Just about all of the “tools” in GAFE can be used by anyone using the “public” version by opening a free Google account. In other words, anyone can create a Google account and instantly have accessed to many if not most of these free tools. The tools include:

• Gmail – the e-mail system, including mail servers, storage and archiving.
• Google Docs – a series of three “office suite” applications including word processor, spreadsheet and presentation applications.
• Google Sites – a web page hosting and page maker utility.
• Google Groups – an application service that creates custom mailing distribution lists.
• Google Calendar – an application that allows users to create multiple calendars and share them with other users.

What makes GAFE different from the public form of Google Apps is that for an annual domain license fee of $10, an educational institution can control all of these services within one domain name, manage their users’ access and control access to the content. Like the public form of Google Apps, all of these services are provided through the use of a browser (or special Google application for mobile devices) and server-based software in the so called “Cloud.” Apart from the annual fee, schools only need computers and access to the internet to be able to use this service.

Many schools and institutions of higher education around the country have signed up for GAFE as it can provide a tremendous savings to the organization. With the GAFE services, the institution may no longer have to maintain their own servers for web and mail services and may also no longer have to purchase and support desktop office suite applications like Microsoft Office. GAFE is operating system agnostic meaning it can run on any computer linked to the internet.

So what’s the problem?

The major problem comes in the form of issues related to the accessibility of GAFE by students with disabilities and the accessibility of content created by GAFE tools.

In a research study conducted by the Access Technology Higher Education Network (ATHEN) Google Apps Accessibility Interest Group published in October 2011, a comprehensive functional assessment was made of the Google Docs tools in GAFE by a cadre of people using a variety of common assistive technologies (AT) (ATHEN, 2011). In the executive summary, they state:

“These tests show that many people with disabilities are currently unable to successfully use these applications. No assistive technology tested was able to fully perform every function within these applications, and the level of support for assistive technologies ranged from being able to perform many, but not all of the functions to not being able to use the applications at all. Some of the major problems include:

• Speech recognition software users cannot dictate text into, or interact with the application.
• Keyboard-only users often cannot access the application menu, and thus, much of the functionality of the application.
• High contrast users cannot see many of the toolbar buttons and other user interface elements.
• Screen reader users cannot interact with the application reliably and effectively, reach and perform the desired functions, and cannot always determine what is being asked in “popup” windows.

Because of these and many other problems, which prevent entire populations of people from fully or sometimes even partially using the software, Documents and the Document List cannot be considered accessible.”

Some additional highlights from the initial ATHEN report were:

• The keyboard focus is not always visible.
• There is inconsistent implementation across browsers.
• There is no ability to apply established web accessibility standards when generating content.
• There is no ability to save user preferences for AT.

In a subsequent report published in February 2012 [PDF], ATHEN reviewed the results of a comprehensive functional assessment of two additional GAFE tools: Gmail and Google Calendar. The findings of that assessment suggest that Google had made some advancement in both the GAFE product and its documentation but it concluded that “there were still significant problems.” The authors concluded: “Google could easily do much more to make the entire interface more accessible. Significant work still needs to be done for visually impaired users, especially screen reader users. Many of the problems encountered in this report could have been solved if standard user interface elements had been used in ways specified by the W3C through the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).”

In a March 20, 2012 webinar hosted by EASI: Equal Access to Software and Information and presented by Greg Kraus and Scott Williams, two members of the ATHEN Google Apps Accessibility Interest Group, the following was learned:

• Despite an ongoing “conversation” with representatives at Google, progress to resolve the accessibility issues with GAFE has been slow in coming.
• Google appears most interested in pursuing a way to get GAFE to work with its own browser and text-to-speech plugin (ChromeVox), rather than working to ensure GAFE works with all browsers and all popular screen reader AT.
• For users of screen reader AT, there were issues with the large number and over-dependency on the use of “hot keys” (access keys) to complete common activities and the occasional conflict of the GAFE access keys with those used by other screen readers.
• Documentation on the use of the accessibility features of GAFE, while extensive, is not complete or easy to understand.
• Google Docs, the content-generating, office suite tools in GAFE were particularly difficult to use with AT including with ChromeVox which often crashed while using Google docs. (Note: This behavior was also observed by this author during a subsequent test of ChromeVox on a MacBookPro using OSX Lion.)

