Facebook Accessibility for Users with Visual Impairments: What Facebook
Wants You to Know
Bill Holton
Document source link:
http://www.afb.org/afbpress/pub.asp?DocID=aw160402
Facebook is an excellent way to keep in touch with friends and family. For
users of computer and mobile access technologies, however, at times, there
can be challenges. The company continuously evolves its products, which can
introduce changes to screen reader flow. So, in order to help readers more
fully enjoy their Facebook experience, we are excited to offer the following
information.
Thanks to consumer feedback, and working with several organizations,
including the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB), Facebook has taken
accessibility to a whole new level. In July of 2011, the company formed the
Facebook Accessibility Team to improve its support of accessibility across
products. Recently, AccessWorld spoke with team founder, Jeff Wieland, and
accessibility engineer Ramya Sethuraman, who offered us a top-10 list of
things they'd like our readers to know about Facebook's accessibility
program and products.
Facebook Offers Extensive Keyboard Navigation
For computer users who do not use a mouse, including most screen reader
users, the main Facebook website makes extensive use of headings, landmarks,
and lists, which can be easily navigated with your screen reader navigation
keys. Additionally, the main Facebook website also offers an extensive
roster of Access and Shortcut keys to help you navigate the site and quickly
perform actions, such as liking, searching, and sharing.
Access Keys
"Access keys let you jump quickly from page to page [within Facebook] with a
single key combination and without having to Tab down to or search for the
appropriate control," says Wieland.
Key combinations vary by browser and/or system:
Chrome for PC users combine the ALT key with the access keys listed below.
IE users combine the ALT key with the access keys listed below, completing
each command by pressing the Enter key.
Firefox for PC users press Shift + ALT in combination with the access keys
listed below.
Mac users press Control + Option in combination with the command keys below.
Facebook Access Keys
Home
1
Timeline
2
Friends
3
Inbox
4
Notifications
5
Settings
6
Activity Log
7
About
8
Terms
9
Help
0
Shortcut Keys
Much the same way as most screen readers offer single-key navigation
shortcuts to help you quickly find your way around a webpage, Facebook
offers a number of single-key commands to perform various actions. Many of
these shortcut keys conflict with browser keys, however, so for now, at
least, you will have to either use your screen reader pass-through command,
or turn off enhanced browser navigation (Forms Mode in JAWS, Focus Mode in
NVDA, and Browser Mode in Window-Eyes).
"If you happen to be in an edit box, or on some other pop-up control, you
may have to Tab away or close the dialogue before using the shortcuts," says
Wieland.
Facebook News Feed Shortcuts
Scroll forward through News Feed stories
j
Scroll backward through News Feed stories
k
See more of the selected story
Enter/Return
Post a new status
p
Like or Unlike the selected story
l
Comment on the selected story
c
Share the selected story
s
Open an attachment from the selected story
o
Search
/
Search chat contacts
q
Open a list of these keyboard shortcuts while in News Feed
?
Facebook Messenger Shortcuts
Search conversations
CTRL + g
Show/hide keyboard shortcuts
CTRL + q
Archive/unarchive conversation
CTRL + Delete
Mark as spam
CTRL + j
Start a new message
CTRL + m
Go to Inbox
CTRL + i
Go to Other
CTRL + u
Facebook Is Making Photos and Videos More Accessible
"We're still rolling out the Dynamic Alt Text Generator to more products
that will improve the accessibility of both photos and videos," says
Wieland. "We gather all the metadata a user supplies and combine it to
generate a caption that tells a more complete story about that." This
Facebook Design video shows voicing for photos and videos before and after
Dynamic Alt Text captioning.
https://www.facebook.com/accessibility/posts/441575089212506
Check out the Mobile Apps for Facebook
Facebook offers a mobile site,
but Wieland encourages iOS and Android screen reader users to try the native
apps for these operating systems. "We've put a lot of work into improving
the accessibility of the Facebook and Facebook Messenger native apps, and in
some cases we can build accessibility experiences in these applications we
simply can't easily replicate on the Web (like use of gestures)," he says.
When you have finished reading a timeline entry using the iOS app, for
example, you can now perform a two-finger double-tap to summon a VoiceOver
menu, which includes options to Like the post, comment, turn on
notifications, or indicate "I don't want to see this" (which will hide the
story). The two-finger scrub gesture also now works to close any pop-up or
dialogue screen. The Facebook Messenger iOS app also now includes an Action
item on the rotor. Perform a one-finger swipe up to delete a message thread,
mute a conversation, archive a conversation and more.
It's Easy to Contact Facebook
"Facebook offers several ways to get in touch with the Accessibility Team,
and we love getting your feedback," states Wieland. Users can Like the
Facebook Access for People with Disabilities page to stay up to date on
accessibility work and improvements,
https://www.facebook.com/accessibility
visit the Facebook Accessibility Help Center,
https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/169372943117927
and follow the Facebook Accessibility Team (@fbaccess) on Twitter. The
Accessibility Help Center offers an accessibility bug report contact form
where you can report accessibility issues.
Spreading the Accessibility Message to Other Facebook Employees
In October of 2014, the Accessibility Team launched an installation at
Facebook Menlo Park, California headquarters called the Empathy Lab. The lab
is designed to showcase the different and various methods that people use to
interact with Facebook and broaden the company's understanding of how to
build products that are both usable to those with limited bandwidth and
accessible to screen reader users.
