Create Accessible Web Sites

Creating Web Pages
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Why Web Sites must be Accessible

Section 508: The Road to Accessability: http://www.section508.gov./index.html

Accessibility, section 508, ADA, Americans with Disabilities Act: http://www.websitetips.com/accessibility/

Accessible Web Design: http://www.washington.edu/doit/Resources/web-design.htmlThe Open Directory Project provides a list of links in their web directory on website accessability resources on the internet.

ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) Technical Assistance Program: http://www.adata.org/
This is a federally funded program that provides information, training, and technical assistance ot businesses and people with disabilities and ADA compliance.

The Americans with Disabilities Act: http://consumerlawpage.com/brochure/disab.shtml
The Alexander Law Firm provides an online brochure called "the Americans with Disabilities Act questins and Answers."

Americans With Disabilities Document Center: http://janweb.icdi.wvu.edu/kinder/
This site provides a complete set of ADA-related documentation including reference sheets and explanations of each title.

Chart on Disability: 1996: http://www.infouse.com/disabilitydata/chartbook.choices.html
This site tells how many people had disabilities in the United States in 1996, the types of disabilities they had, and these disabilities affect their ability to work.

Disability Statistics Center: http://www.dsc.ucsf.edu/UCSF/spl.taf?_from=default
This site has a search engine that searches by disability. It provides statistics on people affected by disabilities and their families.

Persons with Disabilities: http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/diswpa01.htm
World Programme of Action concerning Disabled Persons

Some things to keep in mind about potential website users

• They may not be able to see, hear, move, or understand easily.
• They may be in a situation wherre their eyes, ears, or hands are busy or interfered with, for example, working in a loud environment.
• They may have difficulty reading or comprehending text.
• They may not have or be able to use a keyboard or mouse.
• They may have an early version of a browser, a different browser entirely, a voice browser, or a different operating system.
• They may have a slow connection, a small screen, a text-only screen, etc.
• They may not speak or understand fluently the language in which the document is written.

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines

• Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory and visual content.
  All images and area attributes within image maps should have alternative text provided in the ALT attribute. Not only does this make the Web page accessible, but it is also required by the HTML 4.0 Recommendation. Image-based navigation tools and form elements all need text-based alternatives such as a full text-navigation menu.
  Transcripts should always be provided for audio-based content. This encludes audio protions of video, as well as descriptions of important but nonverbal audio communication. If a sound file of the male lin's roar accompanies the presentation of a photograph of a pride of lions, describe that to the user. Not only does this serve users with hearing disabilities, but it can also help users who are at workstations without sound cards, or who may be struggling with a slow Internet connection. Additionally, search engines can pick up this text-based content.
• Describe everything
  Any component of your Web site that provides visual information cannot be understood by those who cannot view it. Not only does this mean the visually impaired, but also any user who may be accessing your site with a browser or device that cannot fully display images, objects, or form elements. To ensure that these users are presented with as much information as any other user, HTML provides for descriptions that may be passed to the browser in place of the troublesome element.
• Don't rely on color alone
  Color should never be the only idication of importance or context for your information. Users who are color blind or are using a device that isn't capable of color display are not able to perceive such emphasis.
• Ensure that pages featuring new technologies transform gracefully
  Be aware that many users may not have a user agent capable of rendering new conten fromats. Be sure to provide alternative formatting for content contained in frames and scripts by using the NOFRAMES and NOSCRIPT elements. Any dynamic content should have an alternative presentation that does not rely on the interactive capabilities of the user agent.
• Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes
  Not everyone can read or process information at the same pace. If you have scrolling or changing information, be sure there is a mechanism available for the user to pause or stop the flow of data.
• Design for device independence
  Not everyone has a mouse, or not everyone has a keyboard. Keyboard shortcuts, tabbing, order, and event handlers all contribute to the accessibility of forms and elements. Keep in mind that people with a variety of input devices may interact with your documents.
• Provide clear navigation mechanisms
  The most frequently used feature of any Web site is the navigation system. No matter where on a site a user may be, there should be a way to return to the home page or major subsections with only one or two steps.

Places that help people write accessible websites

About Color Blindness: http://www.delamare.unr.edu/cb/
This site provides indepth descriptions of various types of color blindness and how a web page can be designed for color blind readers.

Add Math to Web pages with EzMath: http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/EzMath/
" The Web lacks an effective means for embedding mathematical expressions in Web pages." This site remedies the problem and tells how to make math notation accessible.

