Google takes steps to boost search result accessibility

Category: Accessibility

November 6th 08, 14:09

Google has launched a new experiment aimed at improving the accessibility of its search results for blind and partially-sighted web users.

The opt-in experiment, Accessible View, allows users to navigate through Google listings by only using the keyboard and is based on World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) specifications, as well as the Google-AxsJAX HTML DOM properties for AJAX-style applications.

Users can switch between regular listings and results from Google's Accessible Search service using the A and W keys, while other keyboard shortcuts include those to scroll through individual results, switch categories and jump to ads.

"We've also added a magnification lens that highlights the user's selected search result. Since launching Accessible Search, one of the most requested features has been support for low-vision users," said Google research scientist T V Raman and software engineer Charles Chen on the Official Google Blog.

The W3C's Accessible Rich Internet Applications specifications used in Accessible View focus on allowing disabled web users to better read dynamic web content.

This news story was brought to you by Bluhalo, a leading UK digital agency.

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