Web Content Guidelines Accessibility 2.2: What’s new?

Mada Center Qatar is a W3C member working on the localization of the international standards and guidelines to enhance the digital accessibility journey of persons with disabilities and the Elderly, Since January 2020, Mada leads the Authorized Arabic Translation of WCAG 2.1 [1] with the support of W3C Chapters of GCC and Morocco and the Reviewers’ Committee members from 49 organizations [2]. The door is open for experts to join the committee and to collaborate for the benefit of all.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) [3] cover a wide range of recommendations for making Web content more accessible. Following these guidelines will make content more accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities, including accommodations for blindness and low vision, deafness and hearing loss, limited movement, speech disabilities, photosensitivity, and combinations of these, and some accommodation for learning disabilities and cognitive limitations; but will not address every user need for people with these disabilities. These guidelines address the accessibility of web content on desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices. Following these guidelines will also often make Web content more usable to users in general.

The proposed new success criteria in the Working Draft of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 [4], a W3C Recommendation, is listed below. WCAG 2.2 Working Draft provides 9 additional success criteria to the public WCAG 2.1 released on 05 June 2018 [5]. All success criteria from 2.0 and 2.1 are included in 2.2. The 2.0 and 2.1 success criteria are the same (verbatim, word-for-word) in 2.2.

Guideline 2.4 Navigable

Provide ways to help users navigate, find content, and determine where they are.

2.4.11 Focus Appearance (Minimum) (AA)

• Minimum area:The focus indication area is greater than or equal to a 1 CSS pixel border of the focused control or has a thickness of at least 8 CSS pixels along the shortest side of the element.
• Change of contrast:The color change for the focus indication area has a contrast ratio of at least 3:1 with the colors of the unfocused state.
• Adjacent contrast:The focus indication area has a contrast ratio of at least 3:1 against all adjacent colors for the minimum area or greater or has a thickness of at least 2 CSS pixels.
• Unobscured:The item with focus is not entirely hidden by author-created content.

keyboard focus indicator that has a pattern or gradient may have parts that do not meet the 3:1 contrast ratio for the change of contrast, if an area equal to the minimum does meet the contrast ratio.

If the control has a visible boundary smaller than the hit area, the size measurement is taken from the visible boundary.

The working group is interested in feedback about the minimum area metric, and if there are unusual scenarios where visible indicators are caught by the wording.

2.4.12 Focus Appearance (Enhanced) (AAA)

• Minimum area:The focus indication area is greater than or equal to a 2 CSS pixel solid border around the control.
• Change of contrast:Color changes used to indicate focus have a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 with the colors changed from the unfocused control.
• Unobscured:No part of the focus indicator is hidden by author-created content.

2.4.13 Fixed Reference Points (A)

When a web page or set of web pages is an electronic publication with page break locators, a mechanism is available to navigate to each locator and each locator maintains its place in the flow of content, even when the formatting or platform change.

Guideline 2.5 Input Modalities

Make it easier for users to operate functionality through various inputs beyond the keyboard.

2.5.7 Dragging (AA)

All functionality that uses a dragging movement for operation can be operated by a single pointer without dragging unless dragging is essential.

This requirement applies to web content that interprets pointer actions (i.e. this does not apply to actions that are required to operate the user agent or assistive technology). Is there an assistive technology that helps people with mobility impairments? The group would like to get feedback on the frontier between AT & author responsibility.

2.5.8 Pointer Target Spacing (AA)

For each target, there is an area with a width and height of at least 44 CSS pixels that includes it, and no other targets, except when:

• Enlarge:A mechanism is available to change the CSS pixel size of each target, or its spacing, so there is an area with a width and height of at least 44 CSS pixels that includes it, and no other targets;
• Inline:The target is in a sentence or block of text;
• User-agent:The size of the target is controlled by the user agent and is not modified by the author;
• Essential:A presentation of the target is essential to the information being conveyed.

This criterion has been formulated to increase the hit-area of small targets, but the group would like feedback from providers of touch-screen devices if there is another way of forming the criteria to better complement the tap-heuristics used.

Guideline 3.2 Predictable

Make Web pages appear and operate in predictable ways.

3.2.6 Findable Help (A)

For single-page Web applications or any set of Web pages, if one of the following is available, then access to at least one option is included in the same relative order on each page:

• Human contact details;
• Human contact mechanism;
• Self-help option;
• A fully automated contact mechanism.

Access to help mechanisms may be provided directly on the page or may be provided via a direct link to a different page containing the information.

3.2.7 Hidden Controls (AA)

Controls needed to progress or complete a process are visible at the time they are needed without requiring pointer hover or keyboard focus, or a mechanism is available to make them persistently visible.

Guideline 3.3 Input Assistance

Help users avoid and correct mistakes.

3.3.7 Accessible Authentication (A)

If an authentication process relies on a cognitive function test, at least one other method must also be available that does not rely on a cognitive function test.

3.3.8 Redundant Entry (A)

For steps in a process, information previously entered by or provided to the user that is required on subsequent steps is either:

• auto-populated, or
• available for the user to select.

Exception: When re-entering the information is essential.

Security verification, such as repeating a password, is considered essential.

References

1. Authorized Arabic Translation WCAG2.1 https://nafath.mada.org.qa/authorized-arabic-translation-wcag2- 1/
2. Authorized Arabic Translation WCAG2.1 Reviewers’ Committee members https://nafath.mada.org.qa/authorized-arabic-translation-wcag2-1/reviewers-committee-members/
3. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/
4. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.2 (WCAG 2.2) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG22/
5. What’s New in WCAG 2.2 Working Draft https://www.w3.org/WAI/standards-guidelines/wcag/new-in-22/