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The reason for optimism is that the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB) is backing a number of individuals in taking legal action against various as yet unnamed websites that they say do not comply with the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.
Bring it on!
If you own a restaurant in the U.S., you need access ramps for wheelchairs, and you need restrooms with wheelchair accessible handrails and doors wide enough to accommodate wheelchairs. You're required to provide brail instructions on public phones and brail conversions of public messages.
Why shouldn't that logic extend to websites? Why were some of us planning for this years ago? ;)
What will be very interesting is to see which sites are being brought to task.
As is usually the case it is the ones in the public sector that cop it first and then industry sort of follows suit. This, over here at least, is a new one on me and is move in the right direction. Accessibility is important but the decision makers need to be educated to ask these questions of their design firms. Now if that means a few private companies get a legal kicking then that is good AFAIAK.
BF
I agree :)
The standards apply to Federal web sites but not to private sector web sites (unless a site is provided under contract to a Federal agency, in which case only that web site or portion covered by the contract would have to comply).
I've been all over this for the past 6 months. I spend an hour or two every week at the WAI, Bobby and a few others. My biggest hurdle was font sizing. I just couldn't grasp the concept of allowing everything to flow naturally.
Well, all that changed a month ago. I built a 50 page test site that is 100% accessible. It took me months of reading and participating here and I finally found relativity. ;) Thanks to all who contributed and learned along the way.
Everything was scalable, well not everything. The top graphics were static, but everything below went with the flow. I used a font size of 95% for the general rules and then used ems for everything else, and I do mean everything. I utilized absolute positioning for the main containers and assigned relative margins and padding and the end result was heavenly. Images floating right, images floating left, text wrapping beautifully.
I must have spent hours just sitting there using the font sizing feature in IE. Smallest, Smaller, Medium, Larger and Largest. Back and forth, back and forth. Over to Opera and using the zoom feature, ah, everything flowing just as it does in IE, an exact match, same with Moz.
CSS validation with no warnings. XHTML 1.1 validation on every page. There is no turning back now. For those of you looking for that niche market, this is it! SEM508
The law also applies across the board to any governmental or not-for-profit entity that receives federal funding.
For instance, a state agency that recieves federal funds towards operating expenses would also be under an obligation to comply.
Also, a quote from the same site For Uk'rs concerned about law;
"Organisations which offer goods and services on the web already have a legal duty to make their sites accessible. The DRC is committed to enforcing these obligations but it is also determined to help site owners and developers tackle the barriers to inclusive web design.”
[drc.org.uk...]
As always, its a balance. But I'd like to see the carrot as well as the stick here.
K-Mart and Walgreen weren't allowed to bypass accessibility by pointing out that providing access ramps wouldn't provide much of a boost in business. While the law doesn't extend to private sector sites now I expect that future laws will address the private sector. The precedent has already been set in the bricks and mortar world.
Well, I read this thread a little while ago and thought "well, I'll try and convert my website to relative sizing so that the text size can be changed without breaking the layout ".
I tried to do so, and discovered that
(1) Netscape 6.2 doesn't resize DIVs if the width is set to em units, but it does work correctly if you use ex units.
(2) If you use ex units, the width of my 15ex-wide left menu bar (absolute positioning, no margins or paddings thus avoiding problems with any non-compliant box models), comes out as 36mm on my screen in Netscape 6.2, and 32mm in IE 6.0.
So, I can't use relative sizing and have any confidence, because at least one of the two browsers on my PC is broken, and I have no real way of knowing which.
What do you suggest I do? Am I right in thinking that Netscape is broken, and that DIVs with widths either in ex or em units should always scale in size when the user changes the text size? Em and ex are both relative?
Michael
The site renders well in IE6, Opera7.1, Netscape 7.1 and serves up a useable page to NN4.7x. I can't check rendering in NN6.2 because I simply can't get it to install.
It's really not that difficult to comply with 508 standards, but it takes time. I assume that I'll get more proficient as I code compliant pages and I'll spend less time on the detail.
The reward is knowing that I have will have a site that complies with current federal standards, and that I've taken the time to make the site accessible.
It validates as Strict XHTML 1.0, the CSS validates but I haven't gotten rid of the warnings yet or added a print style CSS. It's coming though.
So far, I haven't figured out a way to break the layout.
You do not need to go down the no-tables, aural style-sheets, w3c-xtreme route to make your site accessible (see the RNIB's website).
Simple things like using simple navigation, descriptive link text, alt text on pictures, resizeable text and form elements linked to labels will improve your site for all your visitors.
Also bear in mind that most people with visual impairments are not actually "disabled" (and do not describe themselves as such), they are "normal" middle aged/senior citizens... It's really important to grasp this.
Netscape 6.2 doesn't resize DIVs if the width is set to em units, but it does work correctly if you use ex units.
MTKilpatrick, em is much safer to use than ex. The ex unit of measure is equal to one half em. From what I've read, you are better off sticking with ems as your relative unit of measure. Maybe there is something else there that might be causing a bug in NN6.2. I have the same problems as digitalghost, I can't get it to install.
digitalghost, congrats on joining the elite club of strict validation. We can safely say that we represent less than 5% of the web at this point in time. I've personally experienced the rewards of the club and I am now a lifetime member! ;)
What do you suggest I do? Am I right in thinking that Netscape is broken?
It could be that NN is broken, although that rarely happens. ;) It could also be that you have something that is not 100% correct. It took me hours to figure how to get the left and right margins to react consistently with the layout I was working with. During that time I had IE, Opera and Moz open refreshing content every 30 seconds. It was a tedious process but I know that the layout performs as it should in the majority of the browsers accessing the site.
Michael
Thats a joke
page one you are right, how can we be brought to task If the people who write about the conditions cant even get it sorted themselves. Validation is a piece of pi##
Cant do bobby at the moment, it will not connect, either that or they have it set up that way (very untrusting I know :))
section508.gov does not validate
Neither does RNIB. But the validation errors do not cause any accessibility problems. Or indeed any other problems AFAICS ;)
A w3c-invalid site can offer good accessibility, and vice versa: a w3c-valid site could be designed in such a way as to be completely inaccessible.
Validation means the html syntax matches the w3c spec. It tells you *nothing* about the level of accessibility and is *not* required for good accessibility.
But it is part of the guidelines. If that one is flexible why not others? (devils advocate)
It’s like the building regulations, and it being OK for the building regs board to bypass expensive ones one their building because we don’t want to. Make a mockery of the whole thing IMHO.
I would imagine the html criteria these organisations use is something like (in order of priority):
=1. it must work
=1. it must be accessible
3. it must be easy to maintain/go thru our CMS
4. it will hopefully validate so we don't get bombarded by standards-fanatics telling us our site is inaccessible - when actually we've poured loads of time and money into applying our hard won personal experience and expert RW web accessibility knowledge to our site - but it isn't the end of the world if it doesn't.
If w3c validation was even vaguely related to accessibility then I could see your point. ;)
