Research project · ongoing
Walk a mile in my shoes
Changing perspective: rethinking accessibility.
Standards and testing tools matter. But they show only part of what digital barriers mean in everyday life. This research project brings software developers and people with disabilities together to understand accessibility through lived experience – and to develop new tools for more inclusive software development.
- Duration
- January 2026 – December 2028
- Funding
- FFG Laura Bassi 4.0
- Coordinator
- Independo GmbH
- Status
- Ongoing
Accessibility is more than a checklist
Technical standards and testing methods are an essential foundation for digital accessibility. Without a connection to real-life use, however, the effects of individual design and development decisions can remain abstract.
People with disabilities experience those effects directly in everyday digital life. Walk a mile in my shoes brings this lived expertise together with the perspective of the people who build digital products.
Connecting perspectives
Software developers and self-advocates meet in structured formats and accompany one another in different everyday situations.
The exchange is deliberately reciprocal. The goal is not simply for developers to observe people with disabilities. Both sides experience aspects of the other person’s everyday and professional context and reflect on what they learn together.
From changing perspective to a toolkit
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Step 1
Encounter
Software developers and self-advocates accompany one another and document their experiences.
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Step 2
Reflection
They reflect on these experiences together and relate them to existing accessibility standards and tools.
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Step 3
Co-design
The insights are translated into requirements for a toolkit and developed collaboratively through prototypes.
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Step 4
Testing
The toolkit is tested and refined in educational and professional settings.
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Step 5
Share openly
At the end of the project, the toolkit is intended to be published as an open resource.
Who is involved
Coordinator
- Independo GmbH
Project partners
Other participating organisations
These organisations take part in the project but are not part of the funded consortium.
A toolkit for inclusive software development
The encounters, reflection phases and co-design process will form the basis for an open-source toolkit.
It will connect technical accessibility knowledge with experience-based learning and is intended for use in universities, programming courses and companies.
Funded by
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FFG Laura Bassi 4.0
Walk a mile in my shoes is funded by the Austrian Research Promotion Agency under the Laura Bassi 4.0 programme.
Further reading on our blog
Published so far
Walk a mile in my shoes runs until the end of 2028. We will add published methods, materials and project results here throughout the project.
More research at Independo
Every project has its own page, with the question behind it, how we work and what has been published so far.