---
title: Introducing AccessLint CI - Automated Web Accessibility Testing
teaser: |
  AccessLint runs accessibility tests in your CI suite and alerts you of WCAG
  2.0 and Section 508 violations, before you release to production.
tags: accessibility,news,testing,accesslint
author: Cameron Cundiff
published_on: 2016-09-01
---

We are excited to announce [AccessLint CI], the easiest way to test web
accessibility in CI.

[AccessLint CI]: https://github.com/accesslint/accesslint-ci

## Why would you use AccessLint CI

You need automated tests for accessibility, but you don't want to overwhelm your
team with breaking builds and hundreds of failures. In the past, we've used
browser plugins to service this need, however this is slow, tedious, and
inefficient. We've also used CI runners that fail the build on any accessibility
violation, but this is noisy and overwhelming.

AccessLint CI automatically comments on your pull-requests instead of triggering
build failures, and only tells you what has changed since the last build. This
has a number of advantages:

1. You get all the advantages of testing with browser plugins, with none of the
   inefficiency.
2. Developers and designers learn about accessibility violations _before code
   is merged and deployed_.
3. Your team can decide when and how to fix accessibility errors, instead of
   being held up by insurmountable build failures.
4. You get very targeted comments about errors _you_ have introduced, making you
   more accountable.

AccessLint CI makes it easy to catch the obvious issues, and is the perfect
companion to manual accessibility review of more complex issues that cannot be
tested automatically.

## How does it work

All you have to do configure CI to run your app with the [accesslint-ci Rubygem]
installed.

[accesslint-ci Rubygem]: https://github.com/accesslint/accesslint-ci

To use AccessLint CI with middleman and CircleCI, add the following in `circle.yml`.

```yaml
general:
  artifacts:
    - "tmp"

machine:
  node:
    version: 6.1.0
  environment:
    CIRCLE_TOKEN: <CircleCI API token>
    ACCESSLINT_GITHUB_TOKEN: <GitHub Personal Access Token>

dependencies:
  override:
    - bundle install
  post:
    - npm install -g accesslint-cli
    - gem install accesslint-ci
test:
  post:
    - middleman server -d -p 4567 && accesslint-ci scan http://localhost:4567
```

That's it. Open a pull request and AccessLint CI will start commenting.

![Screenshot of a comment by accesslint-ci on a GitHub pull request](http://images.thoughtbot.com/blog-images/2016/accesslint-ci.png)

## What makes AccessLint CI awesome

1. Open Source. AccessLint CI and it's libraries are [open source], free for
   review and contribution.
2. Built on axe-core. [axe-core] sets an industry standard for comprehensive,
   reliable accessibility testing.
3. Flexibility. Fix accessibility issues without stopping the presses by failing
   the build.

[open source]: https://github.com/accesslint
[axe-core]: https://github.com/dequelabs/axe-core

## Try it now

Start using AccessLint CI on CircleCI and keep accessibility issues in check!