Author: Dennis

Podcast #34: Design Considerations for Accessibility

Post author By Dennis
Post date November 17, 2006
1 Comment on Podcast #34: Design Considerations for Accessibility

Considerations for designing an accessible web site, including discussion on web site conventions, navigation, color, text, and layout.

Download Web Axe Episode 34 (Design Considerations for Accessibility)

[Transcript for Web Axe 34]

Stick to Conventions

Search upper right
Global navigation across top
Sub navigation on sides
Icons

Navigation Considerations

Skip navigation
Indicate visited pages, current page
Use breadcrumbs where possible

Color Considerations

Ensure enough color contrast
Light on dark, or dark on light?
If you change the color of an anchor state, change them all
Never use color to convey information

Layout Considerations

If you have a low vision/large text style sheet, convert layout to one column
Pay attention to if it is obvious you can scroll downward or not
If Article is broken up between several pages, provide a link to a single page with the whole article for easy printing
Try and design for 760px minimum width

Text Considerations

Sans-serif fonts are generally easier to read on a screen

Print serif fonts are, but light reflects off of paper where screen illuminates light

Text Sizing

Ensure font can be enlarged with out breaking the design
Headers should be larger than regular text (to indicate more importance)
Fonts should be decent size, not everyone knows how to resize text

Other Considerations

Limit the use of Flash
Print Style Sheets
Graphical buttons should be text with graphical backgrounds (for sizing without pixelation)
Include an access guide, or site help
No flickering
Audio–plan for text-only version and links
Video–plan for real-time captioning

captions

The Open & Closed Project

Post author By Dennis
Post date November 16, 2006
No Comments on The Open & Closed Project

In case you haven’t heard, Joe Clark is starting a research project called The Open & Closed Project. The micropatronage page is here. The goal of the project is:

to write a set of standards for the four fields of accessible media – captioning, audio description, subtitling, and dubbing

A set standards for accessible media is much-needed in the web development community. Cheers to Joe for putting this together. Let’s all help support this cause.

administrative

There has been some blog discussion recently on whether or not a web site should provide an accessibility statement. You know, the small text link on the site that says “site accessibility” or “AAA compliant”. It seems that fear of being sued and trendiness have been the main reasons for accessibility statement pages on many web sites.

The consensus from the professional blogs, with which I mostly agree, is that a Help page should be implemented rather than an accessibility page. The Help page should handle any pertinent topics in addition to accessibility features that may be unique to the web site. I say “unique” because if a Help page exists at all, the content should be outside of general knowledge (such as tab order) and browser-specific instructions (such as pressing CTRL + to enlarge text).

The only exception I would point out is a web site that advertises the accessibility of the web site itself. Case in point, the CheckEngine USA web site, which sponsors Web Axe, contains a Site Accessibility page. The reason for the page is as much for marketing and educational purposes as it is for users with disabilities, etc. The company’s specialty is accessibility (as well as web standards and usability) so in this particular case, I believe it makes sense.