Accessibility Team Meeting Notes: June 7, 2024

These are the bi-weekly notes for the AccessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) Team meeting that happens on Fridays. You can read the full transcript here or see the full meeting schedule.

Updates from the working groups

NOTE: Only groups that provided updates are shown below.

Team Updates

Documentation Working Group:

• @Dani Guardiola has stepped up to do a review of the Accessibility Handbook and start updating it. @joedolson has already fixed a handful of issues in the Handbook thanks to Dani’s feedback.

Team Updates

General Working Group:

Here’s the latest for the General Working Group.

• Lots of progress recently on tracTrac Trac is the place where contributors create issues for bugs or feature requests much like GitHub.https://core.trac.wordpress.org/. tickets, so things have been moving forward at reasonable pace in coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress.. Joe also shared that we’re currently in the Release CandidateRelease Candidate A beta version of software with the potential to be a final product, which is ready to release unless significant bugs emerge. phase, so enhancements for 6.6 are closed.

Team Updates

Gutenberg Working Group:

@annezazu shared this update from the GutenbergGutenberg The Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/ Working Group:

Pulled from last week’s Core updates:

• Grid layout: Stabilise grid layout visualiser and resizer saw a bonus aspect of the grid layout work land, offering a visual way to resize. Tied to this, a recent change makes the outlines of the visualizer easier to see based on the text color.
• Unify publish flows: Curious to hear from folks around a change to the RevisionsRevisions The WordPress revisions system stores a record of each saved draft or published update. The revision system allows you to see what changes were made in each revision by dragging a slider (or using the Next/Previous buttons). The display indicates what has changed in each revision. panel making it behind a three dot menu (adding an extra step) rather than displaying it as a top level item in the post sidebarSidebar A sidebar in WordPress is referred to a widget-ready area used by WordPress themes to display information that is not a part of the main content. It is not always a vertical column on the side. It can be a horizontal rectangle below or above the content area, footer, header, or any where in the theme.. For scheduled posts, a PR is underway to ensure the publish date control selection is shown within the modal.
• BlockBlock Block is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. shadows: Edit/create shadows in global styles landed and is in a solid spot for the release.
• Block HooksHooks In WordPress theme and development, hooks are functions that can be applied to an action or a Filter in WordPress. Actions are functions performed when a certain event occurs in WordPress. Filters allow you to modify certain functions. Arguments used to hook both filters and actions look the same.: after more research and experiments, work to Add support for block name aliases for variations is being mostly pushed to 6.6 except for items from this list, which should all be significantly lower risk, and prepare the ground for the bigger changes (for are targeted for 6.7).
• Inserter: a PR landed to show all blocks when searching for blocks while a block is selected. The current experience shows either a limited set or no blocks depending on allowed blocks.
• Data Views: a recent PR bootstraps an APIAPI An API or Application Programming Interface is a software intermediary that allows programs to interact with each other and share data in limited, clearly defined ways. to allow third-party developers to register and unregister post type actions. This is going to be available in the Gutenberg pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party only for now and is not planned for 6.7 but relates to the overall efforts.
• Accessibility: review and join a discussion around a recently opened issue for Consistent Sidebar DOM and Open/Closing Interactions.

Joe stated that there was a project to merge the code base for the site editor and the post editor. That has created a few new accessibility problems that need to be ironed out; I don’t know whether that will happen in time, but we’ll see.

Themes Working Group:

@Amber Hinds is starting to work through the backlog of accessibility-ready theme reviews.

Media Working Group:

• Media is continuing to work through issues; but most major work is being slowed due to the future planning for the media library redesign.

Meta Working Group:

• MetaMeta Meta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. is continuing to work on the site redesign; work is currently mostly in Learn.

Open Floor:

@joesimpsonjr shared three items for consideration/discussion:

• WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. Europe kicks off next week. Anything to share on Contributor DayContributor Day Contributor Days are standalone days, frequently held before or after WordCamps but they can also happen at any time. They are events where people get together to work on various areas of https://make.wordpress.org/ There are many teams that people can participate in, each with a different focus. https://2017.us.wordcamp.org/contributor-day/ https://make.wordpress.org/support/handbook/getting-started/getting-started-at-a-contributor-day/. or the event to share at this time?
• The Accessibility Team is in need of new Team Reps to take over for Alex and myself who have served two plus years. @nhrrob has shown interest and would like more info on what the role entails (Alex has shared some basic info). Alex also mentioned a short voting period as part of the process as well. If you are interested, please reach out;
• WordCamp US happens in August in Portland, OR. Are there any folks from the team planning on attending the event AND contributor day? Joe is NOT planning on attending, unfortunately.
• @amberhinds shared this thread for our Accessibility Team plans for WCEU. Joe and Amber are leading the Contributor Day table at WCEU; Amber is focusing on doing theme accessibility reviews and Joe is focusing on developer onboarding and tickets.
• Team Reps: I’m open to stepping back on with @nhrrob
• Amber and Joe will be at WCUS as well.

NOTE: If you’d like to have a topic added to the agenda for our next meeting, please mention it in the comments on an upcoming agenda.