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Application and Cloud development

Accessibility in the development of new media relies heavily on the use of accessibility-related tools and resources during the creation process. Many popular design and programming tools feature a variety of features which can ensure that your programming code or website design remains accessible. 

Adobe applications:  Acrobat, Dreamweaver,  Flex and Flash

The accessibility features in Adobe products can be used to ensure that content generated by these applications maintains a level of accessibility.  It is also worth noting that although Acrobat documents can be created with a number of accessibility features, the ‘locked’ nature of the format can make it challenging for people using assistive technology products, and alternatives such as Word (DOC) or Rich Text Format (RTF) documents should also be provided. A full range of accessibility information relating to Acrobat, Dreamweaver, Flex and Flash can be found atAdobe Accessibility Resource Center.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS)

The accessibility features in MOSS have changed significantly in recent times. Although MOSS 2003 featured some limited accessibility features, MOSS 2007 has a significantly improved accessibility focus. Further resources are available online, including a MOSS accessibility toolkit created by HISoftware and Microsoft.

Microsoft Visual Studio: ASP.NET, Visual Basic.NET, C++, C# and the .NET Framework

Visual Studio 2005 and 2008 both incorporate a focus on the Microsoft Active Accessibility (MSAA) ‘Certified for Windows’ development initiative. The emphasis of this initiative is to ensure that all programs run effectively with various assistive technology devices and multiple Windows-based operating system platforms. Visual Studio also comes with a validation tools for verification of accessible web-based code.  Application techniques and features relating to specific applications within the Visual Studio suite can be found  either  at the  Microsoft’s Visual Studio 2005 development center website or the Visual Studio 2008 development center website.

Apple Mac Cocoa Accessibility

Developers using Apple’s Mac OS X platform can make the applications that use the Cocoa graphical interface compatible with the Mac’s built-in accessibility tools such as VoiceOver (Mac OS 10.4 and later). A full tutorial on how to incorporate accessibility features into application development on the Mac can be found at Apple’s programming guidelines for Cocoa.