Glossary
Definitions for Accessible Web Design
- Accessibility to Electronic Information
- Assistive Technology for Accessing Web Pages
- Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
- iCITA's HTML Best Practices in Accessible Web Design
- Functional Accessibility Evaluator (FAE)
- Functionally Accessible Web Sites
- Headings
- Screen Reader Assistive Technology
- Section 508 Web Accessibility Standards (Federal Standards)
- Structured HTML
- Universal Design Principles
- W3C Web Standards
- Web Accessibility
- WebAIM WAVE Accessibility Tool
- World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) Guidelines
Accessibility to Electronic Information
The term accessibility is used to describe whether a user with a disability is able to input information into a computer and retrieve and use the output effectively. Accessibility can involve the use of a modified keyboard or mouse, an adjustable desk, screen readers, screen enlargers, or speech recognition software. Accessibility also extends to Web pages. Examples of accessible Web sites are those that allow users who rely on screen readers to navigate and interact with Web pages effectively, or provide alternate formats for audio or video files such as transcripts or captioning.
This definition and more information can be found at The University of Hawaii's Information Technology Support Department.
Assistive Technology for Accessing Web Pages
According to the United States Assistive Technology Act of 1998, Assistive Technology is any "product device or equipment, whether acquired commercially, modified, or customized, that is used to maintain, increase, or improve the functional capabilities of individuals with disabilities." Specific assistive technologies are available which are designed to help individual's with disabilities access Web-based Electronic information. Screen readers, speech recognition technology, and screen magnification are examples of technologies that help people with disabilities access Web-based information. Many assistive technologies access the underlying code of a Web site that is not visible to most users.
Top of Document
Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
Cascading Style Sheets, or CSS, are a series of instructions that specify how text should appear on a Web page. You can use CSS to set styles for text, borders, and other elements, and apply these styles to your entire Web site. CSS separate structure (HTML elements), content (text, images, other media), and presentation (color, layout, etc.). CSS benefits include making a site easier to maintain and update but also helps people with disabilities. Assistive technology used by people with disabities to access a Web site can ignore the visual elements of the CSS and allow the user to access the needed information. Also, CSS setting can be overriden allowing users to view documents with their own preferred fonts, colors, etc. by specifying them in a user style sheet. CSS promotes well structured Web documents with information that can be accessed in different ways depending on the needs of the end user.
This definition and more information about CSS can be found on the World Wide Web Consortium's Web site.
IBM has a Web site that describes the importance of CSS for creating a site with accessibility in mind.
More information on CSS can be found on the UIUC's iCITA Web site.
iCITA's Best Practices in Accessible Web Design
iCITA's HTML Best Practices in Accessible Web Design have been developed by the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign's Illinois Center for Instructional Technology Accessibility (iCITA) to improve the accessibility of Web resources. The typical approach to Web accessibility is a "repair" approach which focuses on meeting the technical requirements of either the Section 508 or W3C accessibility standards. This accessibility repair usually results in the resources becoming more "technically accessible" but still remaining functionally unusable by many people with disabilities. UIUC's Best Practices were developed to avoid this problem by focusing on the functional requirements that improve access to all users, including people with disabilities. They are inspired by the needs of people with disabilities but are designed to give all users more options and control when accessing Web resources, hence the name "user-centered" design practices. In this user-centered approach, less assumptions are made about what technologies will be used to access a Web resource and more options are provided that allow use of a broader range of technologies and the ability to restyle information for their own needs.
This definition and more information can be found on iCITA's HTML Web site.
Top of Document
Functional Accessibility Evaluator (FAE)
The Functional Accessibility Evaluator (FAE) is an online tool that analyzes Web pages for markup that is consistent with the use of iCITA's Best Practices developed by UIUC for development of accessible Web sites that also support interoperability. According to whatis.com "Interoperability is the ability of a system or a product to work with other systems or products without special effort on the part of the end user."
According to FAE tool site these iCITA's HTML Best Practices "are not a new standard, but rather a statement of techniques for implementation of the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and United States Federal Government Section 508 standards. Following the best practices in developing Web resources not only improves accessibility for people with disabilities, but also improves interoperability, giving everyone the benefit of having more options for accessing and using those resources."
Top of Document
Functionally Accessible Web Sites
Web sites can be "technically accessible" but still remaining functionally unusable by many people including people with disabilities. For example, A Web page may have been evaluated using the "letter of the law" Federal section 508 standards and may have passed a checklist for that standard. Even though the site may have passed that standard, the Web site still may have insufficient color contrast for a person with a visual impairment to access the site. Adequate color contrast is not an accessibility standard for the Federal section 508 guidelines. Color contrast is just one example of how someone may look to a checklist of rules and still not make a site functionally accessible.
Functional accessibility is looking to make a site usable and accessibile and not strictly adhering to a checklist of rules. It is making a site that allows different people including people with disabillities access information using a variety of access methods.
Top of Document
Headings
A heading element briefly describes the topic of the section it introduces. Heading information may be used by user agents, for example, to construct a table of contents for a document automatically. There are six levels of headings in HTML with H1 as the most important and H6 as the least. Visual browsers usually render more important headings in larger fonts than less important ones.
Headings provide structure to a Web site and assistive technologies, such as Freedom Scientfic JAWS Screen Reader, can access this heading information. The heading information used properly allows a user with a disabilities to skip to a specific part of a document with a header that is relevant to what the user is interested in reading.
This definition of headings and more information about headings can be found on the W3C Web Site.
