+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 5, Issue 45, April 27, 2007. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 45 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: DREAMWEAVER. 04: EVALUATION & TESTING. 05: EVENTS. 06: JAVASCRIPT. 07: MISCELLANEOUS. 08: NAVIGATION. 09: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. 10: TOOLS. 11: USABILITY. 12: XML. SECTION TWO: 13: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. NFB, Target, Amazon By Joe Clark. "I have never quite figured out why certain news items in the accessibility field get all the press. AOL's adding captioning to one or two snippets of video got covered 50 times. NFB suing Target for accessibility, ditto. That one at least is news. But Amazon and NFB signing an agreement to improve Web accessibility? Why did that get so much coverage when we know so little of the details?..." http://blog.fawny.org/2007/04/24/fishy-nfb-amazon/ World's First Universally Inaccessible Game! By Mel Pedley. "The Human Computer Interaction Laboratory (HCI Lab) at the Institute of Computer Science (ICS) of the Foundation for Research and Technology (FORTH) has just announced the release of 'Game Over!', the world's first universally inaccessible game!..." http://blackwidows.co.uk/blog/?p=121 Jaws Access of PDF - A Users Guide - Web Access Centre By Royal National Institute of the Blind. "This document provides guidance and technical advice on accessing PDF's if you are a screen reader user, in particular a JAWS user..." http://tinyurl.com/2c5htb +02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. Reset Reasoning By Eric Meyer. "The reset styles are undergoing yet another overhaul, but in the meantime, I thought I'd answer a question several people have asked..." http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2007/04/18/reset-reasoning/ Inherit Expression for IE? By Eric Meyer. "The reset styles are currently held up on a point of non-support in IE/Win. However, there's a decent chance we can work around it... http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2007/04/23/inherit-expression-for-ie/ Clean Semantics By Rob Hofker. "As I have written before I wanted to try t get rid of all these extra tags, get rid of the div soup. I set out on a journey not knowing if I would ever reach the destination or where that destination would be..." http://roho2003.blogspot.com/2007/04/clean-semantics.html +03: DREAMWEAVER. Dreamweaver CS3, Spry Widgets, and Accessibility By Virginia DeBolt. "...Use them if you want, but only after making sure that your decision to do so is based on the knowledge that you aren't making your content unreachable to large numbers of your visitors." http://www.webteacher.ws/2007/04/dreamweaver-cs3-spry-widgets-and.html Dreamweaver is Dead to Me By Glen Lipka. "...Dreamweaver...systematically eliminated every single good feature from Homesite. The advanced find/replace sucks. Takes 3x longer to do simple tasks. They got rid of the split view for the folders so I can't see anything. They added a million features that I will never use. Its bloated and sucks up ram..." http://www.commadot.com/?p=512 +04: EVALUATION & TESTING. Revitalizing SUS, the System Usability Scale By Jens Meiert. "About 20 years ago, John Brooke published the concept of a 'System Usability Scale', a reliable, low-cost usability scale that can be used for global assessments of systems usability. SUS is based on a Likert scale questionnaire with standardized content that results in an overall usability and user satisfaction index (ranging from 0 to 100)..." http://tinyurl.com/yu4hh7 Yes, You Should be Using Personas By Leisa Reichelt. "Personas communicate the user centered process like no other method." http://www.disambiguity.com/yes-you-should-be-using-personas/ Five Techniques for Getting Buy-In for Usability Testing By Christine Perfetti. "For more than seven years, I've been teaching and coaching design teams on how to conduct usability tests and gather user feedback early on in the development process. One of the questions that comes up time and time again from clients is, 'How can we get buy-in for usability tests from management and other team members?' Through our own research at UIE, and in our ongoing discussions with expert usability practitioners, we've identified several proven techniques for getting stakeholders onboard..." http://tinyurl.com/3yffax Techsmith's Morae 2.0 Ups the Ante for Usability Testing Software By David Travis. "If you ever carry out web or software usability tests then you'll have come across Techsmith's Morae software. Techsmith has just released a major upgrade to the software, now at version 2.0. As we were just about to run a usability test for a client, we did something we'd never normally advise - we installed the new version of Morae on top of the old one the night before the test. Installation was a breeze and there were no hiccups during our test, allowing us to focus on what's new in Morae. So is it worth taking the plunge if you haven't yet invested in this software?" http://www.usabilitynews.com/news/article3849.asp +05: EVENTS. California Web Accessibility Conference (CalWAC) Teaser Page for their upcoming conference. January, 2008. California State University Campus, U.S.A. http://www.knowbility.org/calwac/ +06: JAVASCRIPT. Seven JavaScript Techniques You Should Be Using Today By Dustin Diaz. "Is your box of JavaScript tricks starting to look a little worn? Got the feeling your functions are slacking off when you're not watching? Never fear--JavaScript expert, Dustin Diaz, has the lowdown on seven smart tips that should be in every coder's toolbox." http://www.digital-web.com/articles/seven_javascript_techniques/ Unobtrusive and Keyboard Accessible Connected Select Boxes By Roger Johansson. "Any web developer who has created a reasonably complex form is probably aware of the concept of multiple select elements that are connected - choosing something from one select box either makes a new select box appear or changes the options of one that is already