gulp-axe-cli

Gulp plugin to test static pages with aXe as pre-commit hook or in CI environment.

Why gulp-axe-cli?

Other axe-based plugins are built to generate reports. While these reports are great for analysis, these CLIs, plugins, and packages do not always work well with development pipelines. With gulp-axe-cli, we leverage the power of gulp as a task runner 💪 and the automation for a11y testing of aXe 💥 to prevent bad code from being committed or built. 👍

Install

$ npm install --save-dev gulp-axe-cli

Usage

const gulp = require('gulp');
const axe = require('gulp-axe-cli');
 
gulp.task('default', () =>
    gulp.src('src/file.ext')
        .pipe(axe())
        .pipe(gulp.dest('dist'))
);

Note While aXe one of the best automated tools, it only covers 20%-50% of all a11y issues. Be sure to test manually after the aXe test.

API

axe(config)

config

Type: Object

All properties are optional.

const gulp = require('gulp');
const axe = require('gulp-axe-cli');
const axeConfig = {
        urls: (file) => {
            ...
        },
        tags: [ ... ],
        rules: [ ... ],
        disable: [ ... ],
        scope: {
            'include': ' ... ',
            'exclude': ' ... '
        },
        browser: ' ... ',
        timeout: 120,
        'load-delay': 2000,
        save: false
    };
 
gulp.task('default', () =>
    gulp.src('src/file.ext')
        .pipe(axe(axeConfig))
        .pipe(gulp.dest('dist'))
);

urls

Type: function
Default: f(file) { return file; }

Allows you to modify the files from gulp.src([...]) to match your routes either locally or remotely.

tags

Type: array[strings]
Default: ['wcag2a','wcag2aa']

Specify which level of a11y compliance to follow. These "tags" include a set of rules to test your pages. Learn more about the rules or learn more about aXe tags

rules

Type: array[strings]
Default: null

Add specific rules to test on your pages. These can be in addition to any rules already included in your tags (above). Learn more about aXe's rules or learn more about axe tags

disable

Type: array[strings]
Default: null

Ignore specific rules as the test run on your pages. These rules will be skipped from the already included in your tags (above). Learn more about aXe's rules or learn more about axe tags

scope

Type: object[string: string]
Default: { 'include': null, 'exclude': null }

Scope your tests to either include or exclude particular sections of your page. The include and exclude keys take in a CSS3 selector for the elements to include/exclude from your test.

browser

Type: string
Default: null

You can run your test on different browsers. By default it runs on a headless Chrome instance. Running in another browser requires that browser's webdriver to be available on your PATH. You can find a list of available webdrivers and how to install them at: https://seleniumhq.github.io/docs/wd.html

timeout

Type: number
Default: null

If you find the execution of axe-core takes too long, which can happen on very large pages, use timeout to increase the time axe has to test that page. The value represents time in seconds.

load-delay

Type: number
Default: null

If you find your page is not ready after axe has determined it has loaded, you can use load-delay. This will make axe wait that time before running the audit after the page has loaded. The value represents time in milliseconds.

save

Type: boolean
Default: false

gulp-axe-cli is meant to run and pass/fail on the terminal, but this doesn't mean you can't save the reports. By default, the reports will save as json files with all the errors in ./axe-results/

Gotchas

Create ./axe-results on install to save

If you want to save the results, by default, we're saving them into an ./axe-results directory. This directory should already be present by the time you run the tests, so you can add a script to add it post install.

Test coverage

aXe helps to automate a11y testing, but it only covers certain rules for fully accessible sites. Here's the note from aXe after each test run:

Please note that only 20% to 50% of all accessibility issues can automatically be detected.
Manual testing is always required. For more information see:
https://dequeuniversity.com/curriculum/courses/testingmethods

There are only certain a11y rules that are covered, so for maximum coverage, do test your application manually.

Demo

We're created a demo repo to test the integration at https://github.com/samueleishion/gulp-axe-cli-demo

License

MIT © Sam Acuna

Support on Beerpay

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