Definition
eAccessibility refers to the access of information and communications technologies (ICT) by people with disabilities, with particular emphasis on the World Wide Web. It is the extent to which the use of an application or service is affected by the user’s particular functional limitations or abilities (permanent or temporary). eAccessibility can be considered as a fundamental prerequisite of usability.
Historical Background
The percentage of disabled citizens has increased dramatically in the last century due to life condition improvements, higher life expectancy, and population aging. This trend is anticipated to further increase in the next decades.
Traditional efforts to provide eAccessibility for users with disabilities were based on the adaptation of applications and services originally developed for able-bodied users. In the context of the information society, this raises the fundamental issue of granting to disabled citizens access to a variety of technologies that...
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Recommended Reading
Dawe M. Understanding mobile phone requirements for young adults with cognitive disabilities. In: Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility; 2007. p. 179–86.
Doulgeraki C, Partarakis N, Mourouzis A, Antona M, Stephanidis C. Towards unified web-based user interfaces. Technical Report 394, ICS-FORTH, Heraklion, Crete, 2007, p. 283. Available online at: http://www.ics.forth.gr/hci/files/publications/technical_reports/2007_TR394_CD-NP-AM-MA-CS.pdf
Emiliani P-L, Stephanidis C. Universal access to ambient intelligence environments: opportunities and challenges for people with disabilities. IBM Syst J (Spec Issue Accessibility). 2003;44(3):605–19.
Furner S, Schneider-Hufschmidt M, Groh L, Perrin P, Hine N. Human factors guidelines for multimodal interaction, communication and navigation. In: Proceedings of the 19th International Symposium on Human Factors in Telecommunication; 2003.
Garay-Vitoria N, Abascal J. Text prediction systems: a survey. Univ Access Inf Soc. 2006;4(3):188–203.
Grammenos D, Savidis A, Stephanidis C. UA-chess: a universally accessible board game. In: Stephanidis C, editor. Universal access in HCI: exploring new interaction environments – Proceedings of 11th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (HCI International 2005), vol. 7. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum; 2005.
Grammenos D, Savidis A, Georgalis Y, Stephanidis C. Access invaders: developing a universally accessible action game. In: Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computers Helping People with Special Needs; 2006. p. 388–95.
Grammenos D, Savidis A, Georgalis Y, Bourdenas T, Stephanidis C. Dual educational electronic textbooks: the starlight platform. In: Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility; 2007. p. 107–14.
Guerreiro T, Nicolau H, Jorge J, Gonçalves, D. Towards accessible touch interfaces. In: Proceedings of the 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility; 2010. p. 19–26.
Hanson VL, Richards JT. A web accessibility service: An update and findings. In: Proceedings of the 6th International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies; 2004. p. 169–76.
IMS Global Learning Consortium. http://www.imsglobal.org/accessibility/index.html
Kane SK, Bigham JP, Wobbrock JO. Slide rule: making mobile touch screens accessible to blind people using multi-touch interaction techniques. In: Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility; 2008. p. 73–80.
Kane SK, Jayant C, Wobbrock JO, Ladner RE. Freedom to roam: a study of mobile device adoption and accessibility for people with visual and motor disabilities. In: Proceedings of the 11th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility; 2009. p. 115–22.
Kartakis S, Stephanidis. A design-and-play approach to accessible user interface development in Ambient Intelligence environments. Comput Ind. 2010;61(4):318–28.
Margetis G, Antona M, Ntoa S, Stephanidis C. Towards accessibility in ambient intelligence environments. In: Ambient intelligence. Berlin: Springer; 2012. p. 328–37.
Mcguire JM, Scott SS, Shaw SF. Universal design and its applications in educational environments. Remedial Spec Educ. 2006;27(3):166–75.
Miyashita H, Sato D, Takagi H, Asakawa C. Making multimedia content accessible for screen reader users. In: Proceedings of the International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility; 2007. p. 126–7.
National Center for Accessible Media. http://ncam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpie/
Ortega-Moral M, Peinado I, Vanderheiden GC. Cloud4all: scope, evolution and challenges. In: Stephanidis C, Antona M, editors. Universal access in human-computer interaction. Design for all and accessibility practice – 8th International Conference, UAHCI 2014, Held as Part of HCI International 2014, Heraklion, Crete, Greece, June 22–27, 2014. Lecture notes in computer science. Berlin: Springer International Publishing; 2014. pp. 421–30.
Spalteholz L, Li KF, Livingston N. Efficient navigation on the world wide web for the physically disabled. In: Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Web Information Systems and Technologies; 2007. p. 321–6.
Stephanidis C, editor. User interfaces for all – concepts, methods, and tools. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum; 2001.
Stephanidis C, Emiliani PL. Connecting to the information society: a European perspective. Technol Disabil J. 1999;10(1):21–44.
Stephanidis C, Salvendy G, Akoumianakis D, Bevan N, Brewer J, Emiliani PL, Galetsas A, Haataja S, Iakovidis I, Jacko J, Jenkins P, Karshmer A, Korn P, Marcus A, Murphy H, Stary C, Vanderheiden G, Weber G, Ziegler J. Toward an information society for all: an international R&D Agenda. Int J Human-Comput Interact. 1998;10(2):107–34.
The Rehabilitation Act Amendments (Section 508). Available at http://www.section508.gov/
W3C – WAI. (2008). Web content accessibility guidelines 2.0. Available at http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/
Web accessibility evaluation tools: overview. http://www.w3.org/WAI/ER/tools/
Zimmermann G, Vanderheiden G, Gilman A. Universal remote console – prototyping for the alternate interface access standard. In: Universal access: theoretical perspectives, practice and experience – Proceedings of Seventh ERCIM UI4ALL Workshop, Paris, France, 2002. p. 524–31.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Section Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature
About this entry
Cite this entry
Stephanidis, C. (2018). eAccessibility. In: Liu, L., Özsu, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8265-9_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8265-9_7
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4614-8266-6
Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-8265-9
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceReference Module Computer Science and Engineering