The Accessible Web Improving the universal experience

What is web accessibility? None of these should be required on a website: Keyboards Mice Monitors Desktop computers

Interface Independence The essence of web accessibility: content is not dependent on the tools used to access it.

Section 504: Equal Opportunities If your web site: Is part of your programs or services Provides information on programs or services Shares documents required to register for or get information about your programs Then youre subject to 504.

Section 504: Equal Opportunities Under Section 504: you must provide alternate formats of information you share. The ideal web site minimizes the need to create alternate formats: one web site with universal access.

Principles of Accessibility Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/ Perceivable Operable Understandable Robust

What does that mean? Web accessibility is for everything on the web: Web sites PDFs .doc, .ppt, .xls, .everything else

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Keyboard Accessibility Unplug your mouse. Hit the tab key Can you navigate to every link? Can you tell where you are?

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Keyboard Accessibility Compare these two sites: http://themes.joedolson.com/universal/ http://themes.joedolson.com/iatc/

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Form Labeling Has a profound impact on web site users Is extremely easy to detect.

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Form Labeling Example: Bad News

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Form Labeling Example: Good News!

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Form Labeling Compare these two sites: http://dev.joedolson.com/form-bad.html http://dev.joedolson.com/form-good.html

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Alternative Text Disable Images Is any information missing? Whats gone with images disabled? Is this an equal experience for the user?

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/image- block/ http://www.girlandthegoat.com/

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Inclusive Content It doesnt matter how accessible your site is if you dont have accessible content.

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Inclusive Content Accessible text content Accessible PDFs Accessible Audio and Video

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Accessible Text Content Scannable: Use headings and bullet points. Avoid directional text: where is left in a screen reader? Use meaningful link text: what does Click here mean?

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Accessible PDFs The source document must be accessible o Alternative text for images o Use heading structures - dont just change fonts and sizes o Export to PDF, dont just print to PDF http://webaim.org/techniques/acrobat/converting

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Accessible PDFs - what about scanning? Not accessible by default - just big images. Use Optical Character Recognition Edit the document to add structure http://wac.osu.edu/pdf/scan/pdffromscan.html

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Inspect your PDFs: With Acrobat X Tools > Advanced > Accessibility > Full Check View > Zoom > Reflow Tools sidebar > Action Wizard > Make Accessible

Testing Web Sites for Accessibility Accessible Audio & Video Two factors: the player and the content. Player Accessibility Text transcription Closed Captioning Audio Description

In Summary Web accessibility is complex and subjective; but theres still an objective difference between inaccessible and usable - you too can spot that difference.

Thank you! Joseph Dolson http://www.joedolson.com/ joe@joedolson.com http://twitter.com/@joedolson