:35:13.280
phone naturally has and even the camera as an
input method I’ve noticed um Apple recently is
0:35:13.280,0:35:21.480
starting to um use head tracking on their iPad to
be able to easily select different icons because
0:35:21.480,0:35:28.160
the camera can follow where you’re looking on the
screen so try to utilize the native things that
0:35:28.160,0:35:34.680
that do that and what was the second part of that
question Adam uh the second part of that question
0:35:34.680,0:35:40.640
were are there any best practices specifically
for mobile accessibility that you’re aware
0:35:40.640,0:35:50.520
of best practic is just multimodal right I
know I’m a broken record but if you do that
0:35:50.520,0:35:59.640
you cover a big chunk of things to go the real
challenge is is the difference between Android
0:35:59.640,0:36:09.760
and and iOS iOS is further ahead and their
accessibility Journey than than Android but
0:36:09.760,0:36:15.320
Google is actually really doing a lot of
good things to help enable developers to
0:36:15.320,0:36:26.760
use their accessibility features out of their
IDE so learn what classes in ide accessibility
0:36:26.760,0:36:35.080
features built in your programming thing and
try to leverage those and just join um join
0:36:35.080,0:36:42.880
a lot of meetups with accessibility and uh make
friends with people with disabilities right and
0:36:42.880,0:36:49.520
just watch learn and observe what they need to
do because then you understand by using the ID
0:36:49.520,0:36:57.800
and automation tools you coded to standard but
then by watching and observing it gives you idea
0:36:57.800,0:37:05.440
is how to go beyond that just like in normal
testing where we learn from users and use cases on
0:37:05.440,0:37:16.880
the edge cases kind of use the same approach but
for a specific segment of users yeah absolutely um
0:37:16.880,0:37:22.400
I have an offline question here from one of my
colleagues actually um are there any standards
0:37:22.400,0:37:28.440
for accessibility that you recommend I know in
our world we we kind of come up against w3c a
0:37:28.440,0:37:34.920
lot but are there anything specifically that you
think is worth paying attention to uh well w3c
0:37:34.920,0:37:43.560
gives you the right to RFP for things right so
it’s your barrier to entry so nail that one but
0:37:43.560,0:37:51.760
look at inclusive design practices and really
kind of um amplify that and if you put that
0:37:51.760,0:37:58.920
in your RFP it’s going to make you stand above
everybody else that might using an automation
0:37:58.920,0:38:10.840
cheacker I like the Shameless plug by by Cara
thank you for uh thank you for the link on uh
0:38:10.840,0:38:17.720
mobile accessibility testing and this is you
know when I seen carara post that it it kind
0:38:17.720,0:38:24.800
of brings a smile to me because when I
was born in the 70s my disability was
0:38:24.800,0:38:31.920
my parents Challenge and my challenge now
it’s comforting to see that organizations
0:38:31.920,0:38:39.640
like uh your organization is caring about
accessibility too and being an advocate for
0:38:39.640,0:38:47.680
it not just the people impacted by it and as
somebody that’s kind of been through the whole
0:38:47.680,0:38:57.280
spectrum of this that is so heartwarming to see
thanks Cara for H sharing that who could have
0:38:57.280,0:39:04.840
thought a Shameless plug would be heartwarming
exactly excellent any other questions from the
0:39:04.840,0:39:13.920
audience was this worth your time did
I put you to sleep I mean I think from
0:39:13.920,0:39:18.240
my perspective and the few people that reached
out to me directly this was an amazing session
0:39:18.240,0:39:23.520
I had quite a few folks ask me if this is
going to be available on demand as well so
0:39:23.520,0:39:27.360
I think they they definitely want to share
it with some colleagues and co-workers also
0:39:28.120,0:39:33.200
and please follow me on LinkedIn if you
have any questions after I’m always more
0:39:33.200,0:39:39.640
than happy to answer I might not respond right
away because I use voice to attack so I got a
0:39:39.640,0:39:47.240
dictated afterwards but um I’m always here to
make sure we help everyone and leave no user
0:39:47.240,0:39:56.760
behind absolutely yeah I think accessibility is
is more about usability at this point than than
0:39:56.760,0:40:01.880
specific individuals so thank you so much David
well what what I’ve been calling accessibility
0:40:01.880,0:40:09.160
for a lot of part is uh relevant because you heard
me say we’re all going to be disabled someday just
0:40:09.160,0:40:17.280
some to it so we can’t just call it accessibility
it’s going to be where you need to go because
0:40:17.280,0:40:24.280
that’s where all your user base will eventually
be what better to keep them is to knowing your
0:40:24.280,0:40:31.360
platform and knowing the flexibility that they can
use by using those features as they need either by
0:40:31.360,0:40:37.920
preference because a lot of times now I’ll let
um a screen reader read my blog post while I’m
0:40:37.920,0:40:45.120
checking my email even though I can visibly
read no problem it allows me to multitask but
0:40:45.120,0:40:52.760
if I ever lose my vision as I age now I know that
tool is available when it’s not just a different
0:40:52.760,0:41:00.600
or alternative method to consuming it might become
my own choice so when you design for accessibility
0:41:00.600,0:41:09.720
it’s the only path for some users but it gives
every other user a multitude of choice yeah
0:41:09.720,0:41:16.840
absolutely awesome well here we have a few minutes
before the next session begins so if any other
0:41:16.840,0:41:22.600
questions come through um we we’ll grab them while
we can and then David you’re more than welcome to
0:41:22.600,0:41:27.360
hang out with us throughout the event I’m sure
people can ping you through the chat as well so
0:41:27.360,0:41:32.840
thank you again this was an amazing session thank
you for having me and thank you everyone for your
0:41:32.840,0:41:39.320
great questions and engagement I’m hoping at
least even if half of you can carry things
0:41:39.320,0:41:47.000
forward it’s moving the movement further for
greater products wider user base and enabling
0:41:47.000,0:41:50.680
everybody well
0:41:50.680,0:42:01.120
said thank you everyone enjoy
the rest of your conference