setup-a11y

GitHub Action for setting up accessibility dependencies in GitHub runners so you can drive xa11y accessibility tests in CI.

On Linux it installs the system libraries xa11y needs and (optionally) brings up a headless display (Xvfb), a D-Bus session, and the AT-SPI bridge — exporting the right environment to later steps. On macOS it can grant the Accessibility (TCC) permission the runner needs. On Windows it is a no-op (UI Automation works out of the box).

Usage

jobs:
  a11y-tests:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: xa11y/setup-a11y@v1
      # DISPLAY / DBUS / AT-SPI are now live for the rest of the job
      - run: pytest tests/

Need GTK/WebKit or Electron libraries? Select extra package groups:

      - uses: xa11y/setup-a11y@v1
        with:
          package-groups: base gtk      # or: base electron
          extra-packages: my-app-deps   # any additional apt packages

On macOS, grant the Accessibility permission to the process running your tests:

      - uses: xa11y/setup-a11y@v1
        with:
          macos-tcc-client: /opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.12.x/x64/bin/python3

Inputs

Input	Default	Description
package-groups	base	Space-separated apt package groups to install on Linux. Available: base, gtk, electron, link. See apt-packages.txt.
extra-packages	""	Additional apt packages to install on Linux (space-separated).
install-deps	true	Install system dependencies on Linux. Set to false to skip apt entirely.
apt-cache-version	1	Cache-busting version for the apt package cache. Bump when the package set changes.
setup-display	true	Start Xvfb and export DISPLAY (Linux only).
setup-atspi	true	Start a D-Bus session + AT-SPI bridge and export their env (Linux only).
setup-window-manager	false	Start fluxbox (Linux only). Some toolkits (e.g. egui via AccessKit) only publish their tree once a window manager has mapped the window.
display	:99	X display number to use for Xvfb (Linux only).
macos-tcc-client	""	Path to the binary that needs the Accessibility (TCC) permission on macOS. When empty, the action prints a warning instead.

Pinning a version

The examples above use @v1. You can also pin to a specific tag or commit SHA for stricter supply-chain guarantees, or use @main to track the latest.

Links

• xa11y — cross-platform accessibility library: https://github.com/xa11y/xa11y
• Setting up GitHub Actions / CI — see the xa11y docs: https://xa11y.dev/guides/ci/

This action was previously published from xa11y/xa11y as xa11y/xa11y/.github/actions/setup-a11y. It now lives here for a cleaner reference name: xa11y/setup-a11y.