Topic on Talk:Growth/Personalized first day/Newcomer homepage

Moxy (talkcontribs)

Wonderful to see mobile access as a priority and being tested. This is something that is currently lacking in many of English Wikipedias new editor landing pages. Has the project also been thinking about blind readers with screen readers. My disability prevents me from using a mouse effectively often...thus I use voice navigation software or if not able to use (as a result of complicated coding) the tab button is used. My only recommendation is information all on one page as clicking link after link is very difficult for many of our disabled readers.... who could easily become editors if over navigation obstacles are removed --Moxy (talk) 23:06, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

MHurd (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Hi @Moxy


Great recommendation! Just to double-check, are you referring to having to expand each section one by one? If so, a couple things come to mind...


On wider screen (tablet) devices the mobile interface loads with all sections expanded. Separately, but related, when screen readers (or tab navigation) are used with the desktop interface, I see a "Jump to navigation" link appears, but seems hidden otherwise.


I was wondering if perhaps a similar (normally hidden yet focusable) "Expand all sections" link for the non-wide-screen mobile interface would be a useful approach?


Any thoughts?

Thanks!

Moxy (talkcontribs)

i.e Help:Introduction VS Wikipedia:Contributing to Wikipedia. Accessibility for all should be an end goal for any page especially help pages. Module tutorials like Help:Introduction requires someone to click 60 times to find servicible info - let alone discouraging having to review so many pages. Also format should work with screen readers (need alt text) and work in mobile view and TV boxs. A table of contents is also very important to help with navigation when no mouse is used and is why collapsed items should be omitted.--Moxy (talk) 22:06, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

MMiller (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Hi @Moxy -- thank you for looking at the Growth team features and bringing up accessibility. In general, we try to make sure that our features are accessible by using visual components that are built for accessibility. That said, there are still some parts that we may have missed. After your comment, we ran some tests that brought up two issues that we want to work on: this one and this one. Beyond those, would you be interested and willing to help us test out the features for accessibility? We can set you up with the features in Test Wikipedia. Let me know!

@MMiller (WMF) We now have some horrible stats...as seen here the vast majority of potential editors dont go beyond the first page of the tutorial and that page has zero serviceable information. We need a page the is navigable with a TOC and works with screen readers.--Moxy (talk) 11:48, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
MMiller (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Thanks, @Moxy, for posting those stats about the Help:Introduction page. That's actually something built and maintained by volunteers, and I recently saw a conversation in which it would be given more prominence on English Wikipedia. @Sdkb -- these thoughts on the accessibility of the Help:Introduction page might be interesting to you, as you continue to talk about whether to send more newcomers toward it. If there are ways that WMF staff could help with the accessibility of the page, let's keep talking!

Sdkb (talkcontribs)

Thanks for the ping, @MMiller (WMF)! We introduced a single-page version of the Help:Introduction series a month ago; it is linked from the main menu page for anyone who prefers it for accessibility or other reasons. I also brought the series to WikiProject Accessibility a little while back to have the folks there vet it. With that said, if the WMF has folks who specialize in accessibility and want to take a look, I'd be very happy to hear any suggestions they have.

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