Today's Accessibility

In this "day and age", isn't it amazing how so many how profile sites don't validate nor remotely take into consideration accessibility issues beyond some lame mission statement saying they may be focused on "improving" provision for these "issues".

I was just reading 'Most websites' failing disabled and many of the reports by the disability rights commission and the RNIB. It's quite a shame that this issue is not still on the high priority list of the web developers of the world.

On the flipside though, it can take a lot of work to make a website truly accessible, as many people say, or even just validates through automatic accessibility validation software such as Cythia Says and Bobby (WebXACT is the new name for it).

I mean, it took me an entire 30 mins to change the few things on our DesignCreek website that had slipped in over the months it's been updated a while ago. Such time consuming exercises should be a problem for most small developers. </sarcasm>

I do wonder if there is any real reason for this shameful situation to continue. I always do love this quote made by the chairman of the DRC in 2004:

So, I wonder what other people's opinions are regarding this these days? Has there been an attitude change overall, are things getting better?

I believe that no matter how much those of us who are enthusiasts of standards and accessibility bang the drum, it's like so many things of this nature, nothing will galvanize the big organisations into action until one of them is taken to court and made to pay heavily for their lack of compliance.

I totally agree with Geoff. Unless you find yourself in court or are sympathetic due to a family member or acquaintance that is disabled you can ignore it. Are they being insensitive... no... probably not, just not aware.

I have been designing sites for years and I have never ever ever once heard anyone ask me about accessability issues. Honestly until joining this forum, I never thought about it. Now since I've heard the drum, I will become educated in it.

Thanks for making me aware!

I think the swing towards accessible sites is gaining momemtum, though. It's still shocking to see how few major sites support it. I was surprised to see http://msn.com/ create a new site that's fairly accessible, though. I'm still waiting for Amazon to lose the tables and JavaScript, however.

I personally think there isn't enough publicity out there aimed at developers; so that they realise the issues, and then care enough to act on them. But who has the responsibility for this?

Developer's have really jumped on the 'standards' bandwagon and cut down their peers not joining them. It's a great situation; one that needs to be replicated in this area. However, to some extent, I think it's beginning to be that way with some of the developer's truly caring accessibility: not enough, though.

I think that large companies are beginning to worry about the accessibility of their websites due to the laws being passed in many Western countries. But, I agree, that there aren't enough high profile cases. During the Australian Olympics, the Olympics Commitee were sued by a blind man, who couldn't navigate their site. That made a few companies sit up and listen
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1868566.stm

I always try to make the site's I make as accessible as possible - but apart from that; I don't see what else an individual developer can do. I think at the moment, the ball is in the court of the governments, disability related organizations, and the disabled community, to highlight their cause and make the big companies breaking the rules pay for it.

I was going to stay out of this thread but what the heck...I am here now. I personally enjoy building websites...and tend to take even more pride in a website if it is accessible. Maybe that is because most of the time I am doing flash websites...lol

I wish there was a way to build a flash website and have it be truly accessible, but unfortently I just build what my clients tell me to build (Which is almost always a flash website...cause that is what I am famous for...hehehe), but for those clients that push me to do a flash website...I always push back at them, and tell them they should do two websites one that is accessible for dial-up users and users with disabilities, and then the fancy flash website.

I don't know if you are aware of it Jacob but Adobe now have an Accessibility Centre with articles on making Flash and PDF documents accessible. How good the information is I couldn't say.
http://www.adobe.com/accessibility/index.html

I don't like the idea of having a so called accessible web site and one for the rest of us.

Designers have to get into the idea of designing a site that meets everyones needs, which if needs be, means a gracefull degredation of the visual effects without any loss of content.

When you find organisations operating two sites, very often the 'accessible site' which usually means text based, is not as content rich as the 'normal' site.

I think there is also a potential for people to only think about blind people when thinking about accessibility as if the only issue was whether you can see the site or not.

There are many issues to be considered such as cognitve awareness, colour perception, dyslexia, motor skills, etc.

Hmm, I don't see anything wrong with focusing on the blind/css disabled client when thinking about developing a website, or if people necessarilly do. The main areas that need to be covered, which I see as:

- Readable by assistive sofware
- Good contrast/colouring on a page (perhaps with options to alter this per user.)
- And Resizable text throughout.

Are all areas affecting different areas/types of blindness... I don't see anyone that does focus on the blind particularly - but if they did then they wouldn't be too far wrong for everyone else.

Just my opinion though...

I don't personally think that graceful degradation is necessary regarding accessibility. Many of accessibility considerations are to do with html markup and getting the appropriate alternatives available for the user such as alt tags or longdesc tags where alt doesn't really contain sufficient information.

But yeah there have been some very successful projects regarding accessible flash including the redesign of J. K. Rowling's website which is championed as a good example of what can be done to improve accessibility. Since it's such a universal product, appealing to the eight million people in the U.K. with a registered disability of some description was quite an important part of this.

There are plenty of other examples on how complex sites have achieved good accessibility without compromising the things that we designers hold dear to ourselves, and rightly so.

Snow:
I think you misinterpreted the point I was trying to make. I was mearly trying to make the point that there are people facing accessibility issues other than those who are blind, and having an all singing and dancing site that can also be read by a screen reader isn't enough.

I think that ALL designers and developers know about accessibility but most are either too lazy or think it doesnt apply to them.

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Rob - Webforumz Founder

I have to disagree with you on that one. I worked with the head of a website design company in Norway a couple of years ago, and he knew nothing about anything. I've also seen and lost several jobs to local designers who charge next to nothing because they can throw a Frontpage site together in 5 minutes not knowing there're better options waiting for them out there.

As for the graceful degradation, I think it's important. If you know how to code JavaScript and CSS correctly, you'll manage it subconciously. It certainly doesn't take any more effort to achieve such a nicety.

yeah its a shame about all those entirely frontpage-oriented websites out there
one example of a big company with a totally invalid site is google - 66 validation errors!
despicable!

hahaha...lol, what made you think to see wither Google validated...lol??