Platform basics

Use the platform to find, review, organize, prioritize, and fix accessibility issues. The issues (findings) are grouped within projects and tasks. 

On this page: 

• Platform hierarchy 
  • Basic platform concepts
    • Workspaces
    • Digital assets
    • Projects and tasks
  • Basic accessibility testing concepts
    • Scanning
    • Manual testing
    • Rules
    • Findings
  • What's next?

Platform hierarchy

• The platform has three levels of hierarchy. 
  • Organization contains one or more workspaces. Organization Administrators can manage the hierarchy and composition of an organization. 
    • Workspace contain digital assets and projects.
      • Digital assets are the assets you want to make accessible, such as websites, apps, or different digital  environments.
        • Projects are custom remediation buckets that you create. They contain tasks. 
• We test digital assets against accessibility criteria called rules. Potential rule violations are called findings.
• Scans organize findings under the rule they violate, whereas manual evaluations present each finding individually.
• Findings are converted into tasks for your team. Tasks are organized by project.

Basic platform concepts

• Workspaces
• Digital assets
• Projects and tasks

Workspaces

Workspaces hold all accessibility testing and remediation data. If you belong to more than one workspace, use the Switcher to move between them. 

Organization admins, Workspace users, and Workspace admins can access workspace data and features, including all digital assets and projects. However, only Organization and Workspace admins can perform certain administrative tasks, for example, add new users. Learn more about user groups. 

To list all digital assets in your workspace, under Workspace, select Digital asset. The Digital asset portfolio is displayed. 

Digital assets

Digital assets are digital items and spaces that you want to make accessible, such as websites, apps, or other environments. A single workspace can contain multiple digital assets. 

To run a scan or see information about a specific digital asset in your workspace, under Workspace, select Digital asset. The Digital asset portfolio is displayed. Select the asset you want to view. The Overview of the digital asset is displayed. 

Note: If a team member doesn’t need access to the entire workspace, you can add them as a Digital asset user. They can run tests but only access specific digital assets they’re assigned to. Learn more about user groups.

Projects and tasks

Projects are buckets for remediation tasks. 

• Test your digital assets, to get findings.  
• Create a project, and convert findings into tasks.
• Start fixing issues across your workspace.  

Basic accessibility testing concepts

• Scanning
• Manual testing
• Rules
• Findings

Scanning

Scanning is accessibility testing done by computer automation. The automation checks a digital asset’s code and produces a list of potential accessibility issues that need to be reviewed.

Scanning is quick and thorough, but it has some limitations. It only works on web-based digital assets, so it can’t scan apps or other non-web assets. It can also only capture code-level accessibility issues–you’ll need manual testing to capture the rest.

In the platform, go to Scans to run a new scan or check scan results.

Manual testing

Manual testing is accessibility testing done by real people. During manual testing, our testing team uses assistive technology like screen readers to uncover accessibility issues. Manual testing best represents how people with disabilities can use your digital asset.

Manual testing typically takes several weeks to complete but is extremely thorough. Once you’re notified that manual testing is complete, head to the Evaluations page to check your results.

Rules

Rules are accessibility requirements for digital assets. They’re created based on success criteria from the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).

Rules tell you what elements of your digital asset might create accessibility issues and guide you toward fixing them.

In the platform, we scan and evaluate digital assets against rules to find those potential accessibility issues. Each violation of a rule is called a finding.

Findings

Findings are instances where rules are violated. The same rule can be violated more than once on a digital asset, so you can have multiple findings from the same rule. Once you have findings, you can start your remediation.

Scan results list each finding under the violated rule. Select the rule on the Scan results page to get to the list of findings.

Manual evaluation results list each finding on its own and note the instances and frequency. Select the finding ID on the Evaluations page to learn more about each finding.

What's next?

• To learn more about the platform, go to Onboarding Guides for Platform Users.
• To learn more about digital accessibility, head to the Level Access Academy for detailed courses.
• To start using the platform, run your first scan.