+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 3, Issue 30, January 5, 2005. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 30 CONTENTS. SECTION ONE: New references. What's new at the Web Design Reference site? http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/webdesign/ New links in these categories: 01: ACCESSIBILITY. 02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. 03: COLOR. 04: DREAMWEAVER. 05: EVALUATION & TESTING. 06: EVENTS. 07: JAVASCRIPT. 08: MISCELLANEOUS. 09: NAVIGATION. 10: PHP. 11: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. 12: TOOLS. 13: USABILITY. 14: XML. SECTION TWO: 15: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. Standard Forms - Updated By Anthony Eggert Anthony Eggert has posted a standards-compliant, valid XHTML form example that includes an elegant bit of JavaScript to show or hide the optional portions of the form. http://www.stylephreak.com/index.php/archives/2004/08/standard-forms/ Semantic Structure By Paul Bohman "Sighted people are able to quickly scan over an entire Web page. They can visually skip past the advertisements, past the main navigation and go directly to the main content. They can ignore the extraneous information all around the main content, without ever having to pay attention to it. Those who use screen readers experience Web sites a little differently. They are not able to immediately zero in on the main content of a Web page. They must find it by listening to the advertisements and the main navigation system. They can speed up the process by tabbing from link to link, but they risk missing an important piece of information this way. The experience is definitely different." http://www.webaim.org/techniques/structure/ Using Opera to Check for Accessibility By Paul Bohman "Opera is not an accessibility validator per se?it's a Web browser, much like Internet Explorer or Netscape?but it can act like an accessibility validator if you know how to use it that way. In fact, it's one of the best available. This article explains why." http://webaim.org/techniques/articles/opera Web Accessibility Toolbar Version 1.0 - Tutorial By Ian Blackham "Ian Blackham from www.dmxzone.com has written an informative tutorial for our Accessibility Toolbar and has given us permission to reproduce it here." http://www.nils.org.au/ais/web/resources/toolbar_tutorial.html +02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. DIV Based Layout with CSS By Alejandro Gervasio "Using CSS and DIV tags reduces markup code, speeds up page downloads, separates content from its visual presentation, and brings your code closer to Web standards compliance--all while making your website more appealing to search engine spiders. Alejandro Gervasio explains how it's done, with copious examples." http://tinyurl.com/6s42p Full CSS Property Compatibility Chart By Keith Schengili-Roberts "The following chart shows all CSS1, CSS2 and Internet Explorer CSS extensions and grades the level of support each receives in a given browser..." http://www.corecss.com/properties/full-chart.php CSS Tutorial By tizag.com CSS basics. http://www.tizag.com/cssT/ +03: COLOR. The 2005 Color Forecast By Adam Polselli "Take this forecast for what it is: a prediction, not a definition, of the year that follows. In some ways it may be dead on, and in others not further from the truth; regardless, design is in the eye of the beholder, and when it comes down to it every single color in the visible spectrum is a possibility. So, go forth with an open mind and, if nothing else, be inspired." http://www.adampolselli.com/2005/ +04: DREAMWEAVER. WYSIWYG Editor Accessibility Test Results: Allowing writers to contribute to the creation of accessible documents. By Nicole Sullivan "Nicole Sullivan tests Contribute, Dreamweaver, Amaya, RoboHelp, Frontpage, GoLive, and three other tools, for their assistance in creating HTML pages which pass accessibility tests. "Contribute, Dreamweaver, and Amaya produced the most accessible markup." http://taurus.larve.net/blog/index.php?p=10 +05: EVALUATION & TESTING. Do It Yourself Usability Testing Your Questions Answered By Meghan Whitmore "So, if you have followed all of our Usability articles, outlining how to create useful content, layout, and navigation, then you may feel your website is set and ready and usable. WRONG! Well, it may be usable, but how do you know for sure? Many top companies spend thousands of dollars to design their websites and then never even actually look at them themselves to see how usable they are. You can test your website to see if it is working in a real-world situation. You know your website backwards and forwards; after all, you designed it. But your customers don't, and it is your customers' perception of your website that makes you your profits, so you will really want to know what their experience is like." http://tinyurl.com/3qyjd +06: EVENTS. Interact 2005 12-16 September 2005 Rome, Italy http://www.interact2005.org/ +07: JAVASCRIPT. CSS Minimum and Maximum Sizes By Andrew Clover Here is a Javascript technique to make CSS min/max sizing work in IE/Win. http://www.doxdesk.com/software/js/minmax.html +08: MISCELLANEOUS. Designing For Clients Made Easy By Derek Ashauer "So you've done the marketing, found the client, signed the deal. Now you only have to do the work! This article isn't going to focus on selling your services or the actual design process or even Photoshop techniques, but all the obstacles (and there are a lot) that many of us run into while trying to complete a project for a client. I think