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Building an accessible web site

In the everyday world making a web site that’s accessible to as many people as possible is not generally a problem. But what if the tables are turned and the majority of the users will have some sort of disability?

Even with an average site that’s built correctly to web standards it’s not always possible to cater for every user ability. I say that because trying to accomodate every single need can involve lots of additional work which some budgets don’t allow for. In context, a well built site will be accessible for probably 99.9% of users anyway, but what about that last 0.01%? That’s where this particular project poses some issues that have to be dealt with.

The scenario

The site is for a UK charity that assists disabled folks start up and run their own businesses by providing support and guidance. There will be site elements like information pages, sign up and member pages, downloads, online documentation, all of which can be updated by using a Content Management System. As a small charity the budget is tight and creating a site that they can update themselves and is fully accessible is quite a challenge!

User profiles

The site will probably be mostly accessed by disabled users for which the accessibility issue won’t be a problem, they may simply be weelchair bound, or fully able to use a web site with a mouse like most of us do. There will however be a higher than average amount of users using assistive technologies such as screen readers, text only browsers, and navigating by keyboard/trackball/other device - all these things will need to be taken into account during the site design.

Choosing a Content Management System

The main problem with many CMS’s is that they sprew out invalid code and have to be extensively modified to make the output and pages fully accessible. Another problem is creating accessible member related pages for submitting data, maintaining user profiles and so on, again extensive modification is required.

After assessing all the requirements Expression Engine is going to be the what the site is based on. It was chosen because, as a CMS, it is fully customisable with layout and presentation, it outputs clean HTML code, and member related pages can also be made fully accessible.

Design and layout considerations

The site needs to be clean and uncluttered with consistant navigation, resizable text, anchor links and must work with text-only web browsers. Of course it goes without saying that the HTML markup must be good so things like correct use of HTML headings, ALT attributes on content images, and use of FIELDSETS and LABELS on forms will all be built into the markup to help those using assistive technologies.

Content considerations

One issue with many CMS’s is that they allow site editors to (unwittlingly) generate content that can cause problems for some users. An example is using vague link descriptions like “click here” which to some users has absolutely no meaning at all. This isn’t really the fault of the site owner but a little eductation will go a long way in prevents future problems.

Another issue is use of video and audio. Fortunately Expression Engine makes it very easy to allow the site owner to post a text transcript of the video/audio, thus allowing all users with aural/visual impairments to access the content.

Summing it up so far

There’s a lot to consider with this project. I’ve already been working on building the site structure and framework using valid XHTML and CSS, testing for any accessibility issues at key stages and making revisions to suit. Now that’s in place it’s time to move onto looking at the different content types and building Expression Engine up for them, I don’t forsee any major problems since most of this involves writing good clean HTML and CSS anyway!

What I do intend to do is carry out some usability/accessibility testing before the site goes live to make sure there are no accessibility issues and last minute tweaking.