TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
I don't want to go back to the person and say "This site sucks" with
>no foundation. (BTW..."it is ugly" doesn't count) Therefore, if I can
>get one or two responses as to whether it is or isn't a properly
>created site (such as why it isn't accessible to a certain portion of
>those with disabilities), I'd appreciate it. Please feel free to
>submit your commnts off-list. Also, if you hve any favorite links of
>warm-all-over-touchy-feely web sites that ARE directed to those with
>disabilities, I'd consider seeing what ya got.
All the links on the main page are images or image-maps, which defeats the purpose of style sheets. The disabled may have difficulty accessing the information because they simply cannot see it. To make matters worse, the designer did not include the "alt" tag so that people know what's there when images are turned off.
The "alt" tag is also used by many accessibility programs, so not including it is a major oversite.
>From a pure design standpoint, the blinking text is *horrible* because it emphasizes the wrong thing - the welcome text instead of the site's name or the links.
The effect of the site itself make me think of a game - my mother walked by as soon as it was displayed and asked me if I was playing another computer game (she's completely computer illiterate). That may not be a negative, since this is a "Young people's press" site.
On the other pages, the purple background is a bit overwhelming, and destracts from the text of the articles. What's worse is that it's a javascript that makes that background 'static," so you can't escape the background.
Also, I notice that there is no text links anywhere in the site - they are all images. For accessibility purposes, the designer should have included at least a bar across the bottom that is pure text.b Those links are also not very consistent, so the site is hard to navigate without returning constantly to the main page.
The only concession that is made to the disabled is the "text-only" version. Unfortunately, the link is hidden at the bottom of the navigation bar, and the textpage itself jumbles the entire site into one long page.
Overall, if I were disabled, I'd probably not return to this site.
_____________________________________________________________
Jeff Hanvey: http://www.jewahe.net
*** Deva(tm) Tools for Dreamweaver and Deva(tm) Search ***
Build Contents, Indexes, and Search for Web Sites and Help Systems
Available now at http://www.devahelp.com or info -at- devahelp -dot- com
TECH*COMM 2001 Conference, July 15-18 in Washington, DC
The Help Technology Conference, August 21-24 in Boston, MA
Details and online registration at http://www.SolutionsEvents.com
---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as: archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot- Visit http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.