Conclusions

Again in citing the ATHEN report, it is important to note that GAFE is a relatively new product which has grown considerably in popularity and in functionality. Google has expressed some willingness to achieve success in terms of accessibility of the product and continues to work in that direction.

However, this consultant agrees with the final conclusions stated in the report:

“Google has made significant improvements for screen reader users when using Documents and the Document List, but these tests show that support for screen reader users is still poor and the needs of people with other types of disabilities have not been met. Considerable work still needs to be done to ensure that people with all types of disabilities can fully use the Google Application suite.” (ATHEN, 2011, p. 12) [PDF]

References

Access Technology Higher Education Network (ATHEN). Report on the accessibility of Google document. October 18, 2011.

Access Technology Higher Education Network (ATHEN). ATHEN Report on the Accessibility of GMail and Google Calendar. February 29, 2012. [PDF]

Kraus, G. & Williams, S. Report on the Accessibility of Google Apps (from the CSUN Conference), EASI Webinar: How Accessible Are Google Apps? Presented on March 20, 2012.

However students with disabilities who utilize Assistive Technology (AT) often have difficulty with CAT because the systems are not accessible to AT. They have, in particular, presented major challenges to students with print disabilities who use screen readers and/or Braille.

A recent article in Education Week describes what may appear to be a solution to this problem. Developed by the Oregon Department of Education along with help from the American Institutes for Research, the new adaptive test can be use with refreshable Braille displays and, if necessary, sections can be printed out by Braille embossers in the school.

It looks like it probably took a lot of time and money to accomplish this, but kudos to Oregon for leading the way.

Read the whole article on Education Week.

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Photo credit: Image licensed by Creative Commons by Sebastien.delorme

Another reference I want to share is regarding new federal laws and rules related to videos and captions. Because our friends at Automatic Sync Technologies (AST) have already done the work, I will share an excerpt from their recent AST Education Newsletter.

A mandate for Internet Protocol (IP)-Video captioning rules began in 2010, when the FCC established the Video Programming Accessibility Advisory Committee (VPAAC) as required by the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (CVAA).

The CVAA mandates that television content distributed on the Internet be captioned with at least the same quality as the television version. The VPAAC meetings are focused on how this will be achieved and the implementation schedule.

On January 13, 2012 the FCC announced adoption of a Report and Order establishing the scope of rules and the implementation timeline, based upon recommendations from VPACC, and its Advisory Work Groups and Committees.

On April 9, reports of all VPAAC Working Groups will be provided to the full VPAAC, which will then deliver its final report to the FCC to determine the rules to be added to the federal register of requirements later this year.

Once rules are entered into the register, the timeline for content owners to implement the new requirements will be:

• 6 months: Prerecorded programming that is not edited for Internet distribution.
• 12 months: Live and near live programming that was recorded within 24 hours of broadcast on television.
• 18 months: Prerecorded programming that is edited for Internet distribution.
• 24 months: Archival programming.

Anticipated to have a wide impact on protocols for all video programming, new FCC rules would govern TV stations, cable systems, broadcast and cable networks and virtually every video program producer who is now, or will in the future be making programming available for Internet access.

Read the rest of this article in the AST Education Newsletter.

In the correspondence that followed, my colleague noted that the mobile version of Facebook was “usable” with screen readers but we both agreed that there were a number of things that you could not do on Facebook using the mobile interface or even the iPad/iPod Facebook app.

