“Help! I need somebody” (the Beatles)
Here we are at H in the A to Z Accessibility: Power Platform Edition. This one is all about using song titles… sorry, I mean HELP! To make up for my overuse of song titles I will even save you the effort of finding the songs to listen to.
It’s also the cry that can be heard by users all across the tech world. When it comes to accessibility though, help can make or break adoption and make a massive difference to anyone using assistive technology and tools.
Although there are different ways to achieve the same end-goal, this post applies to ALL the Power Platform. Yes, I’m talking Power Apps, Power Automate, Power Pages, Power BI and Power Virtual Agents.
“The importance of being idle” Helpful (Oasis)
“My app is so intuitive you don’t need help”, “my dashboard is only a dashboard, why should I put in any help”, “a chat bot is easy to use”, “it’s a web page, everyone knows how to use a web page”
I’ve heard it all. I’ve probably said a few things like it myself. After documentation, help systems can be the next worst thing (Sorry Malin but I still don’t like doing documentation!). What we need to remember is that developers think like developers, we can’t always see things as a user would. What is intuitive to the developer may be the opposite of what the user expects.
This is where having help helps! The long-standing joke (or truth) is that consultants are just expert googlers, and end users are getting used to using their search engine of choice to find answers. That’s fine when you are looking for answers about Excel formulas or Teams shortcuts etc, but it’s no good when it’s a bespoke application build for their company.
We all need help every now and then, so let’s be helpful!
“Wanted Dead or Alive” (Bon Jovi) – Actually… Alive please!
The F1 key is DEAD!
OK, that may be an overstatement in general, but in this context the use of the F1 key to provide help is not a thing. You try that and you’ll get your web browsers help menu rather than help for the tool you are in. Then, of course, on Mobile devices there is no such thing as an F1 key.
So how do we go about building and delivering a help system?
I remember using the help authoring tool in the dim and distant past of Windows 3.11 / NT. Writing out a help manual with hyperlinks that hooked in to the Visual Basic 6 applications I was coding. It was a bit clunky, a bit idiosyncratic, and definitely a bit temperamental… but it worked, in most cases.
Now it’s all tool tips, help screens or pages, visible panels, and accessible text. There are other ways as well, such as having a chatbot to answer questions, but those are the main ways of guiding users through your application, dashboard, portal etc. The important thing is having help that is easy to find, accessible, and not buried in a dark hole.
Popups are the “Enemy”! (Imagine Dragons)
One of the key ways people can implement a help system in Power Apps / Dynamics is to have it appear in a popup dialog window. On the surface this is an elegant, simple, and pain-free solution. The problem is that screen readers, due to the way popups get presented, cannot process these and so it ends up being an audible mess that hinders rather than helps.
Until popups and screen readers work out a way to co-exist in a friendly way the best way to have help appear on screen is to navigate to a separate screen that contains the help information.
For Power BI users having a separate page on the dashboard that people can navigate to is the ideal solution, although if it’s a small amount of information this can also be put into a dedicated panel on the main dashboard.
For Power Pages following some of the concepts within the GDS design language and specification (see the G page!) provides a great way of including inline help for users.
When you are building chatbots in Power Virtual Agents make sure that there are clear and easy ways to ask the chatbot for help. Having a “How do I use you” trigger, with plenty of alternatives, can really make a difference and encourage engagement.
“I get by with a little help from my friend” (Joe Cocker)
The key with all of this is to make it easy to access help, but to ensure that it works with assistive technologies such as screen readers. Help doesn’t, and shouldn’t, need to be a massive document that puts War & Peace to shame. Concise, complete, and useful.
As with all accessibility, talk to people about what works. Find the screen reader users and ask them what they find works best. Talk to people with dyslexia about how to make it work for them.
The end goal is to make your app, your portal, your dashboard, have mass adoption and success. The key to this is making it intuitive and inclusive.
Thanks for reading A to Z a11y – HELP!
Thank you for reading HELP! This post is part of my [A to Z a11y] series the “A to Z Accessibility: Power Platform Edition”. Click here to go to the introduction article where I will be posting a Table of Contents, or simply check out the Accessibility section of the website from the top menu or by going directly to the category page here.
Content in this series is © Mike Hartley. I am happy for folks to quote or reuse snippets (with attribution) but this has taken a lot of work to compile so please do not copy whole sections. If there are any corrections or suggestions, then please use my social links to contact me. I am always happy to add additional content and remarks with full credit given. Likewise, these pages will evolve as my learning and understanding grows, so make sure to keep this bookmarked