Literature Reviews

Reviewed research papers, articles, and publications relevant to digital accessibility.

• Automated Generation of Accessible PDF

  Shaban Zulfiqar, Safa Arooj, Umar Hayat, Suleman Shahid, Asim Karim (2020) — Proceedings of the 22nd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2020)

  This demonstration paper presents AGAP (Automated Generation of Accessible PDF), an open-source tool that automates the generation of accessible PDFs from LaTeX source files while making the authoring process itself accessible to people with vision i…

  • PDF accessibility
  • document accessibility
  • screen readers
  • STEM accessibility
  • automated testing
  • blindness and low vision
  • web accessibility
  • software development

• Ontology-Driven Transformations for PDF Form Accessibility

  Utku Uckun, Ali Selman Aydin, Vikas Ashok, IV Ramakrishnan (2020) — Proceedings of the 22nd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2020)

  This demonstration paper presents TransPAc (Transformations for PDF Form Accessibility), an assistive technology that transforms PDF forms into accessible HTML pages so blind screen-reader users can fill them out. PDF forms present multiple accessibi…

  • screen readers
  • document accessibility
  • PDF accessibility
  • blindness and low vision
  • web accessibility
  • assistive technology
  • software accessibility

• Access Differential and Inequitable Access: Inaccessibility for Doctoral Students in Computing

  Kristen Shinohara, Michael McQuaid, Nayeri Jacobo (2020) — Proceedings of the 22nd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2020)

  This paper investigates why the pipeline of students with disabilities pursuing doctoral degrees in computing remains so thin, despite increased support at the undergraduate level. In 2018, the NSF reported that only about 3% of math and computer sci…

  • education accessibility
  • disability rights
  • deaf and hard of hearing
  • blindness and low vision
  • digital accessibility
  • screen readers
  • accessibility barriers
  • organizational accessibility

• Making Mobile Augmented Reality Applications Accessible

  Jaylin Herskovitz, Jason Wu, Samuel White, Amy Pavel, Gabriel Reyes, Anhong Guo, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2020) — Proceedings of the 22nd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2020)

  This paper tackles a fundamental accessibility gap in augmented reality: AR applications are overwhelmingly visual, mixing virtual 3D objects with the real world in ways that existing screen readers and accessibility services cannot interpret. The re…

  • augmented reality
  • visual accessibility
  • blindness and low vision
  • mobile accessibility
  • screen readers
  • VoiceOver
  • inclusive design
  • emerging technology

• Understanding Audio Production Practices of People with Vision Impairments

  Abir Saha, Anne Marie Piper (2020) — ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This paper presents the first detailed empirical study of how people with vision impairments use digital audio production tools in their personal and professional work. Through semi-structured interviews with 18 blind and visually impaired audio prof…

  • visual impairments
  • audio production
  • creative content production
  • screen readers
  • assistive technology
  • professional accessibility
  • qualitative research
  • community of practice

• Tables on the web accessible? unfortunately not!

  Waqar Haider, Yeliz Yesilada (2020) — Proceedings of the 17th International Web for All Conference (W4A)

  This paper presents the first large-scale systematic study specifically focused on the accessibility of HTML tables on the web. The authors crawled approximately 30,000 web pages sourced from Google, Google Tables, and the Alexa top 10,000 sites, ult…

  • web accessibility
  • HTML tables
  • automated testing
  • WCAG compliance
  • screen readers
  • semantic HTML

• Developing Accessible Mobile Applications with Cross-Platform Development Frameworks

  Sergio Mascetti, Mattia Ducci, Niccolò Cantù, Paolo Pecis, Dragan Ahmetovic (2021) — Proceedings of the 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This experience report from the EveryWare Lab at the University of Milan systematically analyzes how well cross-platform development frameworks (CPDFs) support screen reader accessibility APIs compared to native iOS and Android development. The team,…

  • mobile accessibility
  • cross-platform development
  • screen readers
  • React Native
  • Xamarin
  • accessibility API
  • mobile development
  • VoiceOver
  • TalkBack

• Understanding Screen Readers' Plugins

  Farhani Momotaz, Md Touhidul Islam, Md Ehtesham-Ul-Haque, Syed Masum Billah (2021) — Proceedings of the 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS)

  This paper presents the first empirical study focused specifically on understanding the ecosystem of screen reader plugins — small pieces of code that extend screen reader functionality. The researchers conducted semi-structured interviews with 14 bl…

  • screen readers
  • plugins
  • blind users
  • assistive technology
  • NVDA
  • JAWS
  • extensibility
  • user study
  • accessibility tools

• Understanding Screen-Reader Users' Experiences with Online Data Visualizations

  Ather Sharif, Sanjana Shivani Chintalapati, Jacob O. Wobbrock, Katharina Reinecke (2021) — ASSETS '21: The 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility

  Data visualizations are ubiquitous on the web, communicating everything from health statistics to financial trends, yet their inherently visual nature creates profound barriers for the approximately 7.6 million screen-reader users in the United State…

  • screen readers
  • data visualization
  • web accessibility
  • blind users
  • low vision
  • alternative text
  • information access

• Designing Tools for High-Quality Alt Text Authoring

  Kelly Mack, Edward Cutrell, Bongshin Lee, Meredith Ringel Morris (2021) — Proceedings of the 23rd International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '21)

  This paper investigates how to improve the quality of alternative text through better authoring interfaces and feedback mechanisms for automatic alt text, focusing on Microsoft PowerPoint as the application context. The researchers built and tested f…

  • alt text
  • image accessibility
  • screen readers
  • authoring tools
  • automatic alt text
  • computer vision
  • content accessibility
  • user interface design