Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility • Hacker News Board

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#231

Post by CuriouslyC » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 9:50 PM UTC

freedomben wrote: post #223

CuriouslyC wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The opposite of that actually. Nobody is going to bother with websites if it's just data that gets slurped up by AI and fed back to people, it's a lot of work for no payout. People who make websites are going to make them interactive multimedia experiences that pull you away from the chatbot to feel something. The New York Times the information dump has no future, the New York Times the interactive multimedia social…

I can't speak to GP, but AI is exactly what I had in mind when I read their comment. With AI transforming website content, the sites themselves just become data sources. You could be right though, especially with more and more sites blocking robots. Legitimate companies might just have to shrug and say, "this site prohibits me from reading it. You'll have to go there instead) though that seems like a legal problem to…

Sites that try to use robots.txt to stay relevant are going to fail spectacularly. All their information is going to leak or be provided by other sources, and they're going to get forgotten. The only people who will be able to make a living selling data will be the ones who can produce data so unique that nobody else can claim to have created it, and for which training on it leaves an unmistakable signature that makes litigation easy.

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#232

Post by atomicUpdate » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:12 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #195

madeofpalk wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know - I'm always amused at how companies will try all sorts of growth hacks to eke out an extra 1% of DAU or whatever, but won't prioritise building products for human beings.

Companies do all sorts of (IMO insane) things to their apps that reduce their reach. Ignoring accessibility is just one of them. I remember when I was in the app-writing business, and our devs would be constantly trying to bump up the minimum OS version supported. “See here, it says that only 10% of customer devices are on OS version 10.1 and below. We must bump our minimum version to 10.2 because us developers are t…

> "See here, it says that only 10% of customer devices are on OS version 10.1 and below. We must bump our minimum version to 10.2 because us developers are tired of supporting this old shit and legacy code paths!"

This makes sense if that 10% are costing more money than they generate, which seems especially likely since people that are frugal enough to (for example) hang onto an iPhone 7 are also unlikely to spend much on other frivolous purchases.

Supporting those older devices can range from supporting multiple code paths due to different APIs, or fallbacks for missing HW performance and/or features. All of that adds up in terms of developer time, build/infra cost, etc.

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#233

Post by extra88 » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:13 PM UTC

coolliquidcode wrote: post #110

huqedato wrote: post #9

I would never agree with this statement of the author: "You won’t stop until everybody is using your app." Why ? All the apps I ever build (or participate in their development) where targeted to the fit the most, without sacrificing the business requirements or other important/critical aspects of the app. Otherwise will end-up with an unusable product.

You should see how ADA requirements are practically impossible or completely break design. The high contrast of font to background requirement is so extreme that most major sites and even ADA related sites fail. Things like alt text is so time consuming it would be incredibly expensive to label all the images. Facebook has long resorted to using AI descriptions. Really it shouldn't be up to the developer it should be…

> high contrast of font to background requirement is so extreme

Extreme? The WCAG standard for text most organizations use (Level AA) is 4.5:1 with 1:1 being black-on-black and 21:1 being black-on-white (or vice versa). The higher standard (Level AAA) is only 7:1. Most people wouldn't want to read your content if everything was 7:1 or lower.

> Facebook has long resorted to using AI descriptions

Facebook didn't upload those images, their users did, Facebook isn't responsible for them having good text alternatives.

> Just like someone may need to buy a wheelchair to move around

To go along with your poor analogy, blind people have "wheelchair" equivalents, called screen readers. They're useless if don't build "ramps" that meet established building standards, websites and apps that follow established standards.

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#234

Post by bmitc » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:18 PM UTC

dmazzoni wrote: post #199

bmitc wrote: post #161

For software accessibility, I get the importance, but I personally have no idea where to start. Cross-platform windowing, graphics, fonts, and audio are already insanely difficult. How does one do cross-platform accessibility?

Every cross-platform GUI toolkit I've ever seen has accessibility support. You just need to learn how to use it.

But that required those platforms, such as Qt and Flutter, to figure it out in a bespoke manner. I am not aware of any existing cross-platform accessibility frameworks.