Screen Reader Assistive Technology
Screen Readers are assistive software programs that allow people who are blind or visually impaired to access Web-based information. A screen reader can read (using the computer speakers) the Web-base information as long as the information is coded accessibly. Graphics are unreadable to screen readers so graphics need to be labeled with text. For example, all pictures on a site need an ALT attribute that describes the function of that picture. Other issues such as having a Web page well structured with proper headings greatly enhance the ability of the people who are blind or visually impaired to navigate a site to find needed information. Screen readers have constantly been upgraded and improved to help in accessing Web-based information but they still require a knowledgeable Web designer to understand accessibility issues to ensure that a Web page can be read by a person who is blind.
Section 508 Web Accessibility Standards (Federal Standards)
The Federal government developed Web accessibility standards. These standards provide the requirements that must be followed by Federal agencies when producing Web pages. These 16 standards were enforced as of June 2001. The standards were developed by looking at the W3C Accessibility guidelines and choosing standards that could be enforced objectively. Many tools are available to evaluate sites on the 508 guidelines. State and local agencies, and businesses have implemented the 508 Federal accessibility standards. These standards have had a great deal of impact on promoting accessibility everywhere. The standards are "minimal" standards and functional accessibilty is a better goal when developing a new site.
Structured HTML
A simple definition according to IBM's Web site is "HTML that is well-formed and uses elements with semantic value."
The IBM Web site outlined some checks to ensure that you are creating structured HTML including:
Illinois Center for Information Technology Accessibility (iCITA) has a summary of HTML elements that help stucture a site. Here is the summary from their site:
Use to provide a unique title for each Web resource in a Web site
Headers are used to indicate major/minor topics in a Web resource
Use to indicate navigation bars when used in conjunction with the title attribute
Use to indicate ordered and unordered lists of items (you can use the CSS list-style property to change the formatting of bullets and numbering)
Use to indicate lists of related items that have multiple descriptors, like the multiple definitions of a word in a dictionary or the time, location, and date of a meeting
Use to provide an association between controls and their text labels
Use to provide a label that describes the relationship between form controls in a group
Use to provide a title to a tabular data table
Use to associate header cells (th) with a data cell (td)
Use markup to indicate changes in language so speech technologies can automatically change pronunciation to the specified language.
Universal Design Principles
According to the Universal Design Education Online, "Universal Design is an approach to the design of all products and environments to be as usable as possible by as many people as possible regardless of age, ability or situation. Other terms for Universal Design used around the world include Design For All, Inclusive Design, and Barrier-Free Design. Terminology and meanings differ from one country to another and often reflect each nation's societal values. Significant cultural differences between countries have influenced how the movement has been adopted and evolved in each location but the common goal of social inclusion transcends national laws, policies, and practices."
Making Web sites Functionally Accessible is an approach based on Universal Design Principles.
W3C Web Standards
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) mission is to "to lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing protocols and guidelines that ensure long-term growth for the Web."
The W3C creates standards and guidelines to ensure Web technologies are compatible. Many W3C Standards have been developed including (but not limited to) CSS standards, XML standards, HTML standards as well as accessibility standards.
To ensure accessibility for people with disabilities, universally designed Web sites need to conform to accessibility standards as well as other W3C Web standards.
Web Accessibility
There are many definitions of Web Accessibility here are a few:
Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can use the Web. More specifically, Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can perceive, understand, navigate, and interact with the Web, and that they can contribute to the Web. Web accessibility also benefits others, including older people with changing abilities due to aging. (Definition from the W3C Consortium)
An accessible web page makes all content available to any human user who wants it regardless of browsing technology. (Definition from WebAxe: Web Axe is a podcast and blog featuring practical web design accessibility tips)
Web accessibility is about making your website accessible to all Internet users (both disabled and non-disabled), regardless of what browsing technology they're using. (Definition from Webcredible: Usability and Accessibility experts)
Web accessibility is about enabling equal access to online content and services for all people, including those with visual and mobility impairment. (Definition from The Motive Web Design Glossary)
WebAIM WAVE Accessibility Tool
The WAVE (Web Accessibility Versatile Evaluator) Accessibility Tool was developed by WebAIM (Web Accessibility in Mind) in evaluating sites according to accessibility guidelines (W3C and Federal Section 508). This tool has some unique features with the ability to see a graphical and text views of accessibility related issues with a particular site. The tool also has the ability to upload a Web page to be checked for accessibility without it being published on the Web. The graphical view of a WAVE report by the WAVE make it easier to discover visually the accessibility concerns of a site.
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) Guidelines
The World Wide Web Consortum's Web Accessibility Initiative established Web Accessibilty Content Guidelines (WCG 1.0) in 1999 promoting Web site accessibility. These guidelines were the first established guidelines promoting Web accessibility. Most of the other standards/guidelines including the Federal 508 Standards have drawn from the W3C Guidelines. Section 508 Standards are mostly made up of the W3C Priority 1 guidelines. Priority 3 accessibility is well known as the most stringent guidelines for ensuring accessibility.
These 1.0 guidelines were broken down into three levels of accessibility conformance. Each checkpoint has a priority level assigned by the Web Accessibility Working Group based on the checkpoint's impact on accessibility. Here are the priority levels and performance levels from the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 document:
A Web content developer must satisfy this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it impossible to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint is a basic requirement for some groups to be able to use Web documents.
A Web content developer should satisfy this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it difficult to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint will remove significant barriers to accessing Web documents.
A Web content developer may address this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it somewhat difficult to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint will improve access to Web documents.
Conformance levels are the following:
The complete listing of the specific 1.0 guidelines are located on the W3C Web Accessibility site.
The World Wide Web Consortium is currently working on version 2.0 of these guidelines. Version 2.0 of these guidelines have taken out some of the obsolete language from the earlier 1.0 guidelines as well as making the guidelines more technology neutral.