Topics

Accessibility Conformance

The accessibility conformance topics provide information on meeting the various accessibility standards that apply to digital publications.

EPUB Accessibility
Explanation of the EPUB Accessibility specification.
Section 508 (US)
Explanation of the US Section 508 requirements for publications.
WCAG Overview
Introduction to the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.
WCAG Explainers
Introductions to each WCAG success criterion. Link leads to a submenu of topics.

EPUB

The EPUB topics cover accessibility issues that are unique to the EPUB format.

General

Core Media Types
Explanation of formats that are assured to render in EPUB publications.
Cover
Accessible practices for including a cover image.
Publication Title
Providing a title for an EPUB publication.
Reading Order
Specifying the reading order of documents the spine.
Remote Resources
Overview of the problems hosting resources outside the EPUB container.
Setting the Language
Language identification in the package document and in content documents.
Text Direction
Specifying whether metadata text direction is left-to-right or right-to-left.

Validation

Validation Process
Overview of the validation process and tools and for EPUB publications.
Epubcheck
How to use epubcheck to check publications for conformance issues.
Ace by DAISY
How to use the Ace checker to find accessibility issues.
Ace SMART
How to use the Ace SMART tool to evaluate a publication against the EPUB Accessibility specification.

Navigation

The navigation topics describe how to author accessible navigation aids.

Publication Navigation

Content Lists
Describes how to add lists of tables, figures, etc.
Landmarks
Describes the EPUB concept of publication landmarks.
Table of Contents
Describes best practices for including tables of contents.

Page Navigation

Overview
Introduction to the components of page navigation.
Page Break Markers
Describes the how to add page break markers.
Page List
Describes the purpose and construction of a page list.
Page Source
How to identify the source of pagination.

Metadata

The metadata topics describe the accessibility properties available in widely used digital publishing metadata standards.

General

Evaluation
Covers the conformance and evaluation metadata required by the EPUB Accessibility specification.

Schema.org

Overview
Introduction to the accessibility metadata properties defined in the schema.org CreativeWork type.
Accessibility APIs
Identifying compatibility with platform APIs using the accessibilityAPI property.
Accessibility Controls
Identifying how users can control the content using the accessibilityControl property.
Accessibility Features
Expressing features of the content using the accessibilityFeature property.
Accessibility Hazards
Expressing dangers for users using the accessibilityHazard property.
Accessibility Summary
Providing a summary using the accessibilitySummary property.
Access Modes
Identifying the nature of the content using the accessMode property.
Sufficient Access Modes
Identifying sufficient means of reading that provide access to the information using accessModeSufficient property.

ONIX

Overview
Overview of ONIX accessibility metadata
Codelist 196
Expressing accessibility metadata using list 196
Codelist 143
Expressing accessibility hazard risks using list 143
Codelist 81
Expressing access mode metadata using list 81

HTML

The HTML topics cover issues related to producing accessible HTML content. Guidelines include how to use elements and attributes accessibly, how to create common publishing structures such as indexes and glossaries accessibly, and how to apply ARIA roles, states, and properties.

Elements and Attributes

Abbreviations
The abbr element
Access Keys
The accesskey attribute
Articles
The article element
Asides
The aside element
Audio
The audio element
Bolding and Italics
The b, em, i, and strong elements
Context Breaks
The hr element
Details
The details element
Figures
The figure element
Forms
The form element
Headings
The h1 to h6, hgroup, and heading elements
Identifiers
The id attribute
Inline Frames
The iframe element
Language
The lang and xml:lang attributes
Links
The a element
Lists
The dl, ol, and ul elements
Main Content
The main element
MathML
The math element
Meta
The meta element
Object
The object element
Page Title
The title element
Quotes
The blockquote and q elements
Sections
The section element
Text Direction
The dir attribute
SVG
The svg element
Video
The video element

Images

Animated Images
Best practices for accessible animated images.
Decorative Images
How to identify images that do not convey information to users.
Icons
Best practices for including accessible icons.
Image Descriptions
Methods and writing techniques for alternative text and descriptions.
Image Maps
Best practices for including accessible image maps.
Image Selection
Methods for including images optimized for different device rendering capabilities.
Images of Text
Best practices when images contain text.
QR Codes
Best practices for adding QR codes.
Text-based Images
Techniques for making accessible text-based images, such as ASCII art, emoticons, redacted text, and fill-in-the-blank questions.