"We're hoping to give Facebook employees an idea of what it's like to use
Facebook with magnification or a screen reader. We do this with a collection
of laptops and mobile devices which can only be used with a keyboard or
using screen readers or on slow network connections," says Ramya Sethuraman.
"The installation has become so popular, we're looking to expand it to other
campuses so more members of the Facebook team can experience it."
The Facebook Team Is Constantly Improving the Accessible Facebook Experience
Below Wieland outlines just a few of Facebook's recent accessibility
enhancements.
You now have the ability to control font size in the iOS Messenger app.
https://www.facebook.com/accessibility/photos/a.544973158879747.1073741825.443376095706121/758430570867337/
New VoiceOver gestures were added to help people more easily access the
Delete, Mute, and More actions within iOS Messenger.
https://www.facebook.com/accessibility/posts/806063152770745
New access keys were added to the mobile site.
https://m.facebook.com/
A "Skip to News Feed" link was added to Facebook for people using just the
keyboard and screen readers to easily jump to the News Feed stories.
We now support multilingual caption files for Facebook Videos so you can
provide subtitles for all of your video content.
Here you can add captions to your photos.
https://www.facebook.com/help/261764017354370
Facebook Will Keep You Updated
Every month the team posts a comprehensive review of the key accessibility
changes and enhancements. Here's the February 2015 update and the
Accessibility Year in Review. "Follow our Facebook page so you don't miss
any future updates,"
https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-accessibility/february-2015-monthly-update/879521905424869
Wieland suggests.
Facebook Wants Your Help
Facebook has a dedicated User Experience Research team that runs many
different kinds of studies, including in-house usability studies and phone
interviews with people who use their products.
"Our last round of accessibility usability testing focused on TalkBack with
Facebook for Android," relates Wieland.
If you would like to be considered for participation in future studies and
getting paid for your feedback, send an e-mail to the accessibility research
team.
Accessibility Beyond Facebook
"The Facebook Accessibility Team is passionate about making accessibility
more mainstream, and one of our top priorities is to introduce accessibility
to new audiences," says Sethuraman. "For instance, last year we spoke at
Stanford University to introduce students to writing accessible code. We
also gave a talk on Web accessibility basics at the Grace Hopper
Conference."
In addition, the Facebook Accessibility team actively consults and
collaborates with various disability organizations. Notes Wieland, "Last
year we sponsored and spoke at the American Foundation for the Blind's
Leadership Conference. We also sponsored the American Council for the
Blind's summer conference in Las Vegas. We recently joined the American
Association of People with Disabilities Tech Forum and are excited about
collaborating with industry leaders on a range of accessibility related
initiatives."
For Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD), Facebook hosted companies
from the Bay Area for a round of lightning talks on accessibility
implementations. Guests included the co-founders of GAAD, Jennison Asuncion
and Joe Devon.
Facebook Is Hiring!
"We recently grew our dedicated accessibility engineering team, and we are
still hiring," says Wieland. "We are actively looking for an Accessibility
Specialist." You can read more about the position on Facebook's careers
page.
Robert Acosta, President
Helping Hands for the Blind
(818) 998-0044
www.helpinghands4theblind.org
__._,_.___
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by: "Robert Acosta" <[email protected]>
Bill White [email protected]
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kramlinger, Keith G., M.D. via Jfw" <[email protected]>
To: "'The Jaws for Windows support list.'" <[email protected]>
Cc: "Kramlinger, Keith G., M.D." <[email protected]>
Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2015 1:46 PM
Subject: RE: Facebook Accessibility for Users with Visual Impairments
What are the Pagges kyboard shortcuts, or where can I find them? Thanks,
Keith
-----Original Message-----
From: Jfw [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Michael Mote
via Jfw
Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2015 3:40 PM
To: 'The Jaws for Windows support list.'
Cc: Michael Mote
Subject: RE: Facebook Accessibility for Users with Visual Impairments
When you are on the web page, press JAWS key plus the letter Z.
-----Original Message-----
From: Jfw [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Daniel
McBride
via Jfw
Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2015 3:17 PM
To: 'The Jaws for Windows support list.'
Cc: Daniel McBride
Subject: RE: Facebook Accessibility for Users with Visual Impairments
Paul:
Please allow me to ask the stupid question of the day. How do I "turn off"
my virtual PC cursor?
Daniel
-----Original Message-----
From: Jfw [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Paul Martz
via
Jfw
Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2015 3:10 PM
To: 'The Jaws for Windows support list.'
Cc: Paul Martz
Subject: RE: Facebook Accessibility for Users with Visual Impairments
I missed the start of this discussion, but... As near as I can tell,
facebook is accessible through Internet Explorer. Turn off the virtual PC
cursor and use the page's keyboard shortcuts to move through your news
feed,
comment, like, and post your status. Am I missing something?
I agree that accessibility is rarely a priority in modern web page
development. The pages are designed for visual appeal first, and
retrofitted
for accessibility later. Facebook is a clear example of this. Nonetheless,
I
can use it for the common facebook tasks that I need.
-Paul
-----Original Message-----
From: Jfw [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Aidan
via Jfw
I don't care what life is or not. Fact is that facebook don't do their
job
when
it comes to accessibility. There is always excuses for them and
Microsoft, while the proofe is there that they don't care at all.
Facebook fix some things and then brake others. They stil don't do
enough.
And neither Microsoft. And that is why we shell keep paying fru our
necks for jaws upgrades. So they can have a great life. As far as I
know, the shortcuts in jaws 16 work on the full site.
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