Category: Accessibility

Using RAS to Guide UX Research Resource Allocation and Strategy

Summary:  RAS helps managers allocate resources based on actual impact, shifting focus from outputs to outcomes and enabling data-driven UX strategies. In articles 1 and 2 of this series, we defined research breakage, introduced the recommendation-adoption score (RAS) (see the template here), and showed how to calculate it. In this article, we turn to how leaders… Continue reading Using RAS to Guide UX Research Resource Allocation and Strategy

Day 103: the prefers-reduced-transparency media feature

Design trends like Glassmorphism use translucent backgrounds to create a specific visual effect, resulting in underlying background colors or elements shimmering through the background of the overlaying element. That may be visually appealing, but it can distract some people and impair legibility. Operating systems like macOS and Windows offer options to reduce transparency in the… Continue reading Day 103: the prefers-reduced-transparency media feature

Totally remdom, or How browsers zoom text

Last week, I lied to my students. After I explained how the rem unit worked, I told them that they could compare px and rem by increasing the font size in their mobile browsers and see how it affects text zoom. Before I said that, we created a simple test page with two paragraphs and… Continue reading Totally remdom, or How browsers zoom text

Global Accessibility Awareness Day: Recapping our three free training sessions

Happy 15th Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD)! Or, should we say, GAAD afternoon! Seriously, what a special day this is, as everyone from lifetime advocates to first-time explorers are coming together around the world to create awareness about accessibility. Thank you all for being a part of this. Here at Deque, we’ve been having an… Continue reading Global Accessibility Awareness Day: Recapping our three free training sessions

Closing the Loop: What to Do After a Design Critique Ends

Summary:  Most designers invest in running critiques but skip the followup. That missing step is often why feedback culture breaks down. Design critiques generate feedback. But feedback is valuable only if someone closes the loop on it: telling people what changed because of what they said, what didn’t change, and why. This article covers two… Continue reading Closing the Loop: What to Do After a Design Critique Ends

beyond tellerrand: One of my favourite web development and design conferences

People often ask me for recommendations for front-end development conferences. Picking my Top 3 would be challenging, but I know that beyond tellerrand in Germany is one of them. Location in Düsseldorf Web developers love the beyond tellerrand conference (BTConf), although the event isn’t a typical web dev conf. The organizer, Marc Thiele, a lovely… Continue reading beyond tellerrand: One of my favourite web development and design conferences

UX Conference August Announced (Aug 17 – Aug 28)

  How will the Virtual Event work? Meetings will take place using the video conferencing tool Zoom, collaboration tools (such as group document editing and whiteboarding tools), and the social discussion tool Slack. You’ll also be able to use Slack before, during, and after the event to participate in social events and network with other… Continue reading UX Conference August Announced (Aug 17 – Aug 28)

TYPO3Camp Vienna: Talk and Workshop

Friends of mine organise the seventh international TYPO3Camp, which takes place in Vienna on October 11th – 13th, 2024. I’m there to give a keynote talk and a workshop. Date October 11th – 13th, 2024 Website typo3camp.at Price for the event Starting at 94.87 Euro Price for the workshop 690.00 Euro As you’ve probably already… Continue reading TYPO3Camp Vienna: Talk and Workshop

Website accessibility reaction videos (in German)

Recently, I started a new project. I react to the accessibility of more or less randomly picked websites. Before you get too excited, It’s in German. I feel more comfortable recording live reactions to websites I have never seen in my native language. However, I may try it in English if there’s demand. So far,… Continue reading Website accessibility reaction videos (in German)

A year in review: 2023

No, that’s not a typo. I’m writing my year-in-review post for 2023 in 2025. It’s not like 2023 was terrible, but it was intense, and I needed some distance before I could write about it, and then I just forgot to do it. Before I can write about 2024, I have to do 2023 first.… Continue reading A year in review: 2023

A year in review: 2024

2024 was our first year with three kids, and what a year that was. Personal Life with three kids is different in many ways, but most importantly, it’s awesome. I love my little daughters so much, and I enjoy every day with my family. Okay, maybe not every day because when they’re all sick at… Continue reading A year in review: 2024

