Accessibility at large scale for Enterprise software - Architecture and Constraints

Development of accessible features in conventional software has always been time-consuming. In most of cases, development consideration must be made on a screen-by-screen basis. Inconsistency and accessibility "bugs" are especially common place, especially for larger software projects and products where hundreds of developers might be involved. With ist Enterprise Services Architecture (ESA), SAP separates the user interface layer of software from the business layer.

With a professional trained business user in mind, sometimes spending a big portion of the day in front of SAP applications, accessibility guidelines need to be revised or adapted to serve this user group in a best possible way. SAP has compiled it's own accessibilty standard, derived from Section 508, WCAG 1.0 and upcoming WCAG 2.0, taking into account that accessibility requirements for business software can differ from what you would expect from a static website or web shop that is occasionally visited by anonymus users.

The talk will provide information about how the SAP architecture favours the developement of accessible software and about the guiding principles for the adapted accessibility standard.