Monthly Accessibility Skype: Call for Topics: March 13, 4pm UTC/11am CDT

We could also talk about the Modules page redesign.

There has been some discussion in Skype with Bojhan, Everett, and Siddhant.

There is a sandbox online to test a proposal: http://drupal.org/sandbox/jenlampton/1461916 . You can test it on this site here: http://kreatiekunde.nl/module/drupal/ Username: admin, password: [contact me in Skype to get the password].

And there is an issue filed against that sandbox here: http://drupal.org/node/1467914

I'd like to discuss Drag and Drop plans for D8. It sounds like Drupal 8 might make more use of drag-n-drop for things such as blocks layout. I believe we have two approaches to making those new capabilities accessible.

One approach would be to use the full-blown HTML5 and ARIA drag-n-drop standards in D8. But the down-side is that assistive technology might not work with that for years.

An alternative approach would be creating another user experience for achieving the positioning of items. For example, we could have an admin screen where users could choose locations of items using drop downs or "Move this block" links rather than just using drag handles alone. This approach might be best for tablet/iPad/touch interface users too, not just for accessibility.

I'd love to hear others' thoughts on drag-n-drop accessibility approaches.

Would be useful to talk more about http://groups.drupal.org/node/209513 as well. There's a bit more momentum since the last call, but this is one we need to get into core - http://drupal.org/node/447816

Below are my very rough notes from today's call. Feel free to reply with corrections or additions.

Introductions

• Kris Vanderwater - @eclipsegc on drupal.org - relationship of blocks initiative
• Mike Gifford - open concept - @mgifford
• Annette Carter - @newcreation - from Central CA
• Everett Zufelt - @Everett Zufelt - CA between Ottowa and Toronto - accessibility co-maintainer
• Dan Mouyard - @dcmouyard - outside of Washington DC
• Geri Druckman - in Houston TX, works for Nobility (does accessibility work)
• Brandon Bowersox-Johnson - @bowersox - also an accessibility co-maintainer
• From Iowa: Todd Weissenberger, with colleagues Ken and Bryan - developers on core Drupal project to offer free Drupal service to all University of Iowa units

1. D8 Accessibility One-Pager

See a first draft from Mike and Everett here: http://drupal.org/community-initiatives/drupal-core/accessibility . It could use a goal statement. Feel free to post comments, edit that page (if you have rights to), or send input to Mike via Skype.

2. Drag and Drop Approach

• bowersox introduced the two approaches that were summarized above.
• Everett Zufelt: HTML5 defines some attributes and data to say that items are draggable, but User Agents do not implement this yet (no accessible implementations are available yet).
• Kris: Can I implement HTML5 drag-n-drop with Javascript and hidden form elements -- and then on top of that provide an accessible way?
• Everett Zufelt: The UX people do give us resistance when we do things like "Show row weights". If we can work through how to switch from the default UI to the accessible UI, that is critical. But otherwise this concept of exposing form elements will work.
• Kris: From top to bottom, here is what we envision: Most of the output of Drupal 8 would be driven by blocks. There would be default layouts, and ability to override for a given page or type of page. Maybe the notion is similar to Panel. But we want to make it accessible and make it a better UI than Panels. Layouts would be more like Page Manager layouts. The Theme might not necessarily have a page.tpl.php any more. The layout could be completely separate from the theme. It would be important that when you change the theme of your site, the layouts do not all fall apart. There could be packages of layouts out in contrib land.
• Everett: I already have ideas of how the current Panels Layout Manager could be accessible. Exposing form fields is the basic idea. Most important is ensuring a good user experience for drag-n-drop as well as a good experience without a pointing device.
• Mike: As soon as possible it would be great to have something demo-able so we can evaluate it.
• Kris: Acquia has been pitching ideas and the discussion is about building an HTML5/JS/CSS prototype of it that would live totally outside of Drupal at first. That would be the time to dig in to evaluation.
• Kris: Panels has a flexible layout that you can build from scratch in the UI. A grid layout like 960 could be a starting point for this.

3. Media Module Feedback

• Everett: Introduced the invitation for feedback. Media Module, as many people know, allows media management of images and videos and other assets that may live inside or outside of the Drupal site itself. The Media Browser (for selecting the asset to embed) seems to have some accessibility problems. Also the "ALT Text" should be contextual and live with the image's usage in its context, rather than just living with the image itself. Maybe the ALT text it provides can be a default that is overridable for each context or page it is placed in.
• Have you seen a good Media manager?
• Who is using Media Module?
• Dan: I have some good experience using parts of it, but have not looked at the accessibility of those parts of the UI.
• Mike: Where can we post feedback? Everett will see if there's an open issue.
• Todd: We have some feedback and things we've learned that we are ready to share. We hacked the media module?
• There are 3 open issues here: http://drupal.org/project/issues/media?text=accessibility&status=Open&pr...

4. Modules Page Redesign

Everett gave background about the ideas for redesign of the modules page. The page is currently too overwhelming and has too many details exposed. So the idea is to get rid of the dependencies and allow people to click on that row to expand that information. The current approach in draft format is mouse-driven, so they are working on a link or other info. Feel free to test it out or give feedback here: http://drupal.org/sandbox/jenlampton/1461916 .

5. Form Error Design Wiki

• bowersox: Gave background of this conversation: http://groups.drupal.org/node/209513 .
• Everett: Ideally we want the link to land you on the label first, and then have the error message next, and then have the field.
• The ARIA-described-by could include the element that wraps the error. Described-By can take one or many IDs, so one of those can be the error. It could read Label, Error and Description in that order.
• Mike: I have reached out to a bunch of people to get more feedback. But we need more feedback in this issue queue/wiki itself.

DrupalCons and BoFs

One BoF is already scheduled on 'Designing Accessibility': http://denver2012.drupal.org/bof/designing-accessibility . A second General Accessibility BoF is being scheduled by Dan, perhaps for Wednesday at 5 or Thursday at 2:15. Bowersox offered to make Skype available at both for remote participants to join in. Contact 'brandonbowersox' via Skype if you are interested.