Add Practice Page for Supporting High Contrast

[mcking65]

Part of the resolution of issue #2864.

Preview Link

Preview high contrast practice page in compare branch

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WAI Preview Link failed to build on 'Update site files' step. (Last tried on Sat, 01 Feb 2025 21:15:15 GMT).

[jongund]

@mcking65
This is ready for review, I think it would be great if James Nurthen could review it.

[jongund]

@mcking65 @howard-e
The preview is still out of date with what's in the prepository

[howard-e]

@mcking65 @howard-e The preview is still out of date with what's in the prepository

@jongund the referenced link in the top comment had to be completely rebuilt so it's a new link now. I can only assume the older link was checked. My apologies for not clarifying that in the previous meeting.

The changes of your most recent commit under the Color Scheme (Light or Dark) h2 are present to me when viewing that updated link. Please let me know if this matches what's expected.

[css-meeting-bot]

The ARIA Authoring Practices (APG) Task Force just discussed PR 2991 - Practice Page for Supporting High Contrast.

The full IRC log of that discussion

<jugglinmike> Topic: PR 2991 - Practice Page for Supporting High Contrast
<jugglinmike> github: https://github.com//pull/2991
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I have been reviewing from the perspective of someone who doesn't know anything about this topic
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: It feels unclear to me. In some cases, if the author does nothing to support these settings, the content is still rendered fine.
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: In the case of increased contrast and high contrast modes, isn't it the case that if someone changes those settings, and the author does nothing, that content can disappear?
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: I think the current practice lacks an answer to "what should I do?" We can say, "you should at least do this if you want to comply with WCAG". The only thing we've done is try to comply with contrast themes (as implemented in Windows)
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: Increased contrast seems to me like, kind of a "why do it?" issue. Unless you are trying to meet "contrast enhanced"...
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: If the end user goes to their operating system and chooses to increase contrast--if they visit a webpage where the author has done nothing to support that, then the web page will render without problems
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: Correct. If you don't support media queries, then the page renders as if the media queries were absent
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: I believe in our examples, if we didn't support high-contrast themes, you would just get the colors that the author originally specified
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: but it's complicated; it depends on how much your page is inheriting from the operating system and the browser's default settings
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Is it the case, if you're using the author-specified colors, and somebody has chosen a Windows contrast theme--are there scenarios where, because of author-specified colors, that theme would cause content to not render in a perceivable way
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: that's definitely a possibility
<jugglinmike> Jem: Are you talking about operating system configuration changes?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: If the user changes the OS scheme, and the author has specified colors without referencing the force-colors media query, the page may render in a way where the content is not perceivable
<jugglinmike> Jem: Are you talking about the case where the operating system overrides the color settings?
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: the browser changes its default stylesheet to a configuration that complies with the Windows theme
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: I wouldn't talk about overriding, exactly, because it is changing the default of the browser
<jugglinmike> Jem: When I studied the trusted [??], there was a role that could override the system settings
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: A lot of developers insert a "reset" stylesheet. They're saying, "I don't want the browser to tell me anything; I want to start with this base" So I don't think you can say the default stylesheet of the browser is an accessibility setting
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: In some of the ARIA meetings I attended a few years ago, we met with the CSS working group, and they stated that over half of the pages on the web (at that time) use reset stylesheet
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: None of this is specified, though, so I think the best recommendation we can make is that "you need to test"
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: What Microsoft, Google, Apple--whatever--decides to do with that information is I suppose their best guess at what their users want
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: Could there be problems with rendering if people enable them on the page? Yes
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Should there be guidance on this page that says, "here are some really common problems which cause content to become imperceivable"
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: for "current color", that is an issue because you only get the color of the rendered text. If that color changes from black to white, and you have a white background, that content will disappear
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: "current color" to me is kind of a risky way to inherit these system colors
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Should the recommendation to be not to do it that way?
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: Well then what should we do with all of our examples?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I'm thinking in terms of, "there's a lot of stuff you could do; what happens if you don't do it?" If the answer is "nothing, really", then that's fine
