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SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

slint-ui.com

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Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#21

Post by robin_reala »

badsectoracula wrote: post #19
robin_reala wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, a UI toolkit that doesn’t have even basic accessibility bindings is basically illegal to use for commercial products in multiple major countries now. No specific shame on Slint (everyone has their own roadmaps) but when even big companies are failing* in this way it does seem like we’ve got a long way to go as an industry. * Flutter has no accessibility bindings on the web and therefore falls under the same “il…

> a UI toolkit that doesn’t have even basic accessibility bindings is basically illegal to use for commercial products in multiple major countries now Any sources for that? I've never seen such a claim outside of Hacker News. A quick Google search i did about it only shows some court cases in U.S. (and in those cases it seems to be up to the judge with many failing). The closest is a requirement from EU in 2018 that…

Sure.

In the US is the ADA which stipulates “reasonable accomodations” to be made for users with disabilities. You could argue that providing e.g. a phone system as an alternative helps to satisfy this, but it’s debatable, and has been debated backwards and forwards in the US court system.

In Canada, from 2021-01-01 the AODA (Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act) specifically calls out WCAG 2.0 double-AA (with a few, very minor, changes around closed captioning) as the minimum for both public and private sector businesses.

Israel also has a minimum requirement of WCAG 2.0 double-AA codified into law.

Norway, while not specifically mentioning a standard or guideline, has accessibility requirements interpreted by their regulator to meet WCAG 2.1 double-AA.

And the whole of the EU will gain a minimum requirement of WCAG 2.1 double-AA for the private sector from 2025-06-28 (that’s already the case for the EU public sector). Something to be aware of if you’re purchasing software / white-label systems now.

While it’s a little out of date now, a good starting point is https://www.w3.org/WAI/policies/.

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#22

Post by charcircuit »

whylo wrote: post #5

Hopefully this starts supporting accessibility tools before it gets too much traction and people start shipping inaccessible apps. The WebAssembley output demos on the homepage just render to a and are completely inaccessible with any of the usual tools (screen reader, keyboard-only, voice dictation etc) but there's a GitHub issue ( https://github.com/slint-ui/slint/issues/32 ) so fingers crossed.

It should be possible with a good screen reader. It can read to the icons and text on the page to you. It might be hard to know which boxes are clickable, but that applies to using it normally too.

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#23

Post by cnity »

whylo wrote: post #5

Hopefully this starts supporting accessibility tools before it gets too much traction and people start shipping inaccessible apps. The WebAssembley output demos on the homepage just render to a and are completely inaccessible with any of the usual tools (screen reader, keyboard-only, voice dictation etc) but there's a GitHub issue ( https://github.com/slint-ui/slint/issues/32 ) so fingers crossed.

To be clear, using canvas elements for UI is not inherently inaccessible so long as some accessible content on the page is also available to screen readers. Slint could in theory additionally render a kind of keyboard accessible overlay with invisible page elements, for example.

Edit: accessible -> inaccessible

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#24

Post by robin_reala »

charcircuit wrote: post #22
whylo wrote: post #5

Hopefully this starts supporting accessibility tools before it gets too much traction and people start shipping inaccessible apps. The WebAssembley output demos on the homepage just render to a and are completely inaccessible with any of the usual tools (screen reader, keyboard-only, voice dictation etc) but there's a GitHub issue ( https://github.com/slint-ui/slint/issues/32 ) so fingers crossed.

It should be possible with a good screen reader. It can read to the icons and text on the page to you. It might be hard to know which boxes are clickable, but that applies to using it normally too.

A screenreader doesn’t literally read the screen, it reads the accessibility tree that apps build for their interfaces. If your user interface kit doesn’t create an accessibility tree then your users’ screenreaders are completely lost at sea.

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#25

Post by Cthulhu_ »

whylo wrote: post #5

Hopefully this starts supporting accessibility tools before it gets too much traction and people start shipping inaccessible apps. The WebAssembley output demos on the homepage just render to a and are completely inaccessible with any of the usual tools (screen reader, keyboard-only, voice dictation etc) but there's a GitHub issue ( https://github.com/slint-ui/slint/issues/32 ) so fingers crossed.

I don't think tools like this should be used to make websites / webapps, period; good enough for demo purposes, but just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Just make a good website / webapp, you get a lot of accessibility for free if you use semantically correct HTML and sprinkle in accessibility hints where needed.

Likewise, if you're building apps, prefer to build them using native toolkits if you value accessibility. The major platforms have it built in. When building an app, did you ever consider VoiceOver gestures [1]? Providing a readable text for the text-to-speech engine as an alternative to a UI element?

https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/learn-voiceover-gestu...