Amaya: http://www.w3.org/Amaya/ is the World Wide Web Consortium's own Web frowser that also doubles as an authoring tool within the same window. Amaya servews an important function in the Web deveiloment arena because the W3C pases many of its new Web-based protocols through Amaya. Amaya supposts new W3C protocol develoment and therefore is a good GUI browser to have around. it contains a Zoom feature in the View menu (Alt + or Alt - on the keyboards) that enables users to increase the size of text and graphics as they appear on a Web page. Amaya includes a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editing interface. Assuming you have write access to a particular Web page, you can first browse a Web page and then edit it within the same window simply y single-clicking within the editing window. however, the authoring interface is not accessible to windows screen readers.

A-Prompt: http://aprompt.snow.utoronto.ca/
"A-Prompt (Accessibility Prompt) has been developed to assist Web authors in improving the accessibility and usability of HTML documents."

Dive Into Accessibility-30 days to a more accessible web site: http://diveintoaccessibility.org/
This book answers two questions. The first question is "Why should I make my web site more accessible?" The second question is "How can I make my web site more accessible?"

Effective Color Contrast: Designing for People with Partial Sight and Color Deficiencies:
http://www.lighthouse.org/color_contrast.htm
Useful guide to designing for people with partial sight and color deficiencies.

Guidelines for Designing a Good Web Site for ESL Students: http://iteslj.org/Articles/Kelly-Guidelines.html

HARMONY (Horizontal Action for the Harmonisation of Accessible Structured Documents) Project: http://www.esat.kuleuven.ac.be/teo/docarch/projecten/harmony/harmony.en.htm
"Guidelines for the production of accessible web pages can be found here." A few of the guidelines are:

• Maintain a standard and consisant page layout.
• Make hypertext links descriptive enough so that they may make sense when read out of context.
• Provide all graphic and audio information in alternative formats.
• Provide alternatives for all links accessible throughan image map, useually by having a list of hypertext links just below the image map.
• Include HTML versions of all documents presented in PDR or other formats.
• Tables should have paragraph or line breaks at the end of each cell Accessibility can also be improved by minimizing the number of columns used, since a more "vertical" layout aids left-to-right and top-to-bottom access.
• Presentation in columns should be avioded as it can cause problems for certain access tecnologies, especially screen readers (for the blind).
  

IBM Guidelines for Writing Accessible Applications Using 100% Pure Java:
http://www-3.ibm.com/able/snsjavag.html

Inclusive Web Design: http://www.utoronto.ca/atrc/rd/slideshows/inclusive.html
This site has compiled information on accessibility into an online slide show.

Low-tech features that can make it easier for a student to read text from the computer are the background and font color. Changing the background color and the text color is easy and something you might want to experiment with to see if it helps the students. 
This black and yellow combination can be helpful for students with visual problems.
Students with syndromes such as Aspergers find the pink background and yellow font color beneficial. It can also be helpful with students with ADHD. Along the same principal, pink highlighters can be very helpful. 
Yellow tends not to be helpful for most students with attention difficulties. 
There is also colored tape that can be purchased to lay over text and moved around to highlight main ideas or answer to questions presented. This type of tape can be reused and does not hurt the text. There are also erasable highlighters.

Media Access Generator (MAGpie): http://ncam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpie/
The CPB/WGBH National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM) has developed two authoring tools for making Web- and CD-ROM-based multimedia materials accessible to persons with disabilities.

Microsoft Accessibility: http://www.microsoft.com/enable/default.htm

Oregon State University Web Accessiblity Guidelines: http://tap.orst.edu/Policy/web.html

Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America: http://www.resna.org/
RESNA is an interdisciplinary association of people with a common interest in technology and disability. Their purpose is to improve the potential of people with disabilities to achieve their goals through the use of technology.

Resources for Developing an Accessible Web Sites: http://www.independencefirst.org/accessiblewebsite.asp
FROM: IndependenceFirst - The Resource for People with Disabilities

Speech-Friendly Website Design: http://karn.ohiolink.edu/philosophy/speech_friendly.html
A strong list of links on the broad issue of accessability may be found here.

Sun Microsystems Accessibility Program: http://www.sun.com/access/

W3C Web Accessibility Initiative: http://www.w3.org/WAI/
" WAI, in coordination with organizations around the world, pursues accessibility of the Web through five primary areas of work: technology, guidelines, tools, education and outreach, and research and development." Tells how to make a website accessibile.

