+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 13, Issue 01, July 03, 2014. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 01 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: COLOR. 04: DRUPAL. 05: EVENTS. 06: HTML5. 07: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE. 08: JAVASCRIPT. 09: MISCELLANEOUS. 10: NAVIGATION. 11: TOOLS. 12: USABILITY. SECTION TWO: 13: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. The WAVE Accessibility Tool (Tutorial) By Laura Carlson. "...In this workshop we will take a look at submitting a page for the WAVE's evaluation, reading a WAVE report, checking problems, and strengths and limitations of automated tools..." http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/wave/ Do It Yourself Transcripts and Captions By Deborah Edwards-Onoro. "This is part 3 in an ongoing series on transcripts and captions for videos and podcasts..." http://www.lireo.com/diy-transcripts-captions/ WordPress Themes Suck at Accessibility: It's Time to Fix It By Sarah Gooding. "...One feature, however, sets Simone apart - a heavy emphasis on accessibility. Rand-Hendriksen believes that the accessibility-ready tag should be required for all WordPress themes. 'My main inspiration for accessibility is that I want everyone, regardless of accessibility challenges, to be able to access all content on the web in the way they want and/or need,' he said. To that end, he has educated himself on the requirements for making a WordPress theme accessible. He is, however, only one among a very small minority of theme developers to do so..." http://wptavern.com/wordpress-themes-suck-at-accessibility-its-time-to-fix-it An Accessible Design Maturity Continuum By David Sloan. "We spend an increasing amount of time helping organizations develop a culture and practice of accessible user experience (AUX). We believe that the chances of creating more inclusive, more effective, more enjoyable digital resources and experiences are increased if accessibility and diversity are integrated into the design approach right from the start. However, this typically requires a significant change in thinking and in practice within the organization. In order to help make this change, it can be useful to identify an organization's level of what we call accessible design maturity..." http://blog.paciellogroup.com/2014/06/accessibility-maturity-continuum/ The Visual-Only Icon Problem By Joe Dolson. "...Font icons are awesome. They're easy, flexible, scale nicely, load quickly (as long as you're not going crazy with them) - but they need some support to have alternative text. Please, take that extra step to provide it!" https://www.joedolson.com/articles/2014/06/visual-icon-problem/ Do Not Rely on a Single Sensory Characteristic to Identify Content By Denis Boudreau. "Make sure indications in web pages are not depending on a single sensory perception..." http://dboudreau.tumblr.com/post/90650860297/do-not-rely-on-a-single-sensory-characteristic-to Use the title Element to Notify Users of Required Fields Left Blank By Denis Boudreau. "Make sure users are notified of required fields left blank as soon as the page reloads..." http://dboudreau.tumblr.com/post/90449811047/use-the-title-element-to-notify-users-of-required Avoid Background Sounds When Sharing Audio Files By Denis Boudreau. "Make sure audio files that contain speech information don't have background sounds" http://dboudreau.tumblr.com/post/90346259827/avoid-background-sounds-when-sharing-audio-files +02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. Keep the Focus Outline By Adrian Roselli. "...What's so frustrating is that the useful style is then overridden with this harmful declaration: a:focus {outline: none;} This override greatly decreases the usability and accessibility of the site. Unfortunately, this practice is still common on many more sites across the web. As a web developer, one of the simplest accessibility tests you can do is unplug your mouse. Two quick things to review as part of that: Can you interact with all controls with only the keyboard? Can you tell which item has focus?..." http://blog.algonquinstudios.com/2014/06/24/keep-the-focus-outline/ CSS Variables (video) By Ben Schwarz. "A head-first dive into the past, present and future of all things variable in CSS. And if this floats your boat, you need to get along to the Engineering Track at Web Directions 2014." http://www.webdirections.org/resources/ben-schwarz-css-variables/ +03: COLOR. Accessible Contrast with Less and Sass By Mike Riethmuller. "Contrast is a critical factor in web design, it's important to get right because it has a strong influence on the visual aesthetic, but it's especially important for readability and accessibility of text on the page..." http://blog.madebymike.com.au/accessible-contrast-ratios-with-less-sass/ +04: DRUPAL. WAI-ARIA, Requiring Alt Text, and Other Accessibility Features Now in Drupal 8 By Amber Matz. "On Drupal.org, Drupal 8 promotion is in full-swing. Features and benefits are being touted and summarized right and left. One of the categories of improvement summed up on the Drupal 8 features page is 'Accessibility.' I went digging for more information on how accessibility improvements have been integrated in Drupal 8 and I found a number of resources on the effort to improve accessibility in D8. Here's the summary of what's been done according to Drupal.org..." http://drupalize.me/blog/201406/accessibility-features-drupal-8 +05: EVENTS. Accessing Social Media July 17, 2014. Washington, DC, U.S.A. http://www.fcc.gov/events/accessing-social-media Live stream will be at: http://www.fcc.gov/live +06: HTML5. Label and Name Inputs Properly By Google. "Forms are hard to fill out on mobile. The best forms are the ones with the fewest inputs. Good forms provide semantic input types. Keys should change to match the user's input type; users pick a date in a calendar. Keep your user informed. Validation tools should tell the user what they need to do before submitting the form." https://developers.google.com/web/fundamentals/input/form/label-and-name-inputs The time Element By Ty Strong. "The