I wish I had read a December 8th posting from Marco’s Accessibility Blog because he had done all of the work for me, detailing extensively the issues related to the two big social networking sites as well as several more – some of which I’d never heard of before. Marco’s “Social Networking and Accessibility: A rather sad picture” blog does give a pretty comprehensive, sad and up-to-date (he revised the blog several days later with new information) picture of the topic so I highly recommend reading it in its entirety. I like the fact they he did not stop with screen reader AT but also mentioned issues for folks with mobility issues and the requirement to use a mouse/pointing device to access content and perform functions with many of these services.

So, if you are looking here for a good, reliable and accurate review of the major social networking services and their lack of accessibility, head on over to Marco’s and check it out. I will be adding him to my blogroll.

Happy New Year – Let’s hope there are new and good things in store for accessible web design in 2012.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the announcement from Google that they had markedly improved the accessibility of various free apps they deliver to the public. In a article from the E-Access Bulletin of October, Brian Gaff, an accessibility columnist says “not so fast!”

Google Gaps:

Our regular correspondent Brian Gaff, who is on the committee of the Kingston upon Thames Association for the Blind, writes in to grumble about accessibility issues relating to Google services.

“Judging by the comments in the Google group ‘accessible’ it seems that Google have painted themselves into a corner with their new online apps like Google Plus and Google Docs,” Gaff says. “Half of them won’t work with most basic screenreaders and so they add ChromeVox to their Chrome browser. Hardly what blind folk would want, to have to alter access technology just to use Google’s stuff.

“The failing here surely is that the folk writing the code are not aware enough of what works and what does not for blind access. It’s sad that in this age we are still saying that the writers of code are not educated in making sites that just work out of the box, so to speak.

“Surely in this age when people want more users to generate more revenue, it ought to be a no-brainer to get as many folk as possible to be able to use web sites, software and online systems, but it seems it’s not. We are invisible I suspect.

“I block Google’s ads now as they persist in trying to sell me Venetian blinds… grin.”

Copyright 2011 Headstar Ltd http://www.headstar.com .

From CBS News-60 Minutes:

(CBS News) Ten-year-old Nuno Timoteo, an autistic child who does not speak, was thought to have the intelligence and attention span of a two-year-old until teachers put an iPad in his hands and learned he loved opera and classical music. Joshua Hood, 27, also non-verbal and autistic, was thought to understand much of his world, but his lack of speech frustrated him and all around him until he began communicating freely with a touch-screen tablet computer.

Nuno, Joshua and others whose autism prevents normal speech have made these breakthroughs with the help of tablet computers and special applications that allow them to communicate, some for the first time. Lesley Stahl reports on this new tool for understanding autism for a “60 Minutes” segment to be broadcast on Sunday, Oct. 23 at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

More of this story from 60 Minutes…

A preview of the episode…

We’ve recently made some accessibility enhancements to Google Calendar, Google Docs and Google Sites. Improvements have been made in keyboard shortcuts and support for screen readers among other items.

Google Calendar: Google Calendar now has new keyboard shortcuts and better screen reader support for our blind users. Members of the blind community can now use JAWS, VoiceOver and ChromeVox to manage your calendars, create and edit events or simply browse your events.

Google Docs and Google Sites: New keyboard shortcuts and better screen reader support with support for two screen readers: JAWS and ChromeVox.

Read the rest of the report

As reported here, you will recall that Google had gotten into some hot water with the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) last spring. NFB had lodged a formal complaint to the Department of Justice on concerns it had regarding the accessibility of these free applications. We’ll be checking them out and spreading the word.

For more information about this story and to read it in its entirety, please visit the AST website.

Two prominent disability rights groups have filed suit against prominent media companies for failing to provide closed captioning on internet videos.

In June, the National Association for the Deaf (NAD) charged Netflix in Federal court with violating the ADA based on the limited number of captioned shows available through the company’s “Watch Instantly” option. See the release announcing the lawsuit, and the actual complaint [PDF].

