Prioritizing Remediation of Accessibility Issues

About MeKarl Groves, Dir. of Training, Deque Systems

karl.groves@deque.com

@karlgroves

571-455-4862 Also, a rock star*

Agenda

• What is an accessibility issue?• Why prioritize?• Understanding risk• Challenges• Remediation Approaches– Considerations– Simple Prioritization– Advanced Prioritization

Things to keep in mind

• I am mathematically challenged• This topic is exploratory, not declarative– Please participate, ask questions, offer new ideas

WHAT IS AN ACCESSIBILITY ISSUE?

What is an Accessibility Issue?• Bug: Term used to describe

an error, flaw, mistake, failure, or fault in a computer program or system that produces an incorrect or unexpected result, or causes it to behave in unintended ways.

WHY PRIORITIZE?

Why Prioritize?

• Apply resources most effectively• Minimize accessibility’s impact on business• Motivate development staff• Maximize positive impact for users• Reduction of Risk

UNDERSTANDING RISK

Understanding Risk• Risk is the potential that a

chosen action or activity (including the choice of inaction) will lead to a loss (an undesirable outcome).

Understanding Risk

• Ultimately, remediation of bugs is an effort at risk mitigation

• Risks of– Poor quality (Users having problem with system)– Lost income– Ancillary losses– Administrative Complaint (public sector)– Litigation

Understanding Risk

• Probability

Probability = (number of negative events) / (population)

Understanding Risk

• Risk Amount

Risk Amount = (probability of a negative event) * (expected loss in case of negative event)

Understanding Risk• ROI

ROI = ((Risk Amount - Investment)/ Investment)*100

Where:Risk Amount = Expected loss * probabilityInvestment = Money spent on Accessibility

CHALLENGESWhat factors impact our ability to fix our system?

Challenges

• Not all accessibility problems are equal– Time– Impact• Impact on Users• Impact on Business

• WCAG Level & SC is inappropriate for determining priority

Challenges

• Time– Often at a premium– Time spent on after-the-

fact bug repairs is time that is taken away from meeting other business needs

– See, “Technical Debt”, Martin Fowler

Challenges

• Impact– Budgets– Resources– System

REMEDIATION APPROACHES

Simple Prioritization

• Simple Prioritization– Focused solely on time

and (simple) impact

– How long will it take?– How bad is the problem?

Simple Prioritization

• Pros– Focused on the user– Super simple– Often, “hunch” from

expert is as good as something more formal

• Cons– Does not take into

consideration impact on business or system

Advanced Prioritization

• User Impact• Ease & Speed• Impact on Interface• Volume• Location• Secondary Benefit

• Each item ranked: None (0), Low (1), Medium (2), High (3)

Advanced Prioritization

• Impact on Users with Disabilities– Broken down by type of user &

impact on each

• IB - Blind• IV – Visually Impaired (non-blind)• IH – Deaf & HoH• IM – Motor • IC - Cognitive• IS – Speech

• Impact* = (IB + IV + IH + IM + IC + IS)

Advanced Prioritization

• Ease and Speed of Repair

Advanced Prioritization

• Impact on Interface & Operation

Advanced Prioritization

• Volume of Repeat Issues– How many times does

the exact same issue occur?

– How many times do (very) similar issues occur?

Advanced Prioritization

• Location of Issues– Traffic– Criticality of location

Advanced Prioritization

• Secondary Benefit– Older Users– Low Literacy Users– Low Bandwidth Users– Reduced Dev/ Maintenance time– Alternate Devices– SEO– Usability

• Tie to org goals

Advanced Prioritization

(Impact + Repair Speed + Location + UI Impact + Secondary Benefits) * Volume = Priority

• Sort all issues according to priority• Fix em!

Next Steps?

• Come up with final formula. Current version has weaknesses.– Provide weighting to factors– 1st Round Delphi results:• User Impact: 3.95• Impact on Interface: 1.5• Location of Error: 1.5• Secondary Benefit: 1• Ease & Speed of Repair: 2.25

MANAGING REMEDIATIONDilution

Managing Remediation

• You have a report full of bugs

• Now what do you do?

Managing Remediation

• Managing Remediation is a process not unlike dilution in chemistry– Dilution: The process of reducing the

concentration of a solute in solution

• In our case: reducing concentration (defect density) in a system

Concentration = numBugs/linesOfCode

Accessibility Errors

- Low Priority

- Medium Priority

- High Priority

Non-CompliantSystem

Mostly-CompliantSystem

Partially-CompliantSystem

Managing Remediation

Fully-Compliant System

Managing Remediation

Managing Remediation

• Measuring improvement(concentrationStart - concentrationEnd) / time

Only 1st order accurate. Perfect for snapshots.

CONCLUSION

Conclusion

• In the quest for perfection, prioritization helps us get closer quicker

• We must maximize efficiency to have high positive impact

• Multiple factors exist that can be used to determine priority

• Iterate remediation efforts to progressively dilute them

• We can measure success

Connecting with Deque

Twitter LinkedIn Web Email @dequesystems Deque Systems deque.com info@deque.com