Adam Finlayson from Northwestern University presented yesterday an interesting session at HighEdWebDev05 titled “Improving Accessibility with a Content Management System (CMS).”
After attending this session, Brian Phelps, who agreed to be our very-own correspondent at the conference, filed the following report.
“There are two barriers to improving Web accessibility: learning the techniques and implementing them. HTML-savvy designers and developers easily overcome these hurdles, but what about WYSIWYG-using department assistants making updates? Teaching Dreamweaver basics is challenging enough without the what, when, and why of accessibility recommendations. Learn about techniques Northwestern University uses to improve accessibility and how a content management system (CMS) makes life easy for site editors.”
Adam summarized the three types of challenges most common in web users:
- Physical, e.g., a motor skill limitation
- Technical, e.g., a slow modem
- User-defined, e.g, JavaScript disabled
Adam described basic components of a page and how, through a content management system, you can improve accessibility for impaired users to your content. He broke the document control into three components:
- Template control
- Input control
- Output control
Template Control
Adam described how first specifying the correct Doctype is essential to the disabled user and their web browsing technology, whether it be a screen reader or another technology. He recommended certain base line strategies, including using “skip links†that permit impaired readers to skip navigation to get to the main content. This means imbedding Access Keys in the content. He said that the main content should be placed at the top of the file, and navigation and header matter should come last in the code. The layout should be controlled using CSS.
Input Control
Input control means we should specify a language in the page and require users to implement certain attributes, like the ALT tag for images, the CAPTION tag for tables, and LABELs for forms.
Output Control
Output control means employing techniques or technology to validate user’s code to tidy up X/HTML, to strip unwanted FONT or other tags, and to otherwise optimize it for standard appearance on your web site.
He suggested that meaningful page TITLEs that closely match the first H1 are important. He also described a technique of “reverse bread crumbs†in the TITLE, so that users are always able to discern their location, and bookmark it accurately. He described how to use the LINK tag for navigational aides, such as “Next,†“Prev,†and “Start.†While not visible to most browsers or the users, they can be accessed by disabled users with using assistive technologies.
That being said, CMS won’t solve everything. It doesn’t prohibit users from adding “Click here†to every link, or from using undefined acronyms or abbreviations.