visible..." http://tinyurl.com/ytews4 Form Prepopulation By Patrick H. Lauke. "Generic DOM-based javascript to prepopulate text inputs and textarea on page load, based on their title attribute. In addition, the script also attaches onfocus/onblur behaviors to those elements..." http://www.splintered.co.uk/experiments/22/ +07: MISCELLANEOUS. IA (Information Architecture) Voice By Wolf H. Noding. "Welcome here at IA Voice, the first IA Podcast channel in Europe....We'll cast interviews, conference speeches and discussions about the field of information architecture. Our main goal is to get to know information architects all over the world and talk with them about their IA processes, methodologies and at the same time also about their IA philosophy..." http://iavoice.typepad.com/ Women in Web Design: Just the Stats By Jeffery Zeldman. "...An Event Apart commissioned a fact-finding mission. We hired researchers at The New York Public Library to find out everything that is actually known about the percentage of women in our field...So the first disclaimer is that our research covers IT, not just web design. The second is that we're still sifting the data we received. This is nothing like a final report. If a final report emerges, it will come from An Event Apart. All that out of the way, the picture that emerges is disturbing...Men outnumber women in this workforce by over three to one...The percentage of women employed in the field is declining instead of growing...Women who participate in the field may not be promoted as often or as high as their male colleagues..." http://www.zeldman.com/2007/04/19/women-in-web-design/ The Web Design Survey, 2007 By An List Apart Staff. "People who make websites have been at it for more than a dozen years, yet almost nothing is known, statistically, about our profession. Let's do something to change that. Presenting A List Apart's first annual Web Design Survey." http://www.alistapart.com/articles/webdesignsurvey +08: NAVIGATION. Site Maps Are Not Stupid By Meryl Evans. "I've known of Lyle for years as he provides a great resource for Web designers. He believes sitemaps are stupid and that designers should use guides instead. I disagree and this is why..." http://tinyurl.com/ys9mb5 +09: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. Talk on HTML5 By Anne van Kesteren. "I gave a talk on HTML5 ...'Evolving the Web: HTML5'..." http://annevankesteren.nl/2007/04/html5-talk Proposal to Adopt HTML5 By L. David Baron, Lars Erik Bolstad, Brendan Eich, Dave Hyatt, Hakon Wium Lie, and Maciej Stachowiak. "...If the group is agreeable to these proposals, Apple, Mozilla and Opera will agree to arrange a non-exclusive copyright assignment to the W3 Consortium for HTML5 specifications." http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2007Apr/0429.html My Workshop Dilemma By Donna Maurer. "I have been teaching for many years (like 22) and teach often (4 workshops in the last 4 weeks). And in all that time, I have never resolved one particular problem. One that I have found harder as I move into harder work....This is my teaching challenge. Providing the answers I'm confident about, letting people know I can't provide an answer on the spot and raising awareness that much work needs thought. It is an incredibly hard balance, lifting people from 'give me answers' to 'help me think' in a short time... http://www.maadmob.net/donna/blog/archives/000751.html 35 Designers x 5 Questions By Smashing Magazine. "...over 80 CSS-based tips, design ideas, suggestions, fonts, design-related books and online-magazines - are listed below." http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/04/20/35-designers-x-5-questions/ +10: TOOLS. Deque Ramp Personal Edition Program: First Step to 'One Accessible World' By Deque. "'One Accessible World' is designed to promote accessibility for information technology around the world. We are extremely proud to roll out this free, no cost, program to people committed to World Wide Web accessibility outreach. Below you will find an overview of the program, and how to gain access to this group...Who Qualifies: Assistive Technology labs, Educational institutions, Non-profits, Students of web accessibility, Web accessibility trainers...One-time registration is necessary before you can download your free copy of Deque's Ramp PE, the Web accessibility evaluation software." http://www.deque.com/products/ramp/rampPE.php +11: USABILITY. Markup's Dirty Little Secret By Rick Jelliffe. "Different applications on different systems use different fonts, fonts with the same family name but different metrics, different hyphenation algorithms, hyphenation setting defaults, hyphenation dictionaries, different size spaces, different line-breaking algorithms, different widow/orphan/keep together rules, and different co-ordinate space measures..." http://tinyurl.com/yq4fyt The Problem of Dirty Data By Gerry McGovern. "More than 25 percent of critical data in Fortune 1,000 companies is poor quality because organizations have little experience in managing content." http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/nt/2007/nt-2007-04-23-dirty-data.htm Usability is Design By Mike Cherim. "To better understand this post's curious title, you must understand design and recognize it for what it is -- what it really is. Immediately you might think of colors, images, and patterns, but design is so much more. Design is something that touches our lives continuously, day in and day out. From the subtle touches to full-out implementations that, if done properly, are unappreciated, taken for granted, and go unnoticed unless absent..." http://green-beast.com/blog/?p=169 +12: XML. What is RSS? By Simon Griffin. "Despite its popularity with the cool kids, RSS is still to break into the mainstream. Why? Because the average Joe just doesn't 'get it'. Frustrated by this, commoncraft made the video below to explain RSS in plain English..." http://www.etre.com/blog/2007/04/what_is_rss_plain_english/ [Section one ends.] ++ SECTION TWO: +13: 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.]