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#235

Post by retrochameleon » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:21 PM UTC

extra88 wrote: post #233

coolliquidcode wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should see how ADA requirements are practically impossible or completely break design. The high contrast of font to background requirement is so extreme that most major sites and even ADA related sites fail. Things like alt text is so time consuming it would be incredibly expensive to label all the images. Facebook has long resorted to using AI descriptions. Really it shouldn't be up to the developer it should be…

> high contrast of font to background requirement is so extreme Extreme? The WCAG standard for text most organizations use (Level AA) is 4.5:1 with 1:1 being black-on-black and 21:1 being black-on-white (or vice versa). The higher standard (Level AAA) is only 7:1. Most people wouldn't want to read your content if everything was 7:1 or lower. > Facebook has long resorted to using AI descriptions Facebook didn't upload…

I love your ramp analogy

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#236

Post by neonsunset » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:22 PM UTC

fngjdflmdflg wrote: post #230

freedomben wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My issues with Dart are pretty shallow honestly, mainly coming down to look and feel[1] and personal preference. I have no remaining technical qualms with Dart, just that I don't like it's flavor of ice cream (metaphorically speaking of course). It reminds me a lot of Java and feels like it was created to be more like what Javascript "should" have been had it been designed to be a scripting version of Java from the s…

Interesting view. What makes it feel like java in your opinion? I think I see your point about dart being what JS should have been but I would add that it is also like what Java should have been. And really the only reason to compare it to Java is because it is the language that spawned most other comparable languages (C#, Swift, Dart, Kotlin, JS (kind of)). But syntactically Dart is nothing like java: - no `new` - n…

With all those you could just use C# with much better outcome…

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#237

Post by fngjdflmdflg » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:36 PM UTC

neonsunset wrote: post #236

fngjdflmdflg wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting view. What makes it feel like java in your opinion? I think I see your point about dart being what JS should have been but I would add that it is also like what Java should have been. And really the only reason to compare it to Java is because it is the language that spawned most other comparable languages (C#, Swift, Dart, Kotlin, JS (kind of)). But syntactically Dart is nothing like java: - no `new` - n…

With all those you could just use C# with much better outcome…

I'm not too familiar with C# but I know it does not have a sound type system and it appears to require the "new" keyword for instantiating new objects. You need to import System.Collections for dynamiaclly sized arrays. Also appears to not have python-like print() (requires Console.WriteLine()). It also doesn't have flutter obviously. But in any case my point was more that Dart isn't really like Java.

Why do you think C# will give you a better outcome?

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#238

Post by extra88 » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:36 PM UTC

dmazzoni wrote: post #182

mikece wrote: post #5

What is the real liability for a scenario like this? Is there any grace period when a new app or startup becomes far more successful far sooner than expected? I imagine A11Y isn't a massive concern when it's not certain an idea will even work; outside of California I can't imagine being legally skewered if, once you attain unexpected success, you devote A11Y resources to address this issue.

You should invest as much into accessibility as you do into scaling. Meaning: you should think about it early on, and design for the need, but not over invest in it too early. If you're at the the stage where you don't know if your idea will work, you shouldn't be polishing accessibility, just like you shouldn't be denormalizing your database schema to increase performance. However, you should be thinking about acces…

"Premature optimization" is definitely a thing in scaling but not so much in accessibility. I suppose having a native feature to let users choose from a wide array of fonts and color schemes (vs. honoring OS settings for those) before you have users could be accessibility-related premature optimization.

Accessibility is more often compared to security; if you don't think about how to securely transfer or store data early on, it's going to be much harder later on (support for SSO before you have users might be premature optimization unless your product is especially geared toward enterprises).

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#239

Post by neonsunset » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:42 PM UTC

fngjdflmdflg wrote: post #237

neonsunset wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all those you could just use C# with much better outcome…

I'm not too familiar with C# but I know it does not have a sound type system and it appears to require the "new" keyword for instantiating new objects. You need to import System.Collections for dynamiaclly sized arrays. Also appears to not have python-like print() (requires Console.WriteLine()). It also doesn't have flutter obviously. But in any case my point was more that Dart isn't really like Java. Why do you thin…

We’re reaching the levels of hello world optimization even the staunchest proponents of top-level statements (write Program.cs python script style) considered impossible.

Re: Oh shit, my app is successful and I didn't think about accessibility

#240

Post by LoganDark » Mon, Mar 18, 2024, 10:42 PM UTC

TheRealPomax wrote: post #163

LoganDark wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> About half of the planet has a visual disability that's bad enough to require a corrective medical device Can you clarify how many people who merely need corrective lenses need to also rely on software accessibility features? The way you use "about half the planet" in your comment implies that every visual impairment is equal, and that all visual impairments result in increased accessibility needs. My only accessib…

The idea that "they don't need text controls because most people have glasses, so their vision isn't bad enough" is one of the reasons projects start thinking about a11y too late.

That may be true, but isn't what I said. I think you're misrepresenting the actual percentage of people who actually need to use text controls in saying that about half the population doesn't have perfect vision. You may notice that those are two different things.

It's like using the percentage of people without perfect control of their legs as a proxy for how many people actually need to use a wheelchair. Yes wheelchair accessibility is important, yes many people need to use one, but no not everyone without perfect control of their legs need to be in a wheelchair. Sometimes they only need crutches, etc.