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"Conservative estimates (check any colorblind site for numbers) put the
number of colorblind men at 8% to 20%. I find 12% to be the most common
and, in my opinion, accurate estimate. For some of us, that might be a
few thousand people. For others, that might be millions upon millions.
As you may know, the number of color blind women is incredibly small.
This is due to genetics."
David, thank you for sharing!
My husband is color-blind too, so I know the struggles he has had
figuring out "what color" something is. We have had some interesting
arguments about what is "purple"! :-)
My first rule of documentation is: don't use red and green for
emphasis!! Second rule: don't rely on color alone to indicate
conditions; in fact, don't rely on any *one* method. I use color, sure,
but also graphics and words, tooltips, and so on.
When I worked for the VA, we used the Bobby site, which is now here: http://webxact.watchfire.com/ to test accessibility for Websites. There
are desktop applications available also that can be used for help files.
Diana Ost
Technical Writer/Reporting Analyst
Production Administration
Market Street Mortgage Corporation
diana -dot- ost -at- msmcorp -dot- com
Phone (727) 431-7209
Fax (727) 724-9096
2650 McCormick Drive, Suite 200
Clearwater, Florida 33759
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-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+diana -dot- ost=msmcorp -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+diana -dot- ost=msmcorp -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On
Behalf Of David Loveless
Sent: Thursday, July 06, 2006 4:24 PM
To: TECHWR-L
Subject: Colorblind Users WAS: blue link special
So I'll admit right off the bat that this is probably very late to add
much to the discussion. Don't blame me for a holiday weekend (and a
great one it was).
Paul pointed out the colorblind user when creating links. He has a very
valid point that I hope wasn't missed in the aftermath. As the resident
colorblind techwr-ler, I'll admit that I constantly struggle with online
and printed documentation that relies on color. Not meaning to be
offensive, but... isn't it at least a little foolish not to design
friendly documentation for a relatively large population?
Conservative estimates (check any colorblind site for numbers) put the
number of colorblind men at 8% to 20%. I find 12% to be the most common
and, in my opinion, accurate estimate. For some of us, that might be a
few thousand people. For others, that might be millions upon millions.
As you may know, the number of color blind women is incredibly small.
This is due to genetics.
To illustrate some of the problems... I cannot tell the difference
between the red and green squigglies in Word to save my life. No way.
I also used to work for a group that documented language learning
software for a group of students. We had an audience of some 35,000
students every year and around 95% were males. That's about 4,000 people
annually who could not use our color insensitive product. I've also seen
fellow colorblind users run their mouse across each line of text waiting
for their icon to change shape and indicate a link. There are people out
there who can't see links and other "nifty" tricks of the trade. In some
situations, I'm one of them. I went for a very long time without knowing
that that language software I worked on marked incorrect answers with a
red X and correct answers with a green checkmark. A very long time. And
I never would have known if I hadn't brought up that design flaw to a
co-worker.
I'm not vocal about much when it comes to our profession, but I will say
this. For a group of people who claim to be the advocates of the user,
we have largely failed the colorblind population. And I say that from
experience. It doesn't take much to design colorblind friendly docs, and
in many situations it may even be required by law (all work for the Feds
requires it).
If you want some help on becoming more aware, I recommend the Wikipedia
site on colorblindness. It provides a lot of links to other relative
sites as well.
Oh, and please remember that colorblindness is a disability. Yes, it is
not as noticeable as many other disabilities, but it is a disability and
as such requires consideration. We don't require much, just some careful
color selection.
Thanks for the awareness, Paul. It helps to have a friendly voice for
the colorblind minority.
If you have any questions about colorblindness, please don't hesitate to
ask. Most colorblind people don't mind the questions as long as it isn't
that insensitive "What color is this?" question. I heard one colorblind
person describe that as asking a mentally handicapped person what's on
their mind. Yeah... not funny. Fortunately, I refuse to be that
sensitive. Life's too short.
Now excuse me, I've got to go put on my mismatched socks. Could you hand
me my red tie? It's green you say? Hmmmm... who knew?
Dave "dressed like a rainbow on any given day of the week"
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