accessibility
This page covers swaybeta.ai, the public site. Every figure below comes from a check that runs before each release.
The Sway application at chat.swaybeta.ai and me.swaybeta.ai is a separate codebase and is not covered here. If you need a statement covering the application, contact us.
the standard we target
WCAG 2.1 Level AA. The measurements below are our own, taken from the built site. If your institution needs a conformance report in a particular form, see below.
what we check
Every row below is checked automatically, in a real browser, before each release. A release that fails any of it does not go out.
| check | how |
|---|---|
| Text contrast | Every text element on 25 pages, in both themes, measured against the color actually behind it. Where something could be painted over that background, the pixels are read from a screenshot instead of taken from the ancestor. |
| Reflow at 320 px and zoom to 200% | No horizontal scrolling on any page at either. |
| Text spacing (1.4.12) | Line height 1.5, letter spacing 0.12em, word spacing 0.16em and paragraph spacing 2em forced on; no page loses content. |
| Structure and names | One h1, a main landmark, a skip link and lang on every page; alt on every image; an accessible name on every link, button and field. |
| Reduced motion | With the preference set, nothing on any page transitions or animates a transform, and content that moves on its own stops. |
| Focus is visible | Tabbing through a page, every stop shows an outline. |
| Shortcuts can be turned off (2.1.4) | ? opens the shortcuts dialog, and the dialog carries the checkbox that switches single-key shortcuts off. |
| Nothing paints before the theme resolves | 116 pages, both theme directions, on a throttled CPU. A page that flashed the wrong theme would fail the check. |
| The drawn pages read without JavaScript | With scripting off the generated outlines are replaced by plain CSS borders. Checked on 30 pages. |
| Share cards carry alt text | 117 pages. |
| The mailing-list form | Driven in a browser through validation, error recovery and a phone viewport, including the error summary's focus and announcement. |
keyboard
Every page opens with a skip link as its first tab stop, pointing at that page's main. Focus moves there rather than only scrolling, so a screen reader follows.
The site adds single-key shortcuts: ? opens a list of them, g followed by a letter goes to a page, and j and k step through a page's sections, moving focus the same way. WCAG 2.1.4 requires that single-character shortcuts can be turned off, and the checkbox at the bottom of that dialog turns them off; the choice is remembered. They are also inert while focus is in a field and while any modifier is held, so browser and assistive-technology shortcuts are never intercepted.
Nothing on the site takes over scrolling: the evidence deck on the home page uses CSS scroll snapping rather than intercepting the wheel, so the scrollbar, the keyboard and deep links all behave normally.
text size
Body text is sized as a proportion of the reader's own browser font size, and scales with the width of the window on top of that: it starts at whatever the reader's default is and rises to about 134% of it on a large display, so a large monitor does not need zooming in and a small one does not need zooming out. A reader who has set their browser's default font to 20 px gets a page that starts at 20 px. Browser zoom then works on top of that, to 200% and beyond, without horizontal scrolling.
motion
With prefers-reduced-motion set, transitions and animations stop, the drawn outlines appear complete instead of drawing themselves, and the rotating quotation on the home page holds on one quotation. Nothing flashes.
color
All text meets AA against its background in both themes. Color is never the only cue: the charts show a position by which side of the axis a bar falls on and by the density of its fill, not by hue. The site uses one accent color and no others, so there is no color meaning “error” or “success” that a reader has to tell apart.
reporting a problem
Write to [email protected]. Say what page, what you were using, and what happened. We reply to instructors and campus staff within two business days.
If your institution needs something in a particular form, such as a VPAT, an accessibility conformance report, or an answer to a procurement questionnaire, ask and we will tell you what we can supply.
Every measurement on this page comes from driving the built site in a browser. The scripts that do it are in the site's own repository, and a claim that stops being true fails its check.