iNaturalist Still Inaccessible to Screen Reader Users

General
41

I should have also mentioned that I am happy to have conversations with you about what I do on iNat but my knowledge of accommodations for people with blindness is limited.

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42

He has written a detailed guide to the use of iNat (in Australia)
I was hoping he might add to the conversation - but - more so if it had come up within his guide.

43

His post is here: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/a-guide-to-inaturalist/50517

But if the reference you mean is Roger, E., Kellie, D., Slatyer, C., Brenton, P., Torresan, O., Wallis, E. and Zerger, A., 2023. Open Access Research Infrastructures are Critical for Improving the Accessibility and Utility of Citizen Science: A Case Study of Australia’s National Biodiversity Infrastructure, the Atlas of Living Australia (ALA). Citizen Science: Theory and Practice, 8(1), pp.1-35. then I think the “accessibility” in the title is referring to being able to easily obtain and use Citizen Science data.

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44

Thanks! Familiarity with screen readers is unnecessary; I’m confident I can explain to you whatever needs explaining. :)

45

Would agree with this interpretation - accessibility also meaning low barrier to entry, I would think. The meaning of website accessibility is much more specific.

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46

Technically maybe… But I look at it and understand nothing. Kind of negates the whole “low barrier to entry” thing, wouldn’t you say?

47

I was just responding to your comment about

to clarify that doing most things is possible via the API. I think using coding is basically like learning another language. It certainly takes work to learn, and I’m not particularly proficient in it myself. But the API is definitely a powerful way to interact with iNat - many sighted people choose to use it to accomplish what they wish as it enables them to do things that they can’t do via the web interface or can only do much more slowly/less efficiently.

I’m not saying that it’s a great solution for you necessarily, just making it clear that it is available and one potential avenue that is machine-readable depending on the user’s goals.

In regards to finding a

I think this is probably the app for most people. The website itself with its many functions/interfaces is one of the more complex ones I interact with. Depending on what users want to do, the app may be enough for them without using the website. So depending on what you want to do, you might be able to tailor your approach to that.

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48

Fair enough. My point with bringing up the “low barrier to entry” is that I, as a blind person, shouldn’t have to learn another language just to do what sighted people can do in a few clicks.

Which is not to say that the API and composing specific URLs aren’t useful, and I’ve thought about learning how to do the latter.

49

Thanks for continuing this conversation @daniel5. I’m not a developer but I’ll say that one of the many reasons we decided to write a new app from the ground up is to make accessibility features easier to implement. Support for screen readers is on the roadmap for the app, in addition to better support for large text display, etc. I tried it out with a screen reader on today and, with the caveat that I’m not an experienced screen reader user, it seems to work pretty well for some parts of the app, but not other parts - which isn’t surprising, the app is still in beta and it has pieces missing or broken.

Once it’s out of beta and there’s something stable to work with, we would definitely like to hear feedback and ideas about how to improve accessibility.

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50

Thanks for this. I still think figuring out the major issue areas for the site is a good idea. I can use a good portion, I just need to use workarounds sometimes. So what I want to figure out is where my ways of using the site don’t cut it when it comes to the functionality others have. Then I can give specific feedback which hopefully devs can implement if not everyone is working on the app…

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51

It is very shameful if iNaturalist doesn’t hire accessibility professionals to do this and relies on unpaid disabled users to do all the subtle, tiring and complex work of fixing their whole website. If they ever ask for your consultancy, I hope it is paid.

I am a new iNaturalist user and made a post about this, not only about screen readers but also talking about other concerns with accessibility, if you want to add up to it: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/discussion-accessibility-for-inaturalist/66483

I will edit my post to add a link to your post there.

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52

I would be totally up for this, but only if our report is paid (by iNat), as accessibility is actual very detailed and specialized work, otherwise they could have quickly hired someone to fix everything quickly and without hassle.

I do know it’s not easy, I just don’t think it’s fair to put such a burden on the users to report on accessibility issues individually as bug reports. It is work. It’s not the same as saying “this link isn’t working”. It’s more like: “These 295 links are working for everyone as you intended, except for me because I have a disability.”

I know it’s hard work and don’t blame the team for this, I do understand it and have empathy if they didn’t know about it before. It’s something a lot of people don’t think about. I just wanted to clear that I think it has to be something they value, and value in a monetary way.

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