+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 12, Issue 18, October 24, 2013. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 18 CONTENTS. SECTION ONE: New references. What's new at the Web Design Reference site? http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/ New links in these categories: 01: ACCESSIBILITY. 02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. 03: EVALUATION & TESTING. 04: EVENTS. 05: HTML5. 06: JAVASCRIPT. 07: MISCELLANEOUS. 08: NAVIGATION. 09: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. 10: USABILITY. SECTION TWO: 11: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. One Million Steps - Boosting Access Awareness, One Website at a Time By Robin Christopherson. "Recent research shows that the great majority of websites are still failing consistently to comply with even the lowest priority checkpoints of the accessibility guidelines set out by the international web standards body the World Wide Web Consortium. Despite a plethora of initiatives to raise awareness of this issue, from Citizens Online's 'Fix the Web' campaign to Global Accessibility Awareness Day, the situation does not seem to be improving at a significant rate..." http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=948 Using JAWS to Evaluate Web Accessibility By WebAIM. "This article is designed to help users who are new to JAWS learn the basic controls for testing web content, and to serve as a reference for the occasional JAWS user. While reading this article, keep a few things in mind..." http://webaim.org/articles/jaws/ Using VoiceOver to Evaluate Web Accessibility By WebAIM. "VoiceOve is a screen reader program that comes on new Mac computers, iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches. This article is designed to help users who are new to VoiceOver learn the basic controls for testing web content, and to serve as a reference for the occasional VoiceOver user...." http://webaim.org/articles/voiceover/ Using NVDA to Evaluate Web Accessibility By WebAIM. "This article is designed to help users who are new to NonVisual Desktop Access (NVDA) learn the basic controls for testing web content, and to serve as a reference for the occasional NVDA user. NonVisual Desktop Access (NVDA) is a free and open source screen reader for the Microsoft Windows operating system. It supports over 20 languages and can run on any computer entirely from a USB drive with no installation." http://webaim.org/articles/nvda/ +02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. Challenging CSS Best Practices By Thierry Koblentz. "When it comes to CSS, I believe that the sacred principle of 'separation of concerns' (SoC) has lead us to accept bloat, obsolescence, redundancy, poor caching and more. Now, I'm convinced that the only way to improve how we author style sheets is by moving away from this principle..." http://coding.smashingmagazine.com/2013/10/21/challenging-css-best-practices-atomic-approach/ Cargo Cult CSS By Ben Darlow. "It is generally accepted that having a methodology for writing and managing CSS is preferable to having none at all. In spite of this, some of the practices developers have adopted are having a detrimental effect on the semantic quality and longterm maintainability of what we build. I'm going to talk about some of the problems with techniques being advocated by CSS 'framework methodologies' and how we, as web developers, can better solve these problems." http://www.kapowaz.net/articles/cargo-cult-css Classy Values By Jeremy Keith. "Two articles were published today that take diametrically opposed viewpoints on how developers should be using CSS" http://adactio.com/journal/6537/ CSS Specificity By cssspecificity. "The origin and sorting order of CSS helps browsers to determine which rules win out over others..." http://www.cssspecificity.com More About Scaling in iOS By Peter-Paul Koch. "Turns out Tuesday's post was not so much wrong as incomplete. I was tripped up by what's probably the most complicated feature (or bug) in the meta viewport space, and my conclusions weren't entirely correct..." http://www.quirksmode.org/blog/archives/2013/10/more_about_scal.html Preliminary Meta Viewport Research By Peter-Paul Koch. "Just now I released my preliminary meta viewport research that studies the various permutations of the tag." http://www.quirksmode.org/blog/archives/2013/10/preliminary_met.html The Knowledge Hub for Responsive Design By ugurus. "Responsive Design is a leap forward in the web industry to create a consistent experience on all viewports from mobile to desktop." http://www.ugurus.com/responsive-design +03: EVALUATION & TESTING. Surviving the Top Ten Challenges of Software Testing - Challenge #5: Making Time for Testing By William Perry and Randall Rice. "Somewhere between the agony of rushed deadlines and the luxury of all the time in the world has got to be a reasonable approach to testing. This chapter is about making the most of the time you have available." http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=2124991 +04: EVENTS. JavaScript for Beginners 4 weeks starting November 11, 2013. Online http://www.w3devcampus.com/javascript-for-beginners-w3c-course/ Accessible E-Learning December 16, 2013. Online Symposium http://www.w3.org/WAI/RD/2013/e-learning/ South By Southwest Interactive March 7-6, 2014. Austin, Texas, U.S.A. http://sxsw.com/interactive SITE March 17-21, 2014. Jacksonville, Florida, U.S.A. http://site.aace.org/conf/ International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference March 17-22, 2014. San Diego, California, U.S.A. http://www.csun.edu/cod/conference/ University of Illinois Web Conference 2014 April 28-29, 2014. Champaign, Illinois, U.S.A. http://publish.illinois.edu/uofiwebcon/ Web Conference at Penn State June 9-10, 2014. Penn State, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. http://webconference.psu.edu/ +05: HTML5. Responsive Images - Ain't We There Yet? By Marcos Caceres. Marcos's fronteers 2013 presentation slides https://speakerdeck.com/marcoscaceres/responsive-images-aint-we-there-yet srcN - Alternative to picture and srcset By Marcos Caceres. "Tab Atkins has put forward and alternative proposal to both srcset and picture:" http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-respimg/2013Sep/0064.html Proposal for RespImg Syntax By Tab Atkins. "This document describes a proposed syntax for "responsive images", which allows a user agent to choose an appropriate version of an image from several candidates." http://tabatkins.github.io/specs/respimg/Overview.html +06: JAVASCRIPT. How Many People are Missing Out on JavaScript Enhancement? By Pete Herlihy. "...This isn't about whether we should offer a good service to non-JavaScript people, progressive enhancement, done well, ensures we always will. But it's interesting to know that 1 in 93 people will experience the design without JavaScript enhancement Ð especially when it comes to prioritising how much of our time to spend on that design..." http://digital.