accessibility
Updates to the Va11yS Open Source Project
With Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) quickly approaching, Sharon and I thought it would a be a good time to give you a brief update on our open source Verified Accessibility Samples project – or Va11yS. Jack Dam, our Accessibility Test Engineer, has been rigorously testing the latest samples and adding the results for […]
IBM Employees with Disabilities Volunteer Time to Create Accessible Technology
Who better to confirm the accessibility of solutions before they are released to market than people with disabilities? Being visually impaired, I rely considerably on magnification and altered colors to see what’s on my device screens. One day, not long ago, I sat in a room full of developers in a meeting and it was illuminating to […]
Simplifying the New WCAG 2.1 Guidelines
Recommendations for new accessibility guidelines were released on January 30, 2018 by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). In this new draft version of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), none of the current 2.0 Success Criteria have been altered. Instead, 17 additional criteria have been recommended for 2.1. This article is intended to help […]
Effects of AI on Aging and Ability
I recently attended the Boston Accessibility and Grace Hopper conferences, and from Orlando to Cambridge, artificial intelligence (AI) was at the center of discussions. The next generation of accessibility technology will be driven by AI and have a profound effect on improving the lives of people with disabilities and our growing aging population. It is poised to augment our […]
Maximizing Impact with Personalized Accessibility Training
There are many outstanding accessibility tutorials online. Yet, I’m finding that designers and developers are reluctant to go through them. I always wondered why? As I travel to many different IBM offices around the world training product design and development teams and understanding their needs, I believe I have found what makes them more interested […]
Combating Loneliness in the Aging Population
The world’s aging population is expanding rapidly, and by 2050 more than one out of five people will be age 60 or older. A new epidemic is growing just as quickly, with 43% of people over 60 reporting that they are suffering from loneliness. With an impact often equated to smoking 15 cigarettes a day, loneliness […]
Improving Eldercare with Cognitive Computing and the Internet of Things
by John W. Morgan, CEO, Avamere Family of Companies We are just beginning to see the impact Baby Boomers will have on the healthcare industry and post-acute continuum. Every month, more than a quarter million Americans reach retirement age, and each will have unique challenges and diverse and ever-evolving needs, especially as they acquire physical […]
The Future of Accessibility Shines Bright
Guest post from Richard Schwerdtfeger, IBM CTO of Accessibility Twenty-six years ago I walked into the IBM TJ Watson Research Center to help create the very first Graphical User Interface Screen Reader for the IBM PC. I did not know it but the impact of making the Graphical User Interface accessible on Windows and OS/2 […]
Who is Responsible for Accessibility?
It’s nice to see that accessibility has been garnering more headlines over the past couple of months. With more technology leaders finally grabbing hold of the reins to advance the awareness and importance of accessibility, the industry feels less like Sisyphus and instead is creating an avalanche of innovation in cognitive computing and artificial intelligence to enable […]