Glossary

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ACT Rules(also: Accessibility Conformance Testing Rules, ACT-R)

A set of standardized, machine-readable test rules developed by the W3C that provide specific, objective criteria for evaluating whether web content meets accessibility requirements like WCAG success criteria. ACT Rules aim to reduce inconsistency between different automated…

AChecker(also: IDI Web Accessibility Checker)

An open-source web accessibility evaluation tool that checks HTML content against accessibility standards including WCAG 2.0. AChecker identifies three types of issues: known problems (definite violations detectable by rule), likely problems (probable violations requiring human…

Ablation Study(also: Ablation Experiment)

A methodology, common in machine-learning and systems research, in which individual components of a system are systematically removed or disabled to measure their contribution to overall performance. In accessibility testing research, ablation studies are used to justify design…

Accessibility Audit(also: Accessibility Review, A11y Audit)

A structured evaluation of a digital product, website, or application against established accessibility standards, typically WCAG, to identify barriers that prevent people with disabilities from using it effectively. An accessibility audit usually combines automated scanning…

Accessibility Checker(also: Accessibility Verifier, Accessibility Inspector, A11y Checker)

A software tool that automatically evaluates an application, document, or website against accessibility standards and guidelines, identifying potential barriers for users with disabilities. Accessibility checkers may be built into development environments (such as Apple's…

Accessibility Conformance Testing(also: ACT, ACT Rules Format)

A W3C technical recommendation that defines a standardized format for writing rules to test web accessibility. The ACT Rules Format provides a consistent structure for describing what to test and what outcomes to expect, aiming to reduce inconsistency between different automated…

Accessibility Evaluation Framework(also: A11y Assessment Framework, Accessibility Testing Framework)

A structured methodology for systematically assessing the accessibility of digital content, products, or services against established standards and guidelines. Effective frameworks define the criteria to be evaluated, the methods for evaluation (automated testing, manual…

Accessibility Testing(also: A11y Testing)

The practice of evaluating software, websites, or digital products to ensure they can be used by people with disabilities, including those using assistive technologies such as screen readers, voice recognition, and switch devices. Accessibility testing encompasses automated…

Accessibility Violation(also: A11y Violation, Accessibility Error, Accessibility Issue)

Any instance where web content, code, or design fails to conform to established accessibility guidelines such as WCAG. Accessibility violations can be syntactic (missing required HTML elements or attributes), semantic (elements present but not meaningful), or layout-related…

Automated Accessibility Testing(also: Automated A11y Testing, Accessibility Scanning)

The use of software tools to programmatically check web content against accessibility guidelines such as WCAG. Tools like Axe, WAVE, Google Lighthouse, and AChecker translate accessibility rules into automated checks applied to HTML elements. While efficient for detecting…

Automated Accessibility Testing(also: Automated Testing, Accessibility Scanning, A11y Testing)

The use of software tools to programmatically check web content against accessibility guidelines such as WCAG, identifying issues like missing alternative text, insufficient color contrast, empty links, and missing form labels. While automated tools such as WAVE, axe, and…

Axe(also: axe-core, Deque Axe)

An open-source accessibility testing engine developed by Deque Systems that checks web content against WCAG and other accessibility standards. Axe can be integrated into browsers (via browser extensions), development workflows (via axe-core library), and testing frameworks (via…

Barrier Walkthrough Method(also: BW Method, Barrier Walkthrough)

An accessibility evaluation method developed by Giorgio Brajnik that groups Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) success criteria by user categories such as blind users, people with low vision, and motor-impaired users. Unlike standard WCAG audits that evaluate all…

Cognitive Walkthrough(also: Expert Walkthrough)

An accessibility and usability evaluation method in which one or more experts step through a series of tasks from the perspective of a target user, identifying potential barriers and difficulties at each step. In accessibility evaluations, cognitive walkthroughs often involve…

Dynamic Accessibility Analysis(also: Runtime Accessibility Testing, Dynamic A11y Analysis)

An approach to detecting accessibility issues by testing an application while it is running on a device or emulator, examining the actual rendered user interface rather than just the source code. Tools like Google's Accessibility Scanner perform dynamic analysis by evaluating…

False Negative(also: Type II Error)

An error in which a system fails to identify something that is actually present or true. In privacy and obfuscation contexts, a false negative occurs when an AI system fails to detect private content that should be obfuscated, potentially exposing sensitive information like…

False Positive(also: Type I Error)

An error in which a system incorrectly identifies something as present or true when it is not. In privacy and obfuscation contexts, a false positive occurs when an AI system incorrectly flags non-private content as private and applies obfuscation unnecessarily, potentially…

Functional Web Accessibility Evaluator(also: FAE, Functional Accessibility Evaluator)

A web accessibility testing tool developed by the University of Illinois that evaluates websites based on coding techniques and best practices rather than simply checking for the presence or absence of specific HTML attributes. Unlike traditional tools that might only verify…

Google Lighthouse(also: Lighthouse)

An open-source automated tool developed by Google for auditing web pages across multiple quality dimensions including performance, accessibility, best practices, and SEO. Lighthouse's accessibility audit checks a subset of WCAG criteria automatically, generating a score from 0…

