Dr. Ellen Spertus talks about essential tremors and password fields

Dr. Ellen Spertus explains that it's easy to make mistakes on a password field and a "show password" feature is critical to accessibility. Thanks to Tenon for sponsoring the transcript for this episode. Transcript Nic Hi, I'm Nic Steenhout. And you're listening to the accessibility rules soundbite a series of short podcasts, where disabled people explain their impairment and what barrier they encounter on the web. First, I need to thank Tenon for sponsoring the transcript for this episode. Tenon provide accessibility as a service. They offer testing, training, and tooling to help fix accessibility, fast. So today, I'm talking with Dr. Ellen spertus. Hi, Ellen, how are you? Ellen Good. Thank you, Nic. Nic Thanks for joining me. I invited you because I heard you say something really great on Slack that I'd love to discuss. But first, let me ask you, what's your disability or impairment? Ellen I have an essential tremor. Nic And what does that mean? Ellen Well, the name essential means it's not a symptom of anything else. If when people see me shake, they wonder if I have Parkinson's or something like that. But no, it's just a tremor. And it's also called familial tremor. It tends to run in families and it runs in mine, and my hands shake. And sometimes you can hear a shake in my voice. Nic Thank you. What would you say is your greatest barrier on the web at the moment? Ellen If I'm at a desktop, I really don't have much of a problem. My problem's more if I'm using my phone. And something that's frustrating is entering a password, I have to do that a lot. We all have to do that a lot, even if we use password managers. And sometimes when I access the site, I don't know if I have the right password. And when I type in a password on my phone, you know just which is a soft keyboard, unlike the chunky keyboard I use with my computer, I might hit the wrong key. And if the password field is hidden, where it only displays like a little circle after I type something instead of the character, then I don't know if my password was refused because I entered the wrong password or because I accidentally pressed the wrong key. Nic Right. So the show password feature is something that's really critical for you. Ellen Yes. Nic Thank you. If you had one message to give designers or developers, what would that be? Ellen Curb cuts. I know you're familiar, Nic. And I hope your listeners are to the curb cuts that were created for people with wheelchairs where they turned out to be useful for many different people, including people with bicycles or baby carriages. And an option like show password can be useful to people with motor disabilities, or people with memory problems or just about anyone. I understand you can't clutter a user interface with every possibility. But there are some accessibility enhancements that are useful at times to just about everyone and why not include those. Nic That's a wonderful message. Ellen, thank you so much for being a guest on the show. Ellen My pleasure. Thank you Nic.