Adobe Flex
provides developers with the ability to create a new
generation of accessible Rich Internet Applications.
With a set of twenty-two accessible components, Flex
radically simplifies the process of creating accessible rich
internet applications for the developer. Each component
has been designed and thoroughly tested for accessibility.
Applications using these components inherent these accessibility features and leave the developer with a significantly
smaller set of concerns to address.
This article is designed to establish a basic framework with
which to approach developing accessible applications for
Adobe Flex. The central tenet of accessible design is
to test, test, and test again. This also presents the greatest
challenge of accessible design. In order to build accessible
applications with Flex, developers need to cultivate at least a
limited understanding of a screen reader and other assistive
technologies.
This article includes the following sections.
- Defining User Requirements
- Flex Accessibility Best Practices
- Accessible Components Information
The first section, defining user requirements, presents a limited
number of use cases. The use cases may be implemented as
personas in the design process with an explanation of
issues, challenges, techniques and tools used in each case.
The second section, Accessibility Best Practices walks
through a series of recommendations for developing
accessible applications in Flex. These are:
- Enable Application Accessibility
- Control Reading Order
- Provide Context
- Ensure Keyboard Access
- Provide Captions
- Provide Text Equivalents
- Control Animation
- Use Color Wisely
The third section lists each of the accessible components
that ship with Adobe Flex. For each component,
known issues and end user instructions are provided.
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