Accessibility

Disability Guidelines

Disability guidelines are a set of parameters with which to assess a website and determine if it is suitable for those using different interfaces to browse a site. Items such as colour contrast for those using black and white screens or if the site displays correctly when stylesheets are disabled are two examples of these measures. This site has been made with accessibility in mind.

Section 508 Compliance

Section 508 is an American governmental set of guidelines for accessibility. While this may seem slightly irrelevant, it must be remembered that the web is global and the overseas market may find these measures important. Also, they are a good set of guidelines, regardless of the country of origin.

Section 508 Validation Report

W3C WAI-AAA Compliance

The WAI is a set of standards composed and ratified by the W3C. From the WAI website:

The primary goal of these guidelines is to promote accessibility. However, following them will also make Web content more available to all users, whatever user agent they are using (e.g., desktop browser, voice browser, mobile phone, automobile-based personal computer, etc.) or constraints they may be operating under (e.g., noisy surroundings, under- or over-illuminated rooms, in a hands-free environment, etc.).

These guidelines involve items such as using the longdesc and alt attributes of <img tags to enable image-free browsers to understand what should be on the page and separating links with more than whitespace, as links can blur together under certain conditions. This website has been developed to achieve Triple-A accessbility.

WAI-AAA Validation Report

Standards Compliance

XHTML 1.0 Strict

XHTML 1.0 Strict is the most recent version of the eXtensible Hypertext Markup Language. I have decided to conform to the Strict Doctype instead of the Transitional Doctype to force appropriate use of CSS and ensure reliable interpretation of the HTML in a range of browsers.

Economical use of markup is useful to allow fast display of text content on slow connections. When image sizes are specified and CSS sheets used for styling the content, text can show up properly formatted in a short period of time.

W3C XHTML 1.0 Strict Validation Report

CSS Level 2

In this site, CSS has been used both for layout and style. This is to properly separate content and layout and to enable easy rearrangement and alterations of the style of the site, should the need arise. Also, because CSS stylesheets are often cached, bandwidth and loading time are reduced.

W3C CSS Level 2 Validation Report

Browser and platform compatibility

Cross-browser compatibility is important for web designers. With new browsers eating into Internet Explorer's market share, and with the growth of operating systems alternate to Windows, cross-browser and cross-platform testing should always be undertaken. This site has been tested on Interner Explorer versions 5 and 6, Mozilla version 1.7.x, Mozilla Firefox 0.8, 0.9 and 1.x, Netscape 7.1.x and Opera, all running under Windows. It has also been tested on Konqueror and Mozilla Firefox running under Linux and IE:Mac under OS X.