Accessibility Glossary

Accessibility is a practice that is followed to make your websites and other digital assets usable for everyone regardless of their personal disabilities.

An accessibility audit is a process of evaluation of how well your website supports the needs of users with disabilities.

Accessibility awareness is an act of spreading awareness about the need for web accessibility. This act drives more and more people to make their website accessibility friendly.

Accessibility bar is a software add-on that is installed on a website. It adds features that help people to personalize your website according to their needs. It is also called Accessibility Plugin.

Accessibility compliance is the act of adhering to accessibility laws

Accessibility conformance is the act of adhering to the law and following the standards of accessibility. Violating the laws leads to a risk of accessibility lawsuits.

It is a tool that checks and suggests the best contrast between background and foreground colors.

Accessibility Design Principles are certain web accessibility requirements defined by the World Wide Web Consortium. These requirements are to be fulfilled by the vendors who want to make their websites disabled-friendly. These principles are also called Accessibility Standards.

Accessibility laws are the laws passed by different countries. These laws state that all kinds of content have to be made accessible to disabled people across the world. These laws are also termed as Accessibility Regulations.

An accessibility lawsuit is a case in a court of law. That is, a case is filed by a user against the organization owning the website. A user files a case when they find the organization not abiding the accessibility laws.

Accessibility Scanner is a monitoring software that suggests accessibility improvements and finds accessibility issues on the website.

An accessibility statement is a document that contains an overview of the accessibility features of your website. It acts as a resource for those who have questions about the features of your website.

Accessibility strategy is the overall planning of an organization in terms of accessibility.

It is the process of making sure that any kind of person can use your website easily. This is done by making changes on your website so that it supports usage by the disabled.

ADA stands for Americans with Disabilities Act. It is a civil rights law. This law prohibits discrimination and ensures equal opportunity for persons with disabilities.

Alt tag also called alternative tag. It provides text equivalents for non-text content. It is usually a short text that describes images.

Alternative information is an equivalent content in a different format than the original content. While both convey the same information.

ARIA stands for ‘Accessible Rich Internet Applications’. It is a set of tags that you can add to HTML elements. These tags help Screen readers to understand the functionality of controls on the web page.

Assistive technologies are tools/software designed to help people with disabilities to access and use web contents.

It is a process of converting audio into text and displaying it along with running video on the screen.

ChromeVox is a screen reader created by Google. It helps the users to read content on the internet in the form of speech.

Clickability cue is a visual indication that a given word or item on a Web page is clickable. Signals that can be used to indicate the clickability of an item are color, underlining, bullets, and arrows.

Through your thoughts, experience, senses, and action you acquire knowledge and understanding about the things around you. This mostly happens within your mind. This is called cognitive Capability.

Contrast Ratio is the measurement of the visual difference between background and foreground colors. This difference is expressed mathematically.

Dyslexia is a learning disability that makes an individual’s ability to read, write and speak difficultly. People with dyslexia face problems with reading, pronouncing words, spelling, writing words, attention span, and others.

A focus indicator is a solid or dotted border drawn around the place where the keyboard is focusing on. It serves as a visual indicator for the element that will respond to the next user action

An Image map helps to create clickable areas on a single image. These clickable areas result in relevant actions associated with them.

Impairment is a disability of a specific type. Impairments are problems in the structure or function of the organs of our body.

JAWS stands for Job Access With Speech. It is a screen reader software. It is used by the visually-impaired to read the web information as they can't see

Mnemonic is a learning strategy designed for kids who have disabilities. It is also used by all kids. It is used to improve the memory of the kids.

Few people suffer from malfunctioning of their body parts. This is called Motor Disability.

Screen Reader is a software or a tool that reads the contents of the screen aloud to the users.

It is a regulation that states all the electronic and information technology (EI&T) developed and maintained should be accessible to people with disabilities.

It is a disability in which uncontrolled electrical activity happens in the brain. This results in confusion, jerking movements of the arms and legs, fear, anxiety and so on.

Semantic is a method in which HTML codes are written to create a web page for better accessibility.

It is a disability that affects the normal functioning of one or more of your sense organs. (Sense organs: Eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin)

Tab order is an HTML attribute that defines the order in which the focus has to switch between the page elements when using a keyboard for navigation.

Transcripts are text representations of any audios or videos played on screen. For a video, the transcript can also include the description of actions, graphics, and scene changes.

It is the design of a product in a way that it can be used by all irrespective of their disabilities. It is a design that can be used to the maximum extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design.

Voiceover is an inbuilt screen reader for Apple Inc.'s products like iPhones, Macbooks, etc.

It stands for Voluntary Product Accessibility Template. It is a document that is created by a vendor to show a product's compliance with the accessibility standards.

Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) is an initiative by the  World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to improve the accessibility of the internet for people with disabilities.

These are solutions for all the accessibility issues on a website. These solutions are of different forms. Such as accessibility toolbar, accessibility scanner, accessibility monitor and a few more.

Web Accessibility Tools are the tools used to design, develop and test your website with respect to its accessibility.

WCAG is a document published by World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). W3C is the main international standards organization for the Internet. It focuses on providing technical standards for the web across the world.

World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the main international standards organization for the Internet.