Web Accessibility

January 06

Source: www.w3.org, www.webcredible.co.uk

The Web is an increasingly important resource in many aspects of life: education, employment, government, commerce, health care, recreation, and more. The Web is used for receiving information as well as providing information and interacting with society. Therefore it is essential that the Web be accessible in order to provide equal access and equal opportunity to people with disabilities. An accessible Web also benefits others, including older people with changing abilities due to ageing.

There are initial costs for organisations implementing Web accessibility; however, the initial costs are often offset by a full return on investment. In order to be willing to invest the initial costs, many organizations need to understand the social, technical, and financial benefits of Web accessibility and the expectations of the returns throughout the organization. The justification to commit resources to a project is often called a "business case". Business cases usually document an analysis of the project's value in meeting the organization's objectives, the cost-benefit analysis, and the expected outcomes.

A legal responsibility in the UK

The DDA (Disability Discrimination Act) states that service providers must not discriminate against disabled people. A website is regarded as a service and therefore falls under this law, and as such must be made accessible to everyone.

What is Web Accessibility

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.  For example, many people with age-related visual deterioration can benefit from a sufficient contrast between foreground and background colours and text that does not blink or move.

Web accessibility encompasses all disabilities that affect access to the Web, including visual, auditory, physical, speech, cognitive, and neurological disabilities.  Web accessibility also benefits people without disabilities. For example, a key principle of Web accessibility is designing Web sites and software that are flexible to meet different user needs, preferences, and situations. This flexibility also benefits people without disabilities in certain situations, such as people using a slow Internet connection, people with "temporary disabilities" such as a broken arm, and people with changing abilities due to aging.

Why you should care about disabled Internet users:

The statistics on the number of users who may face difficulties due to your website's accessibility are quite startling:

• There are 8.6 million registered disabled people in the UK - 14% of the population (source: DRC) 
• One in 12 men and one in 200 women have some form of colour blindness - 9% of the UK population (source: Institution of Electrical Engineers) 
• Two million UK residents have a sight problem - 4% of the population (source: RNIB) 
• There are 12 million people aged 60 or over - 21% of the UK population (source: UK government)

Although there is inevitably some overlap between the aforementioned groups, adding up these numbers provides a total of 48% of the UK population that could potentially face problems with your website's accessibility. That's an extraordinarily high number.

It's not just disabled users who can't access your website

Non-disabled people may also experience difficulties with your website's accessibility. Not everyone is viewing your website on the latest version of Internet Explorer, with all the plug-ins and programs that you may require them to have for optimal access.

If your website relies on images, Flash or JavaScript, and fails to provide alternatives, then your website won't be accessible to a number of web users. The following examples are a common occurrence:

• Users on slow connections regularly turn images off to enable a quicker download time. Some browsers, such as the text-only Lynx browser do not display images at all. 
• Not every user has downloaded the latest Flash program that's needed to access your site. Additionally, the download time on Flash websites often takes so long that users lose patience and don't even wait to see the content. Just 25% of web users in the UK are connected to the Internet via broadband (source: National Statistics). 
• JavaScript is a scripting language that can cause changes to a page, often through mouse functions, buttons, or other actions from the user. For example, pop-ups are opened using JavaScript. JavaScript is unsupported by about 5% of web users, either because they have turned it off to prevent pop-up adverts or because their browser doesn't support it (source: The Counter). Any JavaScript-driven content provided on your website won't be accessible to these users. 
• PDAs, mobile phones and WebTV have limited support for large images, Flash and JavaScript.  Don't underestimate the importance of this: in 2008 alone an estimated 58 million PDAs will be sold (source: eTForecast) and one third of the world's population will own a wireless device (source: ClickZ)

How to ensure web accessibility

The first and perhaps the most important rule of web accessibility; not everyone is using the latest version of Internet Explorer, with all the plug-ins and programs that you may require them to have for your website. Different browsing technologies, each with their own accessibility requirements, can include:

