Universal Web Design

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Universal Web Design

• Comp 190
• Greg Lanier

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Contents
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• Project overview
• Root of Web inaccessibility
• Legal environment
• Diagnostic testing
• The premise of universal Web design
• Demonstrations
• What lies ahead

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Project Overview

• Personal Web background
• World Wide Web as a universal communication
  medium
• Current research and development is broad but not
  integrated
• Goal fuse accessibility, standards compliance,
  and creativity

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Root of Web Inaccessibility

• Shift from content to visual presentation
• Browser wars and proprietary HTML
• Design tools perpetuate visual emphasis and bad
  code
• Cost of revamping outdated websites
• Result people with disabilities have been
  overlooked

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Legal Environment

• Section 508 1998 Amendment
• All Federal agencies must provide accessible
  means for using any of its information media and
  electronic equipment to all employees and members
  of the public.

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Legal Environment

• Americans with Disabilities Act, Title III
• Services provided by commercial or non-profit
  entities and state/local governments must not
  discriminate against or otherwise exclude users
  with disabilities
• Traditionally has applied to physical structures
  and hiring practices

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Legal Environment

• Hooks v. OKBridge, Inc.
• Extended ADA Title III to businesses that offer
  services via non-physical channels such as the
  Internet
• Other cases reaffirm that business Web services
  must be accessible
• NFB v. AOL, Inc.
• Maguire v. Sydney Olympics
• Access Now v. American Airlines, Inc.

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Diagnostic Testing

• Forty test subjects
• The diagnostic tests
• HTML standards
• Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
• Content load factor
• Screen reader behavior

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Diagnostic Testing

• HTML Validation Results (errors/line of code)
• Popular sites 1.37
• UNC-CH 0.85
• Search Engines 8.80
• Government 0.86
• Accessibility Advocates 0.18

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Diagnostic Testing

• WCAG Results ( lines of code with errors)
• Popular sites 31.60
• UNC-CH 20.73
• Search Engines 71.56
• Government 36.99
• Accessibility Advocates 6.51

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Diagnostic Testing

• Content load factor (Code-to-content ratio)
• Popular sites 11.28
• UNC-CH 10.38
• Search Engines 7.49
• Government 8.63
• Accessibility Advocates 3.15

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The Premise

• Engineering a web resource to be universal not
  just "accessible" in a standards-compliance sense
  leads to better overall design for everyone,
  regardless of visual, mental, or other
  differences.

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The Premise

• "Universal design" simply requires a paradigm
  shift instead of coding a site to look good on a
  screen and then throwing in the latest validation
  hacks, the designer from the beginning
  conceptualizes a site that is not only usable but
  user-friendly in all scenarios.

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Demonstration

• Well-structured content
• Style switcher on project website

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What Lies Ahead

• Three prototypes
• Search engine redesign

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