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: I think we should say to avoid using "current color" for that particular reason. I would be willing to say that
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I think making it really concrete... In so many places, you've done an answer job creating functional examples. I wonder if you'd like to just show the problem with "current color" in a concrete way
<jugglinmike> jongunderson: That could work
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I have another question on the level-2 heading for the contrast themes. In the table above, we say "contrast themes aka high contrast mode". I wonder if we should do that in the heading as well
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: That's a common term, so I'm wondering if we should use the same wording in the heading
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: That's the heading for the section on "Contrast themes"
<Jem> https://deploy-preview-315--aria-practices.netlify.app/aria/apg/practices/high-contrast/
<jugglinmike> Jem: If it makes the content clearer, then why not?
<Jem> https://deploy-preview-315--aria-practices.netlify.app/aria/apg/practices/high-contrast/
<jugglinmike> s/jongunderson/jongund/g
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: This is the second-to-last section on the page
<jugglinmike> jongund: As I recall, the Microsoft system settings talk about "high contrast themes"
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I would like to be more friendly to a wider audience. The programmers can read the details
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I'm also thinking that in the one where we say "color screen light or dark", we could instead say "light or dark modes"
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I hear everyday people use those terms
<jugglinmike> jongund: Yeah, I think that's a good idea
<jugglinmike> Jem: We use the word "themes", not the word "mode". It doesn't matter much to me, though
<jugglinmike> siri: Whenever I hear "high contrast mode", that is the setting I see in Windows
<jugglinmike> siri: Slowly, we are moving away from that. We're moving towards "forced colors", etc.
<jugglinmike> siri: If we put "high contrast", some readers may get confused
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: When I was looking at this in Windows, I thought it used the term "high contrast". Is that still the case today?
<jugglinmike> siri: This morning, my system was updated, and it no longer uses that term
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Windows is saying "contrast themes", and if I go to "contrast themes"... Hm.
<jugglinmike> siri: Only the older versions of Windows used the term "high contrast". Now, it is different
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Reviewing these, the names are "night sky", "dust", "desert", "aquatic", and "none". None of them even use the term "high contrast" in the name of the theme!
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Well then, maybe we should completely remove "high contrast mode"
<jugglinmike> siri: That's what I was thinking
<jugglinmike> jongund: I don't think we should talk so much about "high contrast", either. I don't think it's accurate about what these settings do. They can be used to achieve high-contrast, but in and of themselves, they don't necessarily do that
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Should we just change the section title to "Supporting color contrast settings"?
<siri> +1
<jugglinmike> jongund: That would be more appropriate
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Okay! Any objections from anybody to changing the name of the practice?
<jugglinmike> Jem: no objection
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Great! (This is going in a direction I didn't expect. I'm glad I asked!)
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Now, there are a couple places on this page where I think the way the page is displayed depends on the browser you are using. I don't think that's explicitly stated, though
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Isn't it the case that what you see depends on what browser you use?
<jugglinmike> jongund: The only one I'm aware of is system colors
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Okay, just system colors. So not "increased contrast examples? That one doesn't change?
<jugglinmike> jongund: We don't do anything to support increased contrast on our pages (other than tiny examples
<jugglinmike> s/examples/examples)/
<jugglinmike> jongund: Maybe on the "systems color" page. The only red flag is on Chrome, for accent color and accent color test, their default color is transparent. I could put a warning to say "use with caution because some browsers such as Chrome render this as transparent which may effect color contrast"
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Yes, please add that
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I still feel like there are some aspects of system colors where I feel like we're not quite bringing people up to speed on what's happen
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: But following today's discussion, I think I can make comments on specific lines in your page
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Okay, that was a lot for this section. Any other questions or comments?
<jugglinmike> jongund: Just to be clear: you want me to add an example of where "current color" could cause problems?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Yeah, explain exactly how things can disappear, and show an example
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Thank you jongund. I will be making the other editorial changes that we discussed

[jongund]

@mcking65 @howard-e
The preview is being built now, just different preview number

[jongund]

@howard-e
Any ideas on why the build is failing?

[jongund]

@mcking65
I am working on some changes, so please wait to review until I commit my changes problably on Monday.