• Lynx browser - Text-only browser with no support for tables, CSS (Cascading Style Sheets – a mechanism for adding style to web documents), images, JavaScript, Flash or audio and video content 
• WebTV - 560px in width with horizontal scrolling not available 
• Screen reader - Page content read aloud in the order it appears in the HTML document 
• Handheld device - Very small screen with limited support for JavaScript and large images 
• Screen magnifier - As few as three to four words may be able to appear on the screen at any one time 
• Slow connection (below 56kb) - Users may turn off images to enable a faster download time 
• 1600px screen width - Very wide screen

This basically means that to ensure your website is accessible to everyone you must provide alternatives to:

• Images - in the form of ALT text 
• JavaScript - through the <noscript> tag 
• Flash - with HTML equivalents 
• Audio & video - by using subtitles or written transcripts

A good way to check that your website is accessible for all these is to download the Lynx browser and see if you can successfully access every part of your website.

It should be easy for all users to quickly process the content on your website

We generally don't read web pages. We scan, trying to find what we're looking for as quickly as possible. On a regular monitor, we scroll down the page looking at the items that stand out from the rest of the text: headings, links, bold text and bullet points. Non-keyboard and visually impaired users often scan pages by tabbing between headings or links.

To ensure the accessibility of your website, use headings, links, bold text and bullet points and make sure they contain descriptive text. For example, never use 'click here' for link text.

The end user should have control over your web pages

All web users have unique requirements for how they use the Internet, depending on the kind of browser they're using or any kind of handicap or disability they may have. By handing control back to your users you'll enhance your website's accessibility and you site visitors will be able to use your website in the way that best suits them.

This accessibility guideline could mean allowing users to resize text, warning them when links are going to open in a new window, or providing a link at the top of the screen that takes the user directly to the page content.

The business benefits of an accessible website

There are two very good reasons as to why businesses should start taking these issues seriously:

• An accessible website will make you more money 
• An accessible website will save you money

There are seven explanations for this:

• Your website will be easier to manage
  
  An accessible website separates the content (the words and images that we see on the screen) and presentation (the way that these words and images are laid out) of each page. Each web page has an HTML document that contains the words and images for that page (the content), and calls up a CSS document that includes the presentation information - this CSS document is shared by all the pages on the website.
  To adjust the layout of your website, you only have to make changes in the CSS file, saving considerable time (and therefore money).
• Your website will be compatible with new browsing technologies
  
  In the near future, the use of PDAs, mobile phones and in-car browsers will all regularly be used to access the Internet. The people making use of these new technologies are generally high-income individuals. In order to reach this lucrative target, you'll need a website that is accessible to these machines. 
•  Your website will appear higher in the search engines
  
  By making your website more accessible to web users, you're also making it more accessible to search engines. Search engines cannot usually understand images, JavaScript, Flash, audio and video content. By providing alternative content to each of these, all areas of your website will be accessible to search engines, who'll then be able to have a better understanding of its purpose.
  The more confident a search engine is of your website's purpose, all other things being equal, the higher it'll place your website in the search rankings.
• You won't have to incur legal fees
  
  The RNIB (Royal National Institute for the Blind) and the DRC (Disability Rights Commission) have been exerting pressure on companies and the government to make their websites accessible. Indeed, the DRC has now published their findings from their accessibility investigation of 1000 websites. They've warned firms that they'll face legal action and the threat of unlimited compensation payments if they fail to make their websites accessible to people with disabilities.
• The download time of your website will be significantly improved
  
  Accessible websites generally download quicker than websites with poor accessibility. Just 25% of web users in the UK are connected to the Internet via broadband (source: National Statistics). You can be sure that if your website takes much longer than ten seconds to download then many of your site visitors will be clicking away and you'll lose their custom.
• The usability of your website will be enhanced
  
  There is a certain amount of overlap between web accessibility and web usability. It's been shown that a usability redesign increases the sales/conversion rate of a website by 100%.
• You'll gain good publicity
  
  Make your website accessible to everyone and you can tell the world about it.