At the state level, the Greater Los Angeles Agency on Deafness (GLAD) has made a similar charge against news giant CNN. GLAD’s lawsuit alleges that CNN.com is violating California’s anti-discrimination statutes, the Unruh Civil Rights Act and the Disabled Persons Act, by preventing access to much of its news content. Both lawsuits come after months of active petitioning by NAD, GLAD and many others concerned with equal access to internet media.

Netflix and CNN acknowledge that the technology is readily available to add captioning, but question whether current legislation does in fact require them to provide it. The ADA and the Unruh Act became law well before anyone knew the how prevalent web media would become, and, as such, have no specific wording that legislates captioning of streamed movies and news. The Twenty-first Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act which became law last year will change this very soon. An FCC advisory committee has been hard at work since January developing specific recommendations for video programming accessibility. The committee has clearly made internet captioning its top priority, assigning the first and earliest report deadline to the work group examining the issue.

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Photo credit: Image licensed through Creative Commons by Daniel Oines

According to their official blog, Google reports that they have worked closely with the American Council of the Blind (ACB) to develop a survey that would give them “a greater understanding of how people choose and learn about the assistive technologies they use.” They go on to note that the survey “will help us design products and tools that interact more effectively with assistive technologies currently available to the blind community, as well as improve our ability to educate users about new features in our own assistive technologies, such as ChromeVox and TalkBack.”

The survey for people in the blind community, reportedly takes about 20 minutes to complete (link to the survey is here) and includes incentives by way of random drawings for gift certificates to Amazon.com.

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Photo credit: Licensed by Creative Commons by Robert Scoble

<rant>

I hope I am not the only one who is getting a headache from the Joomla! folks. Part of the problem is being caused by “business promoters” of all things Joomla. I mean, I appreciate that there are folks who are making a living by making the effort to take the open source CMS Joomla and create an easier to use, prettier to look at, and able to do more things product. But they are starting to make my head spin.

To give an example…today, I received an e-newsletter from a company (who will remain nameless) who sells value-added Joomla products (templates, mods, etc.). Nice folks.

The first article in the newsletter warns us that the end of version 1.5 is coming soon (in April 2012 BTW, eight months from now). They go on to talk about how Joomla 1.8 is right around the corner and that you should be preparing for this event. What!? Joomla 1.6 came out six months ago and Joomla 1.7 just came out two weeks ago! What’s the big hurry?

A couple of articles later the same newsletter has another story about the release of Joomla ver 1.6.6. What? This same company told me just two weeks ago that there would be no further development of Joomla 1.6 and that users of ver 1.6.5 (the then latest version) had to immediately switch to ver 1.7 or all of their websites would turn to pumpkins!!!

You can read about all the fun that caused me elsewhere in this blog.

I guess someone changed their minds and development on ver 1.6 is continuing.

The Joomla home planet gets into this fracas with this comment – clear as mud:

The Joomla Project is pleased to announce the immediate availability of Joomla 1.6.6. This is a security release and is intended only for those users who are unable to use version 1.7.0. Most users should update to 1.7.0 unless there are specific reasons why they cannot use 1.7.0 at this time. Update instructions for updating from 1.6.5 to 1.6.6 are available here.

The Production Leadership Team’s goal is to continue to provide regular, frequent updates to the Joomla community. Learn more about Joomla! developement at the Developer Site.

Version 1.6 will reach end of life on 19 August 2011. All users of version 1.6 should update to version 1.7.0 before that time. The update process to version 1.7 is very simple, and complete instructions are available here.

The thing for everyone to remember is, converting from 1.5x to anything is not an easy process. Many mods which you have learned to rely on are either not going to be upgraded or have a new equivalent built into the core, and more importantly, many of your v 1.5x theme files will not work with ver 1.6, 1.7 and presumably 1.8. If you purchased a theme or spent a lot of time developing one to your liking, it is likely that you will have to start all over again, or at the very least, spend some development time moving things around and getting them to work. Sure, the core and the database may covert easily, but getting your website looking good and running, well, that’s gonna take you some time.

</rant>

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Image licensed by Creative Commons by thetorpedodog