Survey of Computer Accessibility Needs
Personas are used in creating software and they help shape it to fit real people. By building up various pictures of the users and then turning them into specific characters, it helps the software designer consider the whole person. For example, one cannot assume that all secretaries are good at shorthand but are not too good at coping with technical documentation. But to model those that are, one might create the character Mavis, who is in her fifties, is a really fast typist, but not really interested in computers, although she can do amazing things with the family photos on the computer … etc. She won’t be the only “archetype” in a system, but having a concrete example, with some “story”, helps the designers think about how people react. Therefore, some of the questions below will seem to be irrelevant, but they help build a picture. Currently an Ubuntu developer might think “shall I bother testing this application for accessibilty?” we want them to think “my application is broken if Mavis can’t use it” (and similarly for the other personas).
The survey is now closed, thanks ever so much to everyone who participated. We are now working on building the characters that will be used by developers. Please join #ubuntu-accessibility on Freenode IRC to join in the process.