WebABLE: http://www.webable.com/
"WebABLE is a leading provider of Web accessibility technology, consulting, and training. Our work ensures that our client's Web sites are fully accessible to people with disabilities and in compliance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act." Laws and ideas for making websites accessable can be found at this site.

Web Accessibility Learning Modules: http://www.csufresno.edu/webaccess/learningmodules/

Test to see if a website is accessible

Whether you're building a personal Web site or developing a corporate intranet, you'll never get anyone to visit your site if the quality of the site is poor. Almost without exception, users click the browser Stop button if they have to wait more than a minute or so for a site to load. Users take similiar action when your Web site links are broken. Your site's validity comes into question.
The lack of accessibility plays into the Web site integraty factor too. If your site is not accessible, you are sure to lose millions of visitors - not just those who have disabilities, but also those who work with and otherwise support the accssibility community.

Performing a Web site accessibility review is one stage of the Web site validation process.
Essentially you can perform one of the following two types of Web site accessibility review:

• A quick review using one or more HTML validation services and an accissibility validation service
• A thorough review, involving a combination of personal code review, services, tools, and user testing involving people with disabilities

Whether you perform a quick review or a through, top-to-bottom review of your site, it is important to verigy that your site is accessible to people with disabilities.

Clean up your web pages with HTML TIDY: http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/tidy/
Not only will this site clean up your HTML to insure that you are producing valid markup code, but it will offer you advice on how to make corrections to your code for accessibility. HTML Tidy uses the HTML 4.0 specification guidelines as its standard.

Once you have validated your HTML, use the Boby or LIFT online web accessibilty validation services. Both these services were designed to imporve the accessibilty and usability of your web site. Both also use the W3C SAI Content Accessibility Guidelines as the basis for validation.

Welcome to Bobby3.2:CAST(Center for Applied Special Technology): http://www.cast.org/Bobby/Bobby311.cfm
"Bobby is a tool for Web page authors. It will help them identify changes to their pages needed so users with disabilities can more easily use their Web pages. For example, a blind user will be aided by adding a sound track to a movie, and a hard-of-hearing user will be aided by a written transcript of a sound file on a Web page. Bobby will recommend that these be added if they do not already exist."
Bobby is gaining worldwide acceptance as a legitimate validation service. To review the accessibilty of your Web site with Bobby, you can quickly review a single page against a single criterion, review a single page for multiple criteria, or install and run Bobby as an application on your local system and review a complete Web site (local or remote).

UsableNet's LIFT: http://www.usablenet.com/
"UsableNet's software tools empower web developers to quickly and efficiently test and fix their websites to comply with industry standards, including section 508 of the American Disabilities Act and World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) priority one guidelines." LIFT focuses primarily on the usabilty of your seb site, looking for color usage, use of frames, browser compataibility, use of keywords, image size and text descriptions. LIFT not only tells you what to fix and why, but it shows you exactly how to fix your code. A simple cut and past will do the trick.

NIST Web Metrics: http://zing.ncsl.nist.gov/WebTools/
"The objective of the NIST Web Metrics Testbed is to explore the feasibility of a range of tools and techniques that support rapid, remote, and automated testing and evaluation of website usability."

W3C HTML Validation Service: http://validator.w3.org/
The W3C provides an HTML 4.0 validation service that verifies proper HTML accessibility coding.

Checklist of Checkpoints for Web Content Accessibility:
http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/full-checklist

ALTifier Web Accessibility Enhancement Tool: http://www.vorburger.ch/projects/alt/
ALTifier automatically examines your Web page for images and assists you in the creatin of alternative text for the image. It is a tool that ou can use to automate the task of including alternative (ALT attribute) text to images, image maps, objects, and frames on your Web site. ALTifier is comprised of a toolkit with various modules, including an autonomous enhancing filter and graphical user interface GUI) tool. Essentially, ALTifier scans your Web site for HTML coding constructs like IMG or OBJECT, and checks for the presence of assosciated text descriptions. After scanning your Web page, ALTifier than implements appropriate ALT text description using a protoclol that guesses what the text should be based on document context.

Dr. HTML: http://www2.imagiware.com/RxHTML/
Doctor HTML is a form-based Web page and site validation service. It is a fee-based site that enables guests to test up to four URLs. Doctor HTML performs analysis on spelling, image bandwidth and size, HTML structure, image anlysis, table structure, hyperlink verification, and form structure.

This site began in March 1998 and was created by Janet Luch.  Email questions and comments to: studyplans@yahoo.com

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