HoneyPage(also: Honey Page)

A purpose-built test web page used by researchers to study the behaviour of browser extensions, crawlers, or malware in a controlled environment. HoneyPages are instrumented to record network requests, JS API calls, and cookies, and are often designed with known accessibility…

Large-Scale Web Accessibility Evaluation(also: Large-Scale Accessibility Assessment, Web Accessibility Survey)

The systematic automated or semi-automated assessment of web accessibility across hundreds or thousands of websites to understand broad trends, compliance rates, and the overall state of accessibility on the web. These evaluations typically use automated testing tools like…

Matterhorn Protocol(also: PDF Association Matterhorn Protocol)

A comprehensive set of test conditions published by the PDF Association for verifying PDF/UA (ISO 14289-1) conformance. The Matterhorn Protocol categorizes accessibility checks into those that can be performed by automated tools and those that require human judgment, providing a…

Multi-Modal LLM(also: Multimodal Large Language Model, MLLM, Vision-Language Model)

A large language model that can process and reason over more than one type of input modality, typically text combined with images, audio, or video. In accessibility research, multi-modal LLMs such as GPT-4o, CLIP, and BLIP-2 are increasingly used to analyse screenshots of web…

Page Sampling(also: Page Selection Strategy, Website Sampling)

The methodology used to select which pages within a website will be evaluated during an accessibility assessment. Common strategies include evaluating only the home page, testing specific page types (login, contact, sitemap), using hierarchical depth-based selection, or the…

Quality assurance(also: QA)

In accessibility, the process of checking that the methods and practices used to create a product follow established guidelines and best practices. Quality assurance is largely qualitative — it asks whether the right processes were followed, whether accessibility was considered…

Quality control(also: QC)

In accessibility, the process of testing a product or its components against a defined specification to verify conformance. Quality control is quantitative — it measures specific outcomes, such as whether images have alt text, whether colour contrast meets WCAG thresholds, or…

RAVEN(also: Rule-based Accessibility Validation Environment)

An accessibility testing tool developed by IBM as a set of Eclipse IDE plug-ins for verifying the accessibility of graphical user interface applications. RAVEN uses aspect-oriented programming techniques to provide non-invasive, automatic to semi-automatic accessibility…

Red-teaming(also: Red team testing)

A structured adversarial-testing practice in which a dedicated team deliberately attempts to break, manipulate, or provoke harmful outputs from a system — originally from military strategy, now widely used for AI systems including large language models. In an accessibility and…

Self-Consistency(also: Self-Consistency Prompting, Self-Consistency Decoding)

A prompting technique for large language models in which the model is queried multiple times with the same input (using non-deterministic sampling) and the most frequent or highest-voted answer is returned as the final output. Self-consistency reduces hallucination and variance,…

Semantic Accessibility Violation(also: Semantic A11y Violation)

An accessibility issue where HTML elements or attributes are technically present but fail to convey meaningful information to users with disabilities. Examples include alt text set to generic values like "image" instead of describing actual content, button labels that do not…

Static Accessibility Analysis(also: Static A11y Analysis, Source Code Accessibility Analysis)

An approach to detecting accessibility issues by examining an application's source code, layout files, or configuration without actually running the application. In mobile development, this typically involves analyzing XML layout files for issues such as missing content…

Text-Only Browser(also: Text Browser, Text-Based Browser)

A web browser that renders pages as plain text without images, styling, or complex layouts, displaying only the textual content and link structure. Examples include WebbIE, Lynx, and Links. Text-only browsers are used by some people with visual impairments as an alternative to…

Violation Score(also: Accessibility Score, A11y Score)

A numerical metric used to quantify the severity and prevalence of accessibility violations on a web page or within a dataset. Violation scores typically map qualitative impact levels (cosmetic, minor, moderate, serious, critical) to numerical values, enabling quantitative…

WAVE(also: WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool)

A suite of web accessibility evaluation tools developed by WebAIM (Web Accessibility In Mind) that identifies accessibility and WCAG errors in web pages. WAVE provides visual feedback by injecting icons and indicators directly into the page to show accessibility issues, making…

Web Accessibility Assessment(also: Accessibility Evaluation, Accessibility Audit, Web Accessibility Testing)

The process of evaluating websites and web applications to determine how well they meet accessibility standards and guidelines, typically WCAG. Assessment methods include automated testing with evaluation tools, manual expert review, and user testing with people with…

Web Accessibility Audit(also: Accessibility Audit, WCAG Audit)

A systematic evaluation of a website or web application against accessibility standards (typically WCAG) to identify barriers that prevent people with disabilities from accessing content. Audits may be automated (using tools like Google Lighthouse, axe, or WAVE), manual (expert…

Web Accessibility Evaluation(also: Accessibility Assessment, Accessibility Review)

The process of assessing whether a website or web application meets accessibility standards and can be used by people with disabilities. Evaluation methods include automated testing using tools like axe-core, WAVE, or Lighthouse; manual expert review against WCAG success…

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