Designing AI Agents: 4 Lessons from China’s Qwen Agent

Summary:  A study of Qwen’s AI agent reveals 4 design lessons: support discoverability, reuse familiar patterns, handle personal data carefully, and protect user autonomy. GenAI chatbots have made AI-as-personal-assistant feel within reach — and AI agents are the next step toward making that vision real. In consumer contexts, AI agents could theoretically handle daily requests,… Continue reading Designing AI Agents: 4 Lessons from China’s Qwen Agent

Building a progress-indicating scroll-to-top button in HTML and CSS

I noticed a nice detail on theneedledrop.com. They have a square scroll-to-top button with an arrow pointing right. The button’s border is black, and the background color is white. When you scroll, the arrow points up, and the background color turns gradually yellow as you scroll. That’s nothing too special, but it caught my attention… Continue reading Building a progress-indicating scroll-to-top button in HTML and CSS

How to make LibreWolf your default browser on macOS

I recently switched to LibreWolf as my default browser, and I also wanted links to open by default inside it, but there isn’t an option in LibreWolf like in other browsers. Luckily, there’s another way. At least I found a solution for macOS: Click the Apple menu  in the corner of your screen. Select… Continue reading How to make LibreWolf your default browser on macOS

Breaking up with my X

About 2.5 years ago, I was banned from Twitter for no apparent reason. I wrote about it on this blog and described the events and personal consequences. I broke the rules. Your account is permanently suspended Restart When I was first shadow-banned and then permanently banned, I tried a couple of times to contact Twitter… Continue reading Breaking up with my X

What’s an interactive element?

Two years ago, I wrote an article about the dialog element. I tested where focus goes when you open a modal dialog via the showModal() method. I tried different combinations of elements and attributes to see what happens because back in 2023, the behaviour was very inconsistent. In one of my tests, I put the… Continue reading What’s an interactive element?

10 Guidelines for Designing Your Site’s AI Chatbots

Summary:  Helpful site-specific AI chatbots clearly state their capabilities, offer relevant prompt suggestions, and quickly signal they know what users are looking at. AI chatbots are increasingly becoming a standard feature on many websites. As more sites adopt them, the question is not only whether to have one — it’s how to design one so… Continue reading 10 Guidelines for Designing Your Site’s AI Chatbots

A new meta tag for respecting text scaling on mobile

When you open the accessibility settings on your smartphone and increase the font size, you will immediately notice that the system font size increases. On Android, as a Firefox user, you will also notice that websites scale. As a Chrome user, you won’t see any difference because Chrome doesn’t respect the font size settings for… Continue reading A new meta tag for respecting text scaling on mobile

Boost Design Autonomy with an Information Pipeline

Summary:  A four-step framework for building influence over product direction by closing the information gaps that large, complex organizations create. Let me tell you a story I recently heard. A lead designer at an online review platform kept hearing that businesses were cancelling their ads because the setup was too confusing. The setup experience was… Continue reading Boost Design Autonomy with an Information Pipeline

Making an iOS E-Commerce Product Detail Page Accessible to VoiceOver and Beyond

The article about the Product List Page and Wishlist can be read here: Making an iOS E-Commerce Product List Accessible to VoiceOver and Beyond And the full webinar recording is available here: Webinar Developing and testing iOS Apps using a screen reader with Diogo Melo. The Accessibility Issues Hiding in Plain Sight The Product Detail… Continue reading Making an iOS E-Commerce Product Detail Page Accessible to VoiceOver and Beyond

UX Conference July Announced (Jul 20 – Jul 24)

How will the Live Online Courses work? Meetings will take place using the video conferencing tool Zoom, collaboration tools (such as group document editing and whiteboarding tools), and the social discussion tool Slack. You’ll also be able to use Slack before, during, and after the event to participate in social events and network with other… Continue reading UX Conference July Announced (Jul 20 – Jul 24)