
Ask HN: Areas with poor accessibility that can be improved by technology? - theonionknight
My university is hosting a hackathon with the theme of &quot;accessibility&quot;--which we are allowed to interpret broadly. My team is currently brainstorming ideas. So HN, broadly speaking, what areas&#x2F;industries&#x2F;niches have you encountered with poor accessibility that can be greatly improved by an application?
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open-source-ux
" _What areas /industries/niches have you encountered with poor accessibility
that can be greatly improved by an application?_"

Huge swathes of the web (websites and web 'apps') are plagued by poor
accessibility.

My suggestion is to build something that is not tied to a particular niche or
industry, but almost everyone uses: email in the browser.

This would not be an actual working email service with a functioning back-end
- it would be a front-end demonstration of how to implement a fast, accessible
service.

Some things to aim for that will make it standout from existing email
services:

\- The email service when rendered in a browser will load instantly without
complicated JavaScript tricks. Your service will be accessible to screensavers
without the need to have two versions (a 'basic', limited version and a
'enhanced' version you can overstuff with JavaScript).

\- The service is built with HTML with the correct semantic elements so that
it can be navigated quickly by a screen-reader and by keyboard. JavaScript is
perfectly fine, but the service should be functional even without JavaScript
(e.g. progressive enhancement).

\- The email service when rendered in the browser can be zoomed into at least
300% without breaking the display of elements and still remaining usable.
There will be sufficient contrast.

\- The site must load faster than any existing email service and be usable no
matter what someone's connection speed (even a 2G connection).

\- Finally, it must look aesthetically pleasing too.

This might all seem impossible, but with HTML + CSS (and JavaScript when
needed) it's perfectly possible to create something lighter, faster, less
complicated and more accessible than what the major players produce.

Here is an example of an email layout from the Yahoo! Pure CSS framework -
this is actually quite old, but the HTML source is less than 10kb:
[https://purecss.io/layouts/email/](https://purecss.io/layouts/email/)

~~~
theonionknight
Wow, thanks for the comprehensive reply! What would you recommend I use as a
guide for the correct semantic elements? A11Y?

~~~
open-source-ux
The Mozilla developer website has a complete reference site on HTML5 with
examples of each HTML5 element and the correct usage:

[https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
US/docs/Web/Guide/HTML/HTML...](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-
US/docs/Web/Guide/HTML/HTML5)

I also like the HTML5 Doctor site - they have a less formal, sometime more
readable tone:

[http://html5doctor.com/article-archive/](http://html5doctor.com/article-
archive/)

