April 15, 2003
Friday
links … except it’s only Tuesday
But there’s a bank holiday coming up and I’m knocking off early this week. So, it’ll be radio silence here for a few days. Until next week, here are a few interesting links for you to take a look at:
- A Dyslexic Perspective on e-Content Accessibility - A paper brought to you by the TechDis Accessibility and Usability Resource. This paper gives the web developer an insight into the issues of web accessibility for users with Dyslexia (and/or other specific learning difficulties). It covers the four main areas of accessibility: presentation, content, structure and navigation.
- Alternative Interfaces for Accessibility - Jakob Nielsen explains why a one-size-fits-all does not always work when creating web sites for disabled users. He explains why, sometimes, you do have to re-purpose content for specific audiences.
- UK ‘must redesign’ e-gov sites - The Register reports that up to 80 per cent of UK central government Web sites need to be redesigned to be fully accessible to users with disabilities. Source: a leaked report from the e-Envoy’s office!
- Download our site template and make the leap to XHTML and CSS2 - From Builder.com, Shawn Morton provides a ready-to-use DreamWeaver template that is standards-compliant and accessible. Quote:
Here are a few of the benefits this template offers:
- It’s XHTML 1.0 Strict-compliant - By jumping straight to XHTML 1.0 Strict (instead of moving to XHTML 1.0 Transitional), you won’t have to go back and rework your code.
It’s CSS2-compliant - The layout of this template is CSS2-driven, so presentation is completely separate from the content. There are no TABLE tags and no spacer GIFs.- It meets all of Section 508’s guidelines for Web accessibility - There are currently 16 guidelines specified for the accessibility of Web sites and Web-based applications. This template complies with all 16.
It’s cross-browser-compatible with Internet Explorer, Netscape, and Opera - The template works perfectly in the latest versions of the major browsers and it degrades gracefully in the older ones.- It’s small and loads quickly - The code, style sheets, and graphics all weigh in at around 18 KB.