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#26

Post by badsectoracula »

robin_reala wrote: post #21
badsectoracula wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a UI toolkit that doesn’t have even basic accessibility bindings is basically illegal to use for commercial products in multiple major countries now Any sources for that? I've never seen such a claim outside of Hacker News. A quick Google search i did about it only shows some court cases in U.S. (and in those cases it seems to be up to the judge with many failing). The closest is a requirement from EU in 2018 that…

Sure. In the US is the ADA which stipulates “reasonable accomodations” to be made for users with disabilities. You could argue that providing e.g. a phone system as an alternative helps to satisfy this, but it’s debatable, and has been debated backwards and forwards in the US court system. In Canada, from 2021-01-01 the AODA (Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act) specifically calls out WCAG 2.0 double-AA…

Hoes do all those translate to UI toolkits not having accessibility functionality being illegal though?

It is largely a legalese infodump that makes it very hard to parse, but i skimmed through the EU proposal (most of its requirements being at the annex) and it largely seems to be for websites or for very specific uses where it'd make sense (Check-in stations, ticket stations, ATMs, E-commerce sites, etc). The closest to a more general requirement would be the requirement for operating systems to provide functionality like text-to-speech (it mentions "more than one sensory channel" so i assume that would fit), zooming, etc but the wording on that seems to be about the complete package - so i guess if that proposal passes, a store wouldn't be able to sell, e.g., a computer with Linux and IceWM preinstalled as the only desktop (no text to speech there).

When you wrote that UI toolkits without accessibility functionality being illegal was there anything more clear and specific or is it this just more of a "just in case" scenario?

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#27

Post by paxswill »

nindalf wrote: post #13
robin_reala wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, a UI toolkit that doesn’t have even basic accessibility bindings is basically illegal to use for commercial products in multiple major countries now. No specific shame on Slint (everyone has their own roadmaps) but when even big companies are failing* in this way it does seem like we’ve got a long way to go as an industry. * Flutter has no accessibility bindings on the web and therefore falls under the same “il…

I’m surprised by how much progress we’ve made in this area. I used to make android apps circa 2013-15. Accessibility was an afterthought, a nice to have. Reading the SwiftUI docs in 2022, it’s front and centre. They tutorial covers accessibility soon after “hello world”. Every module of the tutorial has a section on setting the right accessibility info, rather than a single, optional accessibility tutorial. It makes…

Integrating accessibility into the tutorial is fantastic, but I’d also attribute it to Apple emphasizing accessibility in their developer documentation for a long time. I remember one of the early Interface Builder tutorials explaining accessibility pretty early on.

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#28

Post by lelandfe »

robin_reala wrote: post #21
badsectoracula wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a UI toolkit that doesn’t have even basic accessibility bindings is basically illegal to use for commercial products in multiple major countries now Any sources for that? I've never seen such a claim outside of Hacker News. A quick Google search i did about it only shows some court cases in U.S. (and in those cases it seems to be up to the judge with many failing). The closest is a requirement from EU in 2018 that…

Sure. In the US is the ADA which stipulates “reasonable accomodations” to be made for users with disabilities. You could argue that providing e.g. a phone system as an alternative helps to satisfy this, but it’s debatable, and has been debated backwards and forwards in the US court system. In Canada, from 2021-01-01 the AODA (Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act) specifically calls out WCAG 2.0 double-AA…

US FE engineer here. I have worked with major online retailers for accessibility remediation after they were successfully sued for WCAG failures.

The biggest thing, folks, is your navigation. If you run a large site and users can’t control your navigation with a keyboard at minimum, you’re really leaving people out in the cold - and asking for a lawsuit, depending on the industry and your country. I'm looking at you, dropdowns.

Full WCAG compliance is expensive and requires vigilance, but getting your navigation right should be priority 0.

Re: SixtyFPS Becomes Slint

#29

Post by badsectoracula »

robin_reala wrote: post #24
charcircuit wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should be possible with a good screen reader. It can read to the icons and text on the page to you. It might be hard to know which boxes are clickable, but that applies to using it normally too.

A screenreader doesn’t literally read the screen, it reads the accessibility tree that apps build for their interfaces. If your user interface kit doesn’t create an accessibility tree then your users’ screenreaders are completely lost at sea.

Considering year old mobiles are able to perform on-the-fly language translations in photos even via awful cameras, i find it weird that screenreaders still rely on such hints.
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