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/2013/10/21/how-many-people-are-missing-out-on-javascript-enhancement/ ARIA Examples By Heydon Pickering. "Some practical ARIA examples to enhance your application accessibility..." http://heydonworks.com/practical_aria_examples/ Why There are Only Two Ways to Make ARIA Widgets Programmatically Focusable for Screen Reader Users By Bryan Garaventa. "This post is one in a series of posts on accessible rich internet applications (ARIA) and the specification by the same name. One challenge with composite widgets (widgets that are made up of other widgets) is properly exposing programmatic focus to assistive technology. The widget with programmatic focus is the widget where commands are sent by assistive technology such as screen readers and speech recognition software. It is also the magnified area where screen magnification software displays for users with low vision. Two solutions will be discussed and an explanation of the necessity of these approaches are provided with sample code..." https://www.ssbbartgroup.com/blog/2013/10/22/why-there-are-only-two-ways-to-make-aria-widgets-programmatically-focusable-for-screen-reader-users/ +07: MISCELLANEOUS. How Healthcare.gov Went Wrong By Department of Better Technology. "Here at DOBT we talk a lot about How To Fix Procurement, but you don't hear a lot about why things go wrong. The Healthcare.gov Fiasco is instructive in that it highlights every piece of our procurement process that's broken. How, with a half-trillion dollar a year spend, could something like this botch even happen? Here's how..." http://blog.dobt.co/post/63655420372/how-healthcare-gov-went-wrong +08: NAVIGATION. Bypassing Blocks of Content - Accessibility for Designers [checklist] By Accessiq. "Best practice for bypassing blocks..." http://www.accessiq.org/create/content/bypassing-blocks-of-content-accessibility-for-designers-checklist +09: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. Design Bomb in W3C's Garden By Alastair Campbell. "A post came up in my feed called the BOMB in the GARDEN by Matthew Butterick. It is from a talk he did in April 2013, but I just saw it after an update more recently. I found itÉ frustrating. Phrases went through my head like 'flawed assumptions'. But I left it a couple of days and I suspect the frustration comes from a different perspective and different assumptions. I try to show those below..." http://alastairc.ac/2013/10/design-bomb-in-w3cs-garden/ The Bridge of Khazad-DRM By Brendan Eich. "People are rightly concerned about what is going on in the W3C with DRM, as couched in the Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) proposal. Please read Henri Sivonen's explanation of EME if you haven't yet..." https://brendaneich.com/2013/10/the-bridge-of-khazad-drm/ +10: USABILITY. Modernist Design - Beyond Flat and Simple By Jerome Ryckborst. "The big players are changing the way user interfaces look and feel by applying modernist design to make the truly digital. At the same time, software is changing because the way people use it, where they use it, and with whom they use it is changing. As development teams continue to provide possibilities, they need to work with interface designers, usability analysts, and members of their target audienceÑthe users or customers. Together, we can ensure the new interactions and simplified interfaces we design and build will tell people how the interface works and both help and remind people to find the functions and content they need. It's not about making things flat and removing clutter; it's about getting the user interface right while applying modernist principles so people can use the product fully." http://fivesketches.com/2013/10/modernist-design-beyond-flat-and-simple/ [Section one ends.] ++ SECTION TWO: +11: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? Accessibility Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/accessibility.html Association Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/associations.html Book Listings. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/books.html Cascading Style Sheets Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/css.html Color Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/color.html Dreamweaver Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/dreamweaver.html Evaluation & Testing Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/testing.html Event Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/events.html Flash Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/flash.html Information Architecture Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/architecture.html JavaScript Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/javascript.html Miscellaneous Web Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/misc.html Navigation Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/navigation.html PHP Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/php.html Sites & Blogs Listing. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/sites.html Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/standards.html Tool Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/tools.html Typography Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/type.html Usability Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/usability.html XML Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/xml.html [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/itss/training/online/webdesign/webdev_listserv.html 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.]