Faster, more effective accessibility management: Announcing our integration with Azure DevOps

The eSSENTIAL Accessibility (eA) Platform is now integrated with Azure DevOps, Microsoft’s comprehensive issue tracking system. Similar to our integration with Jira, customers using Azure will benefit from a custom integration that increases efficiency and productivity by streamlining workflows. We sat down with our VP of Product, Andrew Chung, to better understand the impact of this latest integration and how it will transform accessibility work for Azure DevOps users.

eA: The eA Platform is now integrated with Azure DevOps. What impact will this have for the development community?

Andrew Chung: We’ve essentially bridged the gap between the discovery of an accessibility issue and its resolution. Any organization that relies on Azure DevOps to manage development workflows and track remediation progress can now benefit from our seamless integration with the issue tracking tool.Teams that are already using Azure DevOps as part of their workflows will be able to address accessibility issues faster and more efficiently. They can create tasks from discovered accessibility issues, organize them into projects, assign them to their team members, and push them directly into their issue tracking instance for actioning and remediation. Users can now pass critical information between the eA Platform and Azure DevOps.

What is a typical workflow like without this integration?

Without an integration, any work that you would have completed in an accessibility platform to prioritize accessibility fixes would need to be manually added into Azure DevOps.This typically involves exporting, copy/pasting, spreadsheets, and emails. You’re reliant upon a person, or people, to go back and forth between the eA Platform and Azure DevOps to test, re-test, and confirm fixes. It’s a tedious process that can result in duplication, confusion, missed issues, and inefficient work overall.

And how has that scenario now changed with the integration of the two systems?

By integrating the two, we’re connecting the communication between the eA Platform and an issue tracking system. We’re eliminating the manual back-and-forth, and the possibility of missing critical issues. We’re also streamlining work and saving costs by reducing the amount of overhead that inevitably results from adding more work.

Why was this an important integration to launch?

The ability to track and report on the progress of accessibility work is extremely important. Creating this connection of the various workflows (fixing, retesting, and validation) enables users to get data in real time, resulting in better and faster decision-making.And that’s what we’re all about. We’re continuously improving and ideating to create the tools and integrations our customers need to remove some of the complexity of digital accessibility management. Because when we remove the complexity, organizations are more likely to adopt accessibility, making it part of their everyday workstreams.

Advanced Projects and Tasks is a great feature of the eA Platform. How does that feature, plus this integration enhance accessibility work? 

Advanced Projects and Tasks is what allows users to group, prioritize, and assign accessibility findings. It has helped our customers become more efficient and productive. Advanced Projects and Tasks can be used on its own within the eA platform, or combined with one of our issue tracking integrations. We launched it because we wanted our customers to be able to scale, regardless of how many issues they discover on their digital properties. With this integration, they’re not only able to prioritize, organize, and assign, they can push into their issue tracking systems and monitor remediation progress to completion. We’ve made endless copying/pasting, downloading/uploading, and offline spreadsheets a thing of the past. And by doing so, we’ve minimized the barrier to adopt accessibility into team workflows.

Accessibility-as-a-Service

The Azure DevOps integration is just one of the many benefits of eSSENTIAL Accessibility’s Platform. Reach out today to request a demo.