Adding captions or providing transcripts isn't always enough- (Found June 24, 2008 ) If you search the web for information related to web accessibility for deaf people you will find plenty of advice about captioning or providing transcripts for web based audio and video material. What you are unlikely to find much discussion related to accessibility and language; for many deaf people English is not their first language, Sign Language is. Although Sign Language provides an equivalent for everything that can be spoken or written, understanding written English - for some...http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=67 An example: UK University Accessible Web Design Plan- (Found June 24, 2008 ) This Accessible Web Design Plan may provide a useful 'jumping off' point for universities in the UK as they consider developing their own web accessibility policies and plans.http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=66 Accessible PDFs with Adobe Acrobat 6- (Found June 24, 2008 ) Interested in creating accessible PDFs You will find some good ideas in a guide I have written for ScotConnect: an easy to read practical 'how to', for creating accessible Adobe Acrobat 6 PDF documents. Developing guidelines to determine which documents should be published as PDFs. Preparing source documents for the conversion process. Testing the accessibility of PDF documents after they have been converted. Find out how to make the best of the built-in features and test...http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=65 The Advantages of Using Valid HTML- (Found June 24, 2008 ) I have updated my page on why it is a good idea to use standard markup when creating web pages. In Glasgow Caledonian University we have recently been deciding what DOCTYPE to use for university websites. Currently I would advocate the use of XHTML 1 Transitional - for the following reasons: Because it will encourage stricter adherence to standards based markup. Because using 'transitional' gives us more leeway when it comes to ensuring that pages will still display even when there are...http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=64 Is your website legal- (Found June 24, 2008 ) A new article by Trenton Moss: Web accessibility and the law in the UK: Is your website legal "There's been widespread speculation about the new legislation being introduced, which will ensure that websites are accessible to disabled users. Try to find specific information about it on the Internet and chances are you'll come up empty handed." layout your forms using CSS instead of tables. I am a fan of using CSS for layout and presentation of web pages - but I do still have a few 'blind...http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=63 Accessible Web Typography - Russian translation- (Found June 24, 2008 ) I notice that EServer TC Library - a cooperative library for tech communicatores - gave, 'Accessible Web Typography - an introduction for web developers', five stars, and the top rating of 'best'". Yura Zemskov has translated the section on usability in to Russian.http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=62 Associate form fields explicitly with their labels- (Found June 24, 2008 ) Here is handy accessibility tip that will make filling in web forms easier for screen reader users, and for people with impaired motor skills: associate form fields explicitly with their labels by making use of the 'label' element and the 'id' attribute. When encountering a form on a web page it is easy for sighted users to work out the expected response for each form element; it is just a matter of reading the label next to the field. However, it is not always quite so simple for...http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=60 Ready made style sheets to meet your access needs.- (Found June 24, 2008 ) Here is this weeks web accessibility tip: download ready made style sheets to meet your access needs. I came across this tip while reading through the latest copy of The E-Access Bulletin: technology news for people with vision impairment. It is a little known fact that users of the Internet Explorer 0n Windows can apply their own style sheets to web pages by setting the appropriate accessibility option in their browser. However, the flaw in this scheme is that most users don't know how..http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=59 Juicy CSS Accessibility Analyser- (Found June 24, 2008 ) Gez Lemon has come up with yet another useful addition to the accessible web designers toolbox - a CSS accessibility checker. I could take the time to tell you what it does, or be lazy and leave that job to Gez: "I've been working on a CSS accessibility program. It's a very basic service at the moment, but I'm hoping over time to make the service highlight potential accessibility issues. At the moment, it validates the CSS using the W3C's validation service, checks for colour contrast...http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=58 Make HTML pages created from MS Word more accessible- (Found June 24, 2008 ) Many HTML pages are still being created using Words in-built 'Export to HTML' function, so in this weeks tip I explore some simple ways to make the resulting web pages a little more accessible (than they would otherwise be). Using Word to create HTML pages is not ideal, as the program has a tendency to add a lot of extra 'junk' to the resulting markup; the extra markup is used to try to make the Web page look similar to the original Word document. However here are two important techniques..http://www.mcu.org.uk/showlog.php?weblogid=51 |