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AbilityNet – Making IT Accessible for All.
Web accessibility
Web accessibility and Disability A Practical introduction
Jon Gooday & Robin Christopherson AbilityNet
AbilityNet – Making IT Accessible for All.
What is web accessibility?
Web accessibility is about designing sites so as many peopleas possible can access them effectively and easily, independent of who they are or how they access the net
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Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 Guidelines created in 1999 to explain how to make websites and intranets accessible to people with disabilities.
They are prioritised into three levels:
Priority Level 1 - 'Must' or level ‘A’Minimum Priority Level 2 - 'Should', or level ‘Double-A’Best practice
Priority Level 3 - 'Ought' or level ‘Triple-A’Beyond best practice
Standards
Web standards
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Key accessibility issues
Images not labelled properly
Inaccessible Flash
Language - use of complex text, jargon, poor headings and layout
Multimedia - lack of captioning and transcripts
Frames – poor frame titles makes pages hard to navigate for
blind web users
Tables - information in tables not coded so they are
readable by blind web users
Scripts – JavaScript and applets which are not compatible with
adaptive technology with no alternative content provided
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Who does it affect?
Vision – including blindness, colour blindness and tunnel vision Hearing – both total deafness and hard of hearing Mobility problems with hands and arms Cognitive, Mental and learning disabilities
Many have more than one disability~
9.8 million people in the UK have a disability under the DDA. The groups that have specific Issues with web and intranet accessibility are:
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Vision
As a very visual medium, the Web presents unique problems to the millions who have low, restricted or no vision.
There are 4 broad categories of vision impairment:
Colour blindness – red/green impairment most common, affects 5% of male population and 1% female – test at vischeck.com
Mild vision impairment – larger font size, different background
Moderate vision impairment – screen magnification software
Blind/severe vision impairment – screen readers
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Mild vision impairments – Adjust the Browser
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Magnification software
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Do not use colour alone to convey information (level 1)
Ensure a consistent and uncluttered page layout (level 2)
Avoid using graphics for text (level 2)
Choose colours that ensure sufficient background and foreground contrast and avoid combinations of red/greenand blue/yellow (level 2/3) Ensure all font size definitions are relative -re-sizeable (level 2)
Offer a hi-viz skin and/or link to a page explaining how to change colours and font sizes (level 3)
Use a clear non-seriffed font such as Arial, Tahoma or Verdana (recommended) Avoid using Flash for text – there are resizing issues(recommended)
Key guidelines for mild/moderate visual impairments
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Screen-Reader Users
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Ensure all images have alt tags - especially links, logos and important pictures. Use empty alt tags (alt=“”) for decorative images (level 1)
If you use Flash make sure it works with modern screen readers and provide an accessible alternative for older readers (level 1)
If you use frames make sure they have titles and names that make sense - screen readers navigate in and out of individual frames on a page (level 1)
Make sure tabular data is coded accessibility – use the correct table header tags for column titles (level 1)
Key guidelines blind web users
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Provide transcripts for Multimedia if you use it(level 1)
Ensure both JavaScript and Applets work with screen readers – provide alternative content if they don’t. (level 1)
Choose text for hyperlinks with care – make sure it makes sense out of context and avoid repetition (level 2)
Position labels in forms to the left or above input fields and the right of checkboxes and radio buttons (level 2)
Offer a “Skip to content” link to jump over navigation links (level 3)
Key guidelines blind web users
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Hearing
Hearing impaired people have particular problemswith inaccessible multimedia, including video and audio clips on the web, which lack captioning and transcripts.
Additionally for those whose first language is BSL (British Sign Language) there are words in English that do not exist in their vocabulary.
For example recent research by the BBC foundterms such as ‘marinade’ in their recipe section were not understood by BSL users, highlighting the need to provide a glossary for key words
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Hand/Arm Mobility problems
People with mobility impairments face challenges when navigating and interacting with web pages.
They may experience difficulty moving the cursor with the required precision or may lack the manual dexterity or hand-eye co-ordination required to use a standard keyboard or mouse.
Some people will use voice recognition to navigate and interact with web pages
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Alternative Pointing Devices
Hand/Arm Adaptive technology
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Alternative Keyboards
Hand/Arm Adaptive technology
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Key guidelines for Hand/Arm problems Mobility
For Keyboard users:
If you use flash or scripts make sure pages are useable with the keyboard (level 2)
Ensure a logical tabbing order through all page elements (level 3)
Use shortcut links – ‘AccessKeys’ for top navigation links (level 3)
Limit the number of links on the page (recommended)
For Mouse users:
Graphical or text links should be a decent size(recommended)
Avoid graphical or text links in close proximity not 1/2/3 (recommended)
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Cognitive impairments include dyslexia, memory impairments and attention deficit disorders.
Recommendations:
keep the language clear and avoid jargon (level 1) use consistent navigation, sitemaps and breadcrumb trails (level 2) keep movement to a minimum or allow user to it turn off (level 2) use graphical icons as navigation aids (level 3) content should be organised logically and clearly (level 3) there should be sufficient spacing between lines, paragraphs or sections, use bulleted lists (recommended)Use a clear non-seriffed font and don’t fully justify text (recommended) Dyslexic web users prefer a beige background (recommended)
Cognitive Difficulties and DyslexiaCognitive Difficulties and Dyslexia
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Software tools providing more accessibility features to help designers build accessible sites for example Dreamweaver 2004
More designers creating websites to W3C web standards which includes accessibility – compatible with handheld devices such as mobiles,Palms and Pocket PCs
More accessible Flash
More examples of main stream accessible websites
Clarification of relevant legislation – UK, Europe and World
Future trends
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Sources of help
Organisations such as AbilityNet and RNIB offer a wide range of services to help you make your websites and intranets accessible, Including:
• Audits, • Training• Site design• Disabled user testing
Key resources on the web include:
W3C Web accessibility initiative -http://www.w3.org/WAI/ Irish National Disability Association (NDA) - http://www.accessit.nda.ie/ BBC Research -http://www.bbc.co.uk/commissioning/newmedia/websites.shtml A list Apart –developer resources - http://www.alistapart.com/
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Conclusion State of the eNation Report September 2004 – Premiership Clubs
The eNation Report is a quarterly review of key websites in a particular industry sector.
The latest report looks at the 20 football clubs in the Premiership. 21 sites were reviewed in total as Manchester United also has an alternative accessible site.
A 5 star scale was used:* = Very inaccessible*** = Satisfies a base level of accessibility***** = Very accessible.
1 site had a ** ranking 20 sites had a * ranking
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Contact AbilityNet
To find out more about AbilityNet’s web services
Call: 0800 269545
Visit: http://www.abilitynet.org.uk
Email: [email protected]