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Achieving Universal Usability: Accessibility Without Compromise

This guide outlines a four-step program to create universally usable web interfaces that cater to all users, regardless of their abilities or technology. It emphasizes not merely simplifying the interface but ensuring comprehensive accessibility. Key components include learning accessibility guidelines, testing with automated tools, revising major issues, and planning for future upgrades. The importance of guidelines such as WCAG and Section 508 are highlighted, along with practices for ensuring content is perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust. Embrace universal usability for a more inclusive web experience.

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Achieving Universal Usability: Accessibility Without Compromise

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  1. Harry Hochheiser Department of Computer and Information Sciences Towson University hhochheiser@towson.edu The Universally Usable Web:Accessibility without Compromise

  2. hhochheiser@towson.edu Universal Usability • Interfaces that work for all users despite differences in abilities, experience, or technology • Not “dumbing down” the interface • Not “Click here for text-only site” • Not prohibitively difficult or expensive

  3. hhochheiser@towson.edu A four-step program for making your site universally usable • Learn • Guidelines and Principles • Test • Use automated tools to identify usability problems • Revise • Fix major problems where possible • Plan • Build Accessibility into your next major upgrade.

  4. hhochheiser@towson.edu Learn: Accessibility Guidelines • W3C Web Accessibility Initiative • http://www.w3.org/WAI • Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (WCAG) • WCAG 2.0 coming soon • Section 508 • Ensure Graceful Transformation • Make Content Understandable and Navigable • What’s good for accessibility is good for all users

  5. hhochheiser@towson.edu Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (1.0) • Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory and visual content. • Don't rely on color alone. • Use markup and style sheets and do so properly. • Clarify natural language usage • Create tables that transform gracefully. • Ensure that pages featuring new technologies transform gracefully. • Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes. • Ensure direct accessibility of embedded user interfaces. • Design for device-independence. • Use interim solutions. • Use W3C technologies and guidelines. • Provide context and orientation information. • Provide clear navigation mechanisms. • Ensure that documents are clear and simple.

  6. hhochheiser@towson.edu Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (2.0) • Perceivable • Provide text alternatives for any non-text content so that it can be changed into other forms people need, such as large print, Braille, speech, symbols or simpler language • Provide synchronized alternatives for synchronized media • Create content that can be presented in different ways (for example simpler layout ) without losing information or structure • Make it easier for users to see and hear content including separating foreground from background • Operable • Make all functionality available from a keyboard • Provide users with disabilities enough time to read and use content • Do not design content in a way that is known to cause seizures • Provide ways to help users with disabilities navigate, find content and determine where they are

  7. hhochheiser@towson.edu Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (2.0),continued • Understandable • Make text content readable and understandable • Make Web pages appear and operate in predictable ways • Help users avoid and correct mistakes • Robust • Maximize compatibility with current and future user agents, including assistive technologies • May become a “candidate recommendation” by April or May 2008

  8. hhochheiser@towson.edu Test • Automated checks for compliance with guidelines • Firefox Accessibility Extension (Illinois Center for Information Accessibility) - functional accessibility evaluator?

  9. hhochheiser@towson.edu More tests – IBM aDesigner

  10. hhochheiser@towson.edu Still More Tests • Multiple evaluations • Different tests find different problems • Screen Reader Output – Fangs for Firefox

  11. hhochheiser@towson.edu Revise • Fix major problems and those that are easy • Alt tags for images • Language • Inaccessible scripts • Priority 1,2, then 3 • WCAG 2.0: A, AA, and AAA • Nothing is ever perfect • Note problems/shortcomings for redesign

  12. hhochheiser@towson.edu Plan • Inventory accessibility concerns before the next redesign • Pay attention to • Tables in layout • CSS usage • JavaScript/AJAX • Embedded content (Flash, Java, etc.) • Develop plan for fixing problems in new design

  13. hhochheiser@towson.edu Universal Usability • AJAX, JavaScript, and other flashy tools are neat… • But what do they really add to the user experience? • Use sparingly and appropriately. • Resulting site will be • More accessible • Easier to test, maintain, and implement

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