Tables

Table Basics
Introduction to the basics of accessible table markup.
Complex Headers
Best practices for making complex table headers accessible.
Header Scope
Identifying when table headers apply to row or columns.
Layout Tables
Best practices for when table layouts cannot be avoided.
Table Captions
Adding a caption to explain the purpose of a table.
Table Summaries
Adding a summary to describe the structure of a table.

Structures

Bibliographies
Markup recommendations for producing accessible bibliographies.
Glossaries
Markup recommendations for producing accessible glossaries.
Indexes
Markup recommendations for producing accessible indexes.

Patterns

Drop Caps
Methods for creating accessible drop caps.
Footnotes and Endnotes
Accessibly identifying, structuring, and linking notes and their references.
Hidden Content
Techniques for hiding content both from visual rendering and from assistive technologies.
Poetry
Techniques for formatting and describing line-based content.
Links to Reference Marks
Practices for linking back to the references to tables, figures, notes, etc.

Concepts

Logical Reading Order
Practices for ensuring that the primary narrative is clearly separated from secondary content.
Separation of Style
Practices for ensuring that style is not the only way that necessary information is conveyed.

ARIA

ARIA Landmarks
Introduces the ARIA landmark roles for identifying key sections of publications.
ARIA role Attribute
Describes how the ARIA role attribute influences how assistive technologies understand elements that carry the attribute.
Digital Publishing Roles
Introduction to the DPUB-ARIA module for use with the ARIA role attribute. The page also links through to detailed descriptions for each role in the module.

Semantics

EPUB type Attribute
Overview of how the attribute can improve reading system experiences even though it does not affect assistive technologies.

CSS

The CSS topics cover the accessible styling of content using the cascading style sheets technology.

Color
Techniques to ensure color is not the only means by which information is conveyed.
Contrast
Techniques to ensure sufficient contrast when setting foreground and background colors.
CSS Property Reference
Reference to core CSS properties that have known accessibility issues.
Reflow
Discussion of the issues styling presents in meeting WCAG's reflow requirement.
Text Resizing
Techniques for avoiding accessibility issues when text is resized.
Text Spacing
Techniques for avoiding accessibility issues when text spacing is changed.

Scripted Content and Forms

The scripting and forms topics cover issues related to adding interactive content to digital publications.

Autocomplete
Using the autocomplete attribute to help users fill in common form fields.
Custom Controls
Using ARIA roles, states, and properties to make custom controls accessible.
Input Validation
Techniques for ensuring that users can understand and correct input errors in forms.
Keyboard Control
Techniques for ensuring that keyboard users can control scripted content.
Labels
Techniques for ensuring that inputs and controls are accessibly labelled.
Progressive Enhancement
Review of progressively enhancing content so that it remains accessible when scripting is not available.
Tab Order
Techniques for ensuring the keyboard tab order is accessible.
Timers
Techniques for ensuring timed content is accessible.

Fixed Layouts

The fixed layouts topics cover issues with creating content that is laid out on pages with fixed dimensions (i.e., the content does not reflow to fit the screen but stays where it is positioned).

General

Overview
General introduction to creating fixed layouts in EPUB.
HTML Layouts
Overview of creating accessible fixed layouts in HTML.
Images in Spine
Overview of accessibility issues putting images directly in the EPUB spine.
SVG Layouts
Overview of creating accessible fixed layouts in SVG.
WCAG Conformance
Overview of the difficulties making fixed layouts conform to WCAG accessibility requirements.

Techniques

Images
Explores the issues making image-based fixed layouts accessible.
Multipage Spreads
Explores the issues with content that is split across fixed-layout pages.
Orientation
Explores the issues with constraining the orientation in which fixed layouts render.

Synchronized Multimedia

The synchronized multimedia topics cover the creation of digital publications that provide synchronized text and audio playback. These types of publications are often referred to as "read aloud" books.

Implementations

EPUB 3 Media Overlays
Overview of EPUB 3's media overlays feature for synchronizing text with prerecorded audio playback.

Techniques

Highlighting
Considerations for accessible text highlighting.
Lists
Structuring lists for synchronized playback.
Tables
Structuring tables for synchronized playback.

Text to Speech

The text-to-speech (TTS) topics cover technologies that aid in producing high-quality TTS playback.

Overview
Overview of the issues with text-to-speech playback and the technologies available to help.
CSS3 Speech
Review of the Speech module properties for controlling TTS playback through style sheets.
PLS Lexicons
Review of using pronunciation lexicons to create dictionaries of terms.
SSML
Review of EPUB's attribute implementation of the Synthetic Speech Markup Language.