IBM AbilityLab Mobile Accessibility Checker: a tool to automate the checking of the availability of a mobile application interface

Recently, increasingly, various developers have been paying attention to the topic of digital accessibility, trying to take into account the needs of the largest number of users in their products. Nevertheless, the availability of full QA-engineer accessibility in the team is still an exception rather than a general trend, even in large projects, so the accessibility of interfaces is often attempted to be shifted to automated testing systems. And although machine testing still does not allow controlling many aspects of accessibility, it is still quite capable of helping to eliminate certain problems right at the initial development stage, making the whole process cheaper. By and large, the presence of such tests is also useful if there is a separate QA specialist in the project, so it is not right to oppose them completely.

Against this background, the good news was the emergence of yet another automated testing tool for the availability of mobile application interfaces for iOS and Android platforms, developed by the research department of IBM. This tool is called Mobile Accessibility Checker and allows you to automatically find and fix basic problems, which helps to make the application interface more accessible and convenient for the mass of users who are elderly or disabled. The number of such people in the modern world exceeds one billion, so due to the increasing penetration of digital technologies, the number of such users of mobile applications is constantly growing.

IBM AbilityLab Mobile Accessibility Checker helps developers and designers automate the validation, documentation and reporting of compliance with accessibility standards for native and hybrid interfaces for iOS and Android platforms. As a result, developers get information about the problems found and how to solve them right in the interface design process.

Automated testing covers such issues as unsigned graphic elements, the non-optimal size of controls and text, insufficient color contrast of the interface and limitations of keyboard navigation, that is, aspects that are critical for users with visual impairment and motor skills. As a result, the developer receives:
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• Compliance with accessibility technical standards and, as a result, government regulations declaring the obligation to comply with accessibility standards (for example, US Section 508).
• Save time and development costs through automation.
• Reducing the competence threshold of entry, as Mobile Accessibility Checker allows you to make accessible interfaces and developers who are not very deeply familiar with various aspects of accessibility (at least to a certain level).

IBM AbilityLab Mobile Accessibility Checker is available both in the form of a service and in the form of a software component with the Java SDK, which allows you to integrate it into already existing development systems, but, unfortunately, it is not open. All interested can get more information in the trial documentation (PDF-file, 185 kB).