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Definitions

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assistive technology

Assistive technologies include the following:

  • screen magnifiers, and other visual reading assistants, which are used by people with visual, perceptual and physical print disabilities to change text font, size, spacing, color, synchronization with speech, etc. in order to improve the visual readability of rendered text and images;

  • screen readers, which are used by people who are blind to read textual information through synthesized speech or braille;

  • text-to-speech software, which is used by some people with cognitive, language, and learning disabilities to convert text into synthetic speech;

  • speech recognition software, which may be used by people who have some physical disabilities;

  • alternative keyboards, which are used by people with certain physical disabilities to simulate the keyboard (including alternate keyboards that use head pointers, single switches, sip/puff and other special input devices.);

  • alternative pointing devices, which are used by people with certain physical disabilities to simulate mouse pointing and button activations.

focus
When a webpage item that can be operated, such as a link, received 'focus' it is highlighted in some way, such as the cursor turns into a hand if the mouse if used, or a border is placed around the link if it is tabbed to using the keyboard
input device
Any device that provides input to a computer, such as a mouse, keyboard, tablet, joystick.
screen reader
A software package that reads a webpage to a person through synthesized speech or presents it in a refreshable braille display
semantic function
Webpages should be structured using semantic elements, which means that elements are used according to their meaning, not how they appear visually.
structure in documents and webpages
Structure refers to semantic elements that help organise the content in a way that can be interpreted by assistive technology. Examples are headings, lists, table of contents, and table headers. Structure is added with an editor that is capable of adding the right code in the background.
text alternative
A text description that achieves the same outcome for the user is the alternative. For example, if presenting a video on a webpage, what is the video for, or what experience is intended for the user? A description of the action in the video may not serve the same purpose. A text description of time-based visual and auditory information needs to be correctly sequenced and provide a means for achieving the outcomes of any time-based interaction.