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Google's Accessibility team has released two new Chrome extensions recently that improve the browser's accessibility in two specific ways.
Animation Policy is a Chrome extension that gives you more control over animated image formats in the browser.
Animations run in a never ending loop in Chrome by default which is not always the best usability experience especially since there is no quick option to stop the animation once the image has loaded fully in the browser.
Animation Policy provides you with controls to run animations only once or not at all. It is compatible with popular image animation formats but not video animations. The extension adds an icon to Chrome's address bar that reveals the options when you click on it.
The change takes effect from that moment on. Animations that are already running need to be reloaded though.
Probably the biggest issue with the extension is that the rule is applied globally to the browser and not on a per-site basis.
It is necessary to reload web pages with animations if you want to play them again in Chrome after switching to the allow once option.
The second extension, Color Enhancer, adds a customizable color filter to Chrome which may improve color perception on websites for partially color-blind users of the browser.
A click on the extension icon displays a basic configuration menu at first and an extended menu once you click the setup button.
Complete two steps during setup to find the color adjustment that works best for you. In step one you are asked to pick the row with the faintest stars, and in step 2 to use a slider until all stars in the selected row are visible.
Click ok afterwards and then enable to apply the color adjustment to all websites you visit in the browser.
Depending on your selection you may see marginal changes or even no changes at all on some websites. It depends on the site's color composition and your selection during setup.
A color adjustment slider is provided that you can use directly to adjust colors on a site once you have gone through the initial setup. (via Francois Beaufort)
Posted by
Kevin Allen
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