+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 12, Issue 27, December 26, 2014. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 27 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: TYPOGRAPHY. 07: USABILITY. 08: XML. SECTION TWO: 09: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. Ethical Dilemmas in Web Accessibility By Steven Clark. "...The cascade of inclusiveness will improve conversion rates, exceed legal requirements and has marketing potential. That is a compelling argument in a business meeting." http://www.sitepoint.com/ethical-dilemmas-web-accessibility/ 2.1.1 Keyboard By Rakesh Paladugula. "...As per web accessibility standards the web content should be accessed by keyboard alone. Users should be able to navigate within the web page using a keyboard, should be able to hit the links and navigate to the next page, submit the form without any difficulty..." http://www.maxability.co.in/2013/12/2-1-1-keyboard/ Something to Hide By Joanna Briggs. When you're hiding content-whether to provide additional context to one user group or hide blocks of content from users-you need to make sure that it's actually hidden. This week's Best Practice of the Week focuses on different ways you can hide content. http://simplyaccessible.com/bpow/something-to-hide/ Semantics and Accessibility - Heading Structure By Matt Long. "The more you understand the specification, the more you'll realize there are more right ways to implement proper semantic HTML markup than wrong. Thinking in terms of web accessibility can provide direction." http://accessiblehtmlheadings.com/ Easy Checks - A First Review of Web Accessibility Updated Draft By W3C. "The Education and Outreach Working Group (EOWG) has published an updated draft of the WAI resource Easy Checks - A First Review of Web Accessibility. Easy Checks helps you assess if a Web page addresses accessibility. It provides simple steps for anyone who can use the Web; no accessibility knowledge or skill is required. The checks cover just a few accessibility issues and are designed to be quick and easy, rather than definitive. Learn about the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)." http://www.w3.org/blog/news/archives/3547 +02: EVALUATION & TESTING. Why Usability Testing is Vital to Success By Kerry Butters. "Usability is something that's at the forefront of most designers' minds, whether they're front or back-end developers. It's also something that should be considered by content creators, SEO professionals, marketers and anyone that's involved in a design project..." http://www.sitepoint.com/usability-testing-vital-success/ How Reliable are Web Analytics? By Gerry McGovern. "Often, marketers justify intrusive or annoying marketing tactics because they claim they improve conversion rates. Is that really true?" http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/new-thinking/how-reliable-are-web-analytics +03: EVENTS. Respond February 4-5, 2014. Sydney, Australia http://webdirections.org/respond2014/ High Ed Web Regional Pittsburg April 9-10, 2014. Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. http://pitt.highedweb.org/ HighEdWeb New England April 25, 2014. Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.A. http://ne.highedweb.org/ University of Illinois Web Conference April 28-29, 2014. Champaign, Illinois, U.S.A. http://publish.illinois.edu/uofiwebcon/ +04: HTML5. The Truth About 'The Truth About Multiple H1 Tags' By Adrian Roselli. "...Don't trust articles that don't present you with evidence (or links to evidence). Don't buy into SEO claims that are never justified. Build your heading structure for backward compatibility." http://blog.adrianroselli.com/2013/12/the-truth-about-truth-about-multiple-h1.html +05: MISCELLANEOUS. The Many Faces of 'Adaptive Design' By Brad Frost. "Lots of terms evolve beyond their initial definitions and become a catch-all for a general notion or idea. I've talked about this regarding responsive web design and mobile first, and there are certainly other terms that escape their original definition..." http://bradfrostweb.com/blog/post/the-many-faces-of-adaptive-design/ Responsive Images - Solutions To Our Problems By Steven Bradley. "...Until the time when a standard evolves and we can safely use it in production, we can choose among the variety of solutions that try to mimic the functionality that standards will eventually bring. None are perfect though, and you may decide none are worth implementing, choosing instead to balance the simplicity of serving a single image with the potential decrease in performance...." http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/responsive-images-solutions-problems/ +06: TYPOGRAPHY. Untangling Web Typography By Nicole Sullivan. "When I was a carpenter, I noticed how homeowners often had this deer-in-the-headlights look when the contractor I worked for would ask them to make tons of decisions, seemingly all at once..." http://24ways.org/2013/untangling-web-typography/ +07: USABILITY. Minimize Cognitive Load to Maximize Usability By Kathryn Whitenton. The total cognitive load, or amount of mental processing power needed to use your site, affects how easily users find content and complete tasks. http://www.nngroup.com/articles/minimize-cognitive-load/ 5 Secrets To Speed Up Your Website By Virginia DeBolt. "The average website user expects your website to load in 4 seconds or less. If your website is slow, not only are you losing so much business, but your SEO rankings also suffer..." http://www.webteacher.ws/2013/12/23/5-secrets-speed-website/ User Experience Versus Users By Paul Bryan. "The field of user experience has, from its inception, championed the notion that meeting users' needs is the path to success for digital products. Recently, however, it seems that user experience is increasingly playing a role in formulating designs that diametrically oppose users' wants and needs for the sake of generating greater profits..." http://uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2013/12/user-experience-versus-users.php +08: XML. Using ARIA to Enhance SVG Accessibility By Leonie Watson. "SVG1.1 accessibility support is limited in browsers and screen readers. Things are set to improve with SVG2, but ARIA can be used now to improve the accessibility of simple SVG." http://blog.paciellogroup.com/2013/12/using-aria-enhance-svg-accessibility/ [Section one ends.] ++ SECTION TWO: +09: 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.]