+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 12, Issue 24, December 5, 2013. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 24 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: EVALUATION & TESTING. 03: EVENTS. 04: HTML5. 05: MISCELLANEOUS. 06: NAVIGATION. 07: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. 08: TOOLS. 09: USABILITY. SECTION TWO: 10: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. Coding Towards Accessibility By Charlie Perrins. "'Can we make it AAA-compliant?' - does this question strike fear into your heart? Maybe for no other reason than because you will soon have to wade through the impenetrable WCAG documentation once again, to find out exactly what AAA-compliant means?..." http://24ways.org/2013/coding-towards-accessibility/ HealthCare.gov - Lessons Learned on Accessibility, Privacy and Security By Ken Nakata. "Unfortunately the U.S. government's HealthCare.gov website has been plagued with a number of issues. Many stories have appeared on deficiencies in usability, security, testing and technical failures to name a few. That said, Healthcare.gov isn't all bad..." http://blog.hisoftware.com/2013/brand-integrity-site-quality/healthcare-gov-lessons-learned-on-accessibility-privacy-and-security Telstra Bans CAPTCHA Tests By Eliza Cussen. "Australia's largest telecommunications company Telstra has won the day by announcing it will no longer use CAPTCHA tests on its apps and websites..." http://www.accessiq.org/news/news/2013/12/telstra-bans-captcha-tests +02: EVALUATION & TESTING. How to Breathe Life Into Personas By Barnabas Nagy. "...Creating a model of your target audience may help you and your stakeholders feel significantly more empathy for those people..." http://boxesandarrows.com/how-to-breathe-life-into-personas/ +03: EVENTS. An Event Apart Atlanta February 17-19, 2014. Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A. http://aneventapart.com/event/atlanta-2014 An Event Apart Seattle March 30 - April 2, 2014. Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. http://aneventapart.com/event/seattle-2014 An Event Apart Boston April 28-30, 2014. Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A. http://aneventapart.com/event/boston-2014 +04: HTML5. Responsive Images, Part 1 - Using srcset By Annarita Tranfici. "...In this article we've described how the srcset attribute could help developers in a better management of their websites' images. Nevertheless, as we've seen, support among browsers is lacking but we are hopeful and confident that this problem will be solved very soon..." http://www.sitepoint.com/responsive-images-part-1-using-srcset/ How to Use HTML5 Data Attributes By Craig Buckler. "...HTML5 introduces custom data attributes. You can use any lowercase name prefixed with data-, e.g..." http://www.sitepoint.com/use-html5-data-attributes/ +05: MISCELLANEOUS. Interview with EasyChirp Creator Dennis Lembree By Mark Miller. "This week on the IAP, we talk with Dennis Lembree, creator of EasyChirp, an accessible interface for Twitter..." http://www.interactiveaccessibility.com/blog/podcast-episode-21-interview-easychirp-creator-dennis-lembree How To Choose The Best Responsive Table Solution By Steven Bradley. "One topic I haven't yet covered where responsive design is concerned is how to work with data tables. Part of the reason is that I haven't had to work with them much. For whatever reason my clients haven't needed tables beyond very simple ones where a bit of flexibility was enough to make them work responsively." http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/responsive-table-solutions/ The Business of Responsive Design By Mark Boulton. "...it's clear that everyone is finding everything hard right now. The change is so big, and so rapid, that we're struggling to keep our heads above water. And this especially goes for those working in-house or clients. Breaking new ground is always difficult. But, just like Hinterstoisser, take heart in knowing that what we're working on right now is a legacy for designers and developers in the months and years ahead." http://markboulton.co.uk/journal/thebusinessofrwd +06: NAVIGATION. Accessible Dropdown Menus Revisited By Terrill Thompson. "...I created a simple test page using Accessible Mega menu, and I like it! This menu meets all of the needs I described above..." http://terrillthompson.com/blog/474 Efficiently Simplifying Navigation, Part 1 - Information Architecture By Anastasios Karafillis. "Navigation, as crucial as it is to the user experience, is merely a means to an end - the end being to consume content. This is why users have very contrasting expectations about content and navigation. While content is supposed to be unique, surprising and exciting, navigating to it is supposed to be as simple and predictable as possible..." http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/2013/12/03/efficiently-simplifying-navigation-information-architecture/ URL Rewriting for the Fearful By Drew McLellan. "...When we think about URL rewriting, usually that means adding some rules to an .htaccess file for an Apache web server. As that's the most common case, that's what I'll be sticking to here..." http://24ways.org/2013/url-rewriting-for-the-fearful/ +07: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. Standards Matter By Kyle Weems. "...As the web continues to fracture into not only multiple browsers, but a wider and wider variety of form factors and devices, from toast to televisions, from watches to phones, standards, and the advocacy of them, become even more important. We're not just talking about making a site's CSS look good in four browsers, or ensuring a site is usable for people with accessibility challenges. We're talking about ensuring our sites, our clients sites, and the sites we use every day being available for use in situations we wouldn't have needed to consider even six years ago..." http://cssquirrel.com/blog/2013/11/30/standards-matter/ The (Other) Web We Lost By John Allsopp. "In the aftermath of the Browser Wars, the W3C and developer groups like the Web Standards Project worked long and hard to rebuild a unified, un-fragmented Web. But these last few years, we developers have gone and re-fragmented it all over again all by ourselves. Maybe we should think about what we are losing, before we lose this Web for good..." http://www.webdirections.org/blog/the-other-web-we-lost/ Plussing Web Standards By Marc Drummond. "Following the standards for HTML5 and CSS3 will get your site part of the way there. You'll get further along if you count WCAG2 and ARIA in your staple of standards you adhere to with all your might. But even with that, you need more. That green check mark doesn't solve everything. But it's a good place to start. Those green check marks offer a pretty good attraction..." http://marcdrummond.com/web-standards/2013/11/30/plus-it +08: TOOLS. YouDescribe By The Smith-Kettlewell Video Description Research and Development Center. "An experimental platform for adding extended audio description to YouTube videos." http://youdescribe.ski.org/rel/ +09: USABILITY. Speedy Mobile Sites Impact Google Search Rankings By Andy King. "Google is now factoring in mobile friendliness and mobile website speed into their search engine rankings." http://www.websiteoptimization.com/speed/tweak/mobile-site-speed-rankings/ When Content Audits are Not a Good Idea By Gerry McGovern. "When dealing with a large, complex, old and out-of-date website, a content audit can be a waste of time and money." http://gerrymcgovern.com/new-thinking/when-content-audits-are-not-good-idea [Section one ends.] ++ SECTION TWO: +10: 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.]