Accessibility features in the portal

[AbigailWelsh]

Good afternoon, I wanted to share some feedback from visually impaired portal users. The current portal layout and structure does not work very well with screen-readers and can be difficult to follow. For example, the symbols on the left-hand menu are very small and do not have an obvious meaning. We do not get advanced notice of changes to the layout of the portal, for visually impaired users this is especially challenging as they do not have time to learn the new layout in advance of the change. What are your plans for developing better accessibility within the portal? Is this something we could have a conversation about? Thank you. 

[rydersims]

Hi Abagail - 

My name is Ryder Booth and I work on the Equinix User Experience team for the portal. I'm investigating this issue with the navigation with our engineers right now.

We are focusing on making our site more accessible this year, and aiming for AA compliance. The team would really like to have a conversation with you about accessibility and how you experience the site. Would you send your contact information to quix@equinix.com please? We will get back to you promptly.

-ryder

[Shannon]

Ryder from our design team is investigating and will be following up with you directly.

[Shannon]

Thank you, @AbigailWelsh, for joining our team of designers and product managers on a call to discuss accessibility, your feedback, and ways to improve the portal moving forward. Our team will reconnect with you to ensure we improve accessibility across the Equinix portals.

I'm excited to see your feedback and ideas help shape Equinix! 

[rydersims]

Hi Abigale, we are modifying the customer portal header to include the word 'Support' which will be localized in an upcoming release. 

We are also working on modifying the behavior of the navigation to be expanded by default. There is an expanded and collapsed state, and currently, it defaults to the collapsed state. We will also be looking at storing the users preferred view of the menu from session to session. This will take a little bit longer but should be available soon. When I know more concrete dates I'll reach out.
Collapse toggle, at the bottom of the menu.

[Shannon]

Thanks for sharing the update @rydersims. I'll mark the feedback as accepted as you begin implementing the changes @AbigailWelsh shared for improvements. 

If anyone else has accessibility feedback, please join the conversation and share your input!