Skip to main content
Springer Nature Link
Log in

Improving accessibility of Web interfaces: refactoring to the rescue

  • Long paper
  • Published:
Universal Access in the Information Society Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Universal access should be a target for all public Web sites. However, it is very hard to achieve, and even Web applications that comply with accessibility standards may still lack usability for disabled users. This paper proposes refactoring as an essencial technique to incrementally improve the accessibility and usability of a Web interface. Some accessibility refactorings are described and classified by the problems that each refactoring addresses. The way mainstream Web sites struggle with accessibility is illustrated, and two evaluations of email clients are presented as empirical evidence of the significance of accessibility refactorings at a low implementation cost.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic
$34.99 /Month
  • Get 10 units per month
  • Download Article/Chapter or eBook
  • 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
  • Cancel anytime
Subscribe now

Buy Now

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. http://www.w3.org/WAI/bcase/.

  2. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/h.html.

  3. http://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria.

  4. https://webmail.ugr.es.

References

  1. W3C: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0, http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20 (2008). Accessed 10 July 2012

  2. Nielsen, J.: Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity. New Riders Publishing, Indianapolis (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Fowler, M.: Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code. Addison-Wesley, Boston (1999)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Ambler, S.W., Sadalage, P.J.: Refactoring Databases: Evolutionary Database Design. Addison-Wesley, Boston (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Puente, G., Diaz, O.: Wiki Refactoring as Mind Maps Reshaping. In: 24th International Conference on Advanced Information Systems Engineering (CAiSE’12) Poland, pp. 646–661

  6. Harold, E.R.: Refactoring HTML: Improving the Design of Existing Web Applications. Addison-Wesley, Boston (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Garrido, A., Rossi, G., Distante, D.: Refactoring for usability in web applications. IEEE Softw. 28(3), 60–67 (2011)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Beck, K., Andres, C.: Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change, 2nd edn. Addison-Wesley, Boston (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  9. Schwaber, K., Beedle, M.: Agile Software Development with Scrum. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Koch, N., Knapp, A., Zhang, G., Baumeister, H.: UML-based web engineering: an approach based on standards. In: Rossi et al. (eds.) Web Engineering: Modelling and Implementing Web Applications. Human–Computer Interaction Series, pp. 157–191. Springer, New York (2008)

  11. Busch, M., Koch, N.: MagicUWE—a CASE tool plugin for modeling web applications. In: Proceedings of 9th International Conference Web Engineering (ICWE’09), Springer, Berlin, LNCS 5648: 505–508

  12. Wentz, B., Lazar, J.: Usability evaluation of email applications by blind users. J. Usability Stud. 6(2), 75–89 (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  13. Tidwel, J.: (2011) Designing Interfaces: Patterns for Effective Interaction Design. O’Reilly Media Inc, California

    Google Scholar 

  14. Garrido, A., Rossi, G., Distante, D.: Systematic improvement of web application design. J. Web Eng. 8(4), 371–404 (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  15. Kerievsky, J.: Refactoring to Patterns. Addison Wesley, Boston (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Rossi, G., Schwabe, D., Garrido, A.: Design Reuse in Hypermedia Applications Development. In: Proceedings of the eighth ACM Conference on Hypertext (Hypertext’97). Southampton, United Kingdom, pp. 57–66 (1997)

  17. Asakawa, C., Takagi, H.: Transcoding. In: Harper, S., Yesilada, Y. (eds.) Web Accessibility: A Foundation for Research, pp. 231–261. Springer, New York (2008)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  18. Huang, A.W., Sundaresan, N.: Aurora: a conceptual model for Web-content adaptation to support the universal usability of Web-based services. In: Proceedings of the 2000 Conference on Universal Usability, Virginia, United States, pp. 124–131 (2000)

  19. Asakawa, C., Takagi, H.: Annotation-based transcoding for nonvisual web access. In: Proceedings of the 14th International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies, Virginia, USA, pp. 172–179 (2000)

  20. Garrido, A., Firmenich, S., Rossi, G., Grigera, J., Medina Medina N., Harari, I.: Personalized web accessibility using client-side refactoring. IEEE Internet Comput. To appear (2013)

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. LIFIA, Fac. de Informática, Univ. Nacional de La Plata, 50 y 120, CP 1900, La Plata, Pcia. de Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Alejandra Garrido, Gustavo Rossi, Julián Grigera & Sergio Firmenich

  2. Escuela Técnica Sup. de Ingenierías Informática y de Telecomunicación, Univ. Granada, C. Periodista Daniel Saucedo Aranda s/n, 18071, Granada, Spain

    Nuria Medina Medina

  3. CONICET, Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Alejandra Garrido & Gustavo Rossi

Authors
  1. Alejandra Garrido
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar

  2. Gustavo Rossi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar

  3. Nuria Medina Medina
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar

  4. Julián Grigera
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar

  5. Sergio Firmenich
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alejandra Garrido.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Garrido, A., Rossi, G., Medina, N.M. et al. Improving accessibility of Web interfaces: refactoring to the rescue. Univ Access Inf Soc 13, 387–399 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-013-0323-2

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-013-0323-2

Keywords