Forum Moderators: not2easy
- As long as the images are very legible.
- The original and over state images are background images pulled in through CSS (so looking at the HTML it appears to be a normal link) and (no javascript).
- In the above case, if images and CSS are turned off you will still see a styled text link.
I have been trying to decide which way to go on my new website for over a month now but I just can't seem to settle on one choice. I really want to do it but is it a good idea if I'm using accessibility as a selling point?
Kind regards.
Chris.
The problems I have with using images are:
1. They cause increased load times, and use more bandwidth. While you can get images small, they can never be NEARLY as small as using text.
2. They are fixed size. Well generally speaking people make them fixed size, but you could in theory size them with ems, only problem there is a bit of aliasing since browser don't have good filters for compacting images. The other problem with it is that you'll either have people downloading higher quality of something they may never see (if their font size is small), or that the people with larger font size will experience a very lousy image quality (due to the smaller image just being exploded).
It seems like it's moving as slow as hell, even though I consider it to be one of the most important things for the internet, but eventually vector-based graphics (SVG) will come along which will be very useful for all sorts of things such as images in navigation.
Until then, at least I will, still stick to using normal text as much as possible.
I was wondering more about a business perspective. If I advertise 'Accessibility Standards Compliant Design' but use background images for some links where I could just as easily have used a text link, am I offering what I suggest?
What about if a user has images turned off but CSS turned on (with the text indented off the screen)? The user would not see either unless I use the title attribute.
Is this good practise?
Kind regards.
Chris.
unique web site = good
unique navigation = bad
Also another worry is (hardly likely, but I have seen a lot of site designs die when I try it) if a user changes the text size in the browser to '84px' or 'far too big'. I don't want my hard work to look a mess!
Chris.
Also another worry is (hardly likely, but I have seen a lot of site designs die when I try it) if a user changes the text size in the browser to '84px' or 'far too big'. I don't want my hard work to look a mess!
I think those who'll enlarge fonts mostly do so for a good reason (for them). Stopping them from doing so by using bitmaps where text could do just as well (menus e.g.) is for the visitor stopping them in their needs.
If you want the menus titles etc to look nice theres plenty that can be achieved with CSS (just look at e.g. sliding doors).
If you're concerned about it, detect the font setting in JS, and warn the visitor if it's set beyond what your design still supports, but do let them resize it to their needs.
Not all those that have visual challenges use a screen reader, some have enough with a larger to a very large font. I've had a colleague with that need.
