The evaluation of web accessibility in government portals: the Paraná Inteligência Artificial (PIÁ in portuguese)

Abstract

Since the early 1990’s, the Brazilian government has been trying to keep up with international public management trends in order to change its relationship with its citizens. One of the resources to achieve this goal is government web portals. If such portals are accessible, they can provide citizens with greater participation opportunities. Based on that, the general goal of this article is to evaluate the web accessibility of a government portal, namely the Paraná Inteligência Artificial (PIÁ) and the specific goals are: to describe the main assistive resources available to provide accessibility for the visually impaired; to identify key violations that can hinder/prevent access to Paraná state government information and services; and to organize a summary of improvements. For this, was used the qualitative methodology of an exploratory and descriptive type. Observation and a documentary analysis of the portal were conducted using the following tools: e-Scanner, NVDA, TalkBack and Manual Accessibility Checklist for the Visually Impaired, all of which were handled by three people with different visual impairment levels. Results showed that the PIÁ portal is partially accessible. Some of its main features are: a page on accessibility; short paragraphs; a site map; text and background options. With regard to the violations, it´s possible to mention: links do not open on the page the user is browsing, most pages the user is redirected to do not use the minimum accessibility guidelines. As a suggestion for improvement, one advise is the constantly survey visually impaired users and/or groups of visually impaired persons so that this government portal can become accessible also for members of that community.