there are many common pitfalls we all run into, which can be avoided." http://www.sitepoint.com/article/designing-for-clients-made-easy +09: NAVIGATION. Provide Clear Navigation Mechanisms By Gez Lemon "If you're reading a book, there are several clues to help determine where you are. Page numbers, chapters, headings, weight, thickness of the part read, and the thickness of the part still to read. If someone navigates to your site from a search engine, have you provided enough information for the visitor to determine the context of where they are? You should provide clear and consistent navigation mechanisms to increase the likelihood of visitors finding what they are looking for on your site." http://juicystudio.com/tutorial/accessibility/navigation.asp +10: PHP. PHP Predictions for 2005 By Harry Fuecks http://www.sitepoint.com/blog-post-view.php?id=220828 +11: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. The Importance Of Standards Compliance and The Process of Validation By Karl L. Groves "Among the more troubling observations I've made during my (admittedly short) studies into web development has been the complete and shameful disregard "web designers" have for standards." http://www.karlcore.com/articles/article.php?id=9 +12: TOOLS. FoxyVoice By Kenche "FoxyVoice is a Firefox extension that provides text-to-speech functionality using Microsoft Win32 Speech API (SAPI). With FoxyVoice you can listen to the page being read; or browse on one page and listen to another page being read for higher degree of sensory overload. The soothing voices that comes with SAPI also makes FoxyVoice a competent virtual hypnotist." http://foxyvoice.kenche.info/ Visio Stencils for Information Architects By Nick Finck "The Visio stencils on this page are free for downloading and using. They are designed to aid the work of Information Architects. In short, they are not for everyone, you may want to familiarize yourself with common IA practices before trying to use these stencils." http://www.nickfinck.com/stencils.html +13: USABILITY. Organization in the Way: How Decentralization Hobbles the User Experience By Peter Merholz "The biggest problem in user experience design isn't its methods or practice. Re-published by popular demand,Peter's?s essay explains how organizations are structured to defeat good design." http://www.adaptivepath.com/publications/essays/archives/000351.php Validate that Grammar By Sheri German "In this first article, we'll look at the proofing process, the development of an effective Web writing style, formulas for measuring reading levels, and a list of standard style manuals." http://www.communitymx.com/content/article.cfm?cid=F95AD +14: XML. Should I serve application/xhtml+xml to Mozilla? By mozilla.org "...if you are using the usual HTML features (no MathML) and are serving your content as text/html to other browsers, there is no need to serve application/xhtml+xml to Mozilla. In fact, doing so would deprive the Mozilla users of incremental display, because incremental loading of XML documents has not been implemented yet. Serving valid HTML 4.01 as text/html ensures the widest browser and search engine support." http://www.mozilla.org/docs/web-developer/faq.html#accept [Section one ends.] ++ SECTION TWO: +15: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? Accessibility Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/accessibility Association Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/associations Book Listings. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/books Cascading Style Sheets Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/css Color Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/color Dreamweaver Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/dreamweaver Evaluation & Testing Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/testing Event Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/events Flash Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/flash Information Architecture Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/architecture JavaScript Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/javascript Miscellaneous Web Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/misc Navigation Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/navigation PHP Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/php Sites & Blogs Listing. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/sites Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/standards Tool Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/tools Typography Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/type Usability Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/usability XML Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/xml [Section two ends.] ++END NOTES. + SUBSCRIPTION INFO. WEB DESIGN UPDATE is available by subscription. For information on how to subscribe and unsubscribe please visit: http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/webdevlist The Web Design Reference Site also has a RSS 2.0 feed for site updates. + TEXT EMAIL NEWSLETTER (TEN). As a navigation aid for screen readers we do our best to conform to the accessible Text Email Newsletter (TEN) guidelines. Please let me know if there is anything else we can do to make navigation easier. For TEN guideline information please visit: http://www.headstar.com/ten + SIGN OFF. Until next time, Laura L. Carlson Information Technology Systems and Services University of Minnesota Duluth Duluth, MN U.S.A. 55812-3009 mailto:lcarlson@d.umn.edu [Issue ends.]