Transcript Path 8 - Accessible web design in the tertiary ed. sector

Wednesday 29th November 2006
Universal Design Workshop
Group B
Electronic Access
ELECTRONIC ACCESS
“It’s OK, it’s all available on the Web.”
Access to education and training is increasingly dependant upon access
to computer technology and digital communication. This Workshop will
explore the opportunities and limitations of the new technologies
including:
• accessible web design
• learning management systems (e.g. WebCT, Blackboard etc.)
• assistive technology and computer access
• real time transcription and digital recording systems (e.g. I Lecture)
“Accessible web design in the tertiary
education sector. Current practice
and future possibilities”
Damian Sweeney
Overview
• Principles of accessible web design
• Recognising accessibility barriers on the
web
• Steps to take to enhance the accessibility
of your institution's web presence
Principles
• The web starts out accessible, barriers are
built
• Choose the right technologies
• Use them as they were designed
• Pay attention to the semantic structure of
your documents
• WYSIWYG myths (WYSIOWYS)
Principles - separating web
technologies
• (X)HTML - for content
• CSS - for presentation
• Javascript - for behaviour
• … then the rest
Recognising barriers
• Resize the text
• Get an accessibility toolbar/extension
• Turn off styles
• Turn off javascript
• Validate the code
• Scripting behaviour (AJAX/Hijax)
Examples - bad and good
• USyd (images for text)
• UniMelb LMS (scripting)
• myCQU (code validation)
• RMIT Union (CSS design)
• AIRport (unobtrusive scripting, multimedia)
• WANAU (stylesheet changer)
Your backyard
• Train up or get rid of old-style designers
• Don’t let them tell you it can’t be done
• Include accessibility statements in your
requirements documents
• Insist on user and browser testing
Your backyard (cont...)
• Learn to recognise poor design
• Look for:
– tables used for layout
– text as part of an image
– Flash used without cause
– 'best viewed in x browser / at x resolution'
– back button stops working
Resources
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W3C - http://w3.org
Code validation - http://validator.w3.org
WAI - http://w3.org/WAI
ALA (for designers) - http://alistapart.com
S5 - http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/s5/
WANAU - http://wanau.org