+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 6, Issue 29, January 11, 2008. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 29 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: COLOR. 04: EVALUATION & TESTING. 05: EVENTS. 06: FLASH. 07: JAVASCRIPT. 08: MISCELLANEOUS. 09: PHP. 10: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. 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. Section 504 vs. Section 508 By Wayne Dick. "If you are at a University or any other agency that receives US Federal funding then you are subject to section 504 regarding all services at your institution including your technology. Section 504 does not address accessibility in detail like 508 does, but it is far more demanding. Recently four California State Universities have been audited by the Office for Civil Rights regarding accessibility of instructional materials, paper and electronically based - including the Web. The key finding was this: We must provide equally effective access. This means that access must be equal regarding timeliness, quality and availability. Specifically that means that if a resource is available 24/7 for individuals without disabilities then it must be available 24/7 for individuals with disabilities. Also the quality of the reading experience must be equal. If the user without a disability has a usable table of contents then the user with a disability must have a usable table of contents..." http://www.webaim.org/discussion/mail_message.php?id=11164 National Federation of the Blind Lawsuit Addressing Web Accessibility Will Proceed By National Federation of the Blind. "The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has denied Target Corporation's petition for an interlocutory appeal of the District Court's order granting class action certification to a lawsuit filed against the retailer by the National Federation of the Blind for Target's failure and refusal to make its Web site fully accessible to blind shoppers. As a result, the suit will proceed against Target on behalf of all blind Americans, as well as for a subclass of all blind Californians..." http://www.nfb.org/nfb/NewsBot.asp?MODE=VIEW&ID=264 Hiding Content for Screen Reader Users By Mike Cherim. "...Please bear in mind, I'm not disagreeing with Mel, not one bit, and what she offered about the 'experienced JAWS user' is invaluable. I have had this draft started for a while and when I read that it really inspired me to continue this article but in a more refined way so as to emphasize the fact (as I know it) that this can be useful but only if done with care. To reiterate..." http://green-beast.com/blog/?p=237 PDF - ISO Standard By Stephen Partridge. "At a recent meeting, the International Organization for Standardisation (ISO) voted to approve Adobe's PDF as an international document format standard..." http://blogs.adobe.com/spartacusacrobat/2008/01/pdf_iso_standard.html +02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. Coming Soon: Changes to the CSS Working Group? By Kevin Yank. "In a previous post I reported on the crisis within the web standards community, and in particular the controversy surrounding the W3C CSS Working Group. It seems the criticism leveled by Andy Clarke and others has not fallen on deaf ears, because a movement for change is now being led from within the Working Group..." http://tinyurl.com/2ywyeh +03: COLOR. How to Create Sublime Colours By Professor Odd Fellow. "What colour is so awe-inspiring, so out-of-this-world that it elevates viewers to new heights of wonderment?..." http://tinyurl.com/yv7teh +04: EVALUATION & TESTING. Always Crashing In The Same Car: Recurring Misuses Of Higher Education Web Sites - The User Feedback Myth By Rose Pruyne. "...Think about it. If you were overseeing the construction a classroom building, would you conduct focus groups and surveys to determine what materials should be used, where the doors and stairways should go, how strong the load-bearing walls should be? No? You would rely on qualified architects? Then why on earth would you open the door for individuals who have no understanding of how the Web works to step in and have a direct hand in your site design?..." http://tinyurl.com/yqs4cs +05: EVENTS. Future of Web Apps Miami 08 February 28- March 1, 2008. Miami, Florida, U.S.A. http://futureofwebapps.com/2008/miami/ Web App Summit 2008 March 26, 2008. San Diego, California, U.S.A. http://www.uie.com/events/web_app_summit/2008/ +06: FLASH. Accessible Flash Banner Ad Guidelines By Henny Swan. "Here are a few of our top tips for producing accessible Flash banner adverts. I've also included information about testing, compliance with WCAG, navigating Flash using Jaws and WindowEyes and some additional resources..." http://tinyurl.com/27you3 +07: JAVASCRIPT. An Attempt for a More Accessible Edit-In-Place Solution By Chris Heilmann. "Today I will try to find a more accessible way to provide an edit-in-place script. The solution described here is probably not ready for real life yet, please test it in different environments and provide fixes. It is licence with creative commons share-alike, so go nuts!..." http://tinyurl.com/28az2l JavaScript Errors By James Payne. "When last we spoke, we discussed the various Events in JavaScript. In this tutorial we will go over some of the errors that can occur and how to deal with them. I know, I know: how can any of your programs possibly fail when you have been taught by the JavaScript Ninja? Well, you can blame that on the good folks that create the various browsers." http://www.devarticles.com/c/a/JavaScript/JavaScript-Errors/ +08: MISCELLANEOUS. Improving Your Process: Boosting Productivity By Jonathan Christopher. "...In a more general sense of the term, I've got some tips that I try to constantly keep in mind, regardless of the small changes in my workflow..." http://tinyurl.com/26pybm Kimberly Blessing Interview By Christopher Schmitt. "If you haven't heard the name Kimberly Blessing, which is indeed a failing, you might have heard of some of her work..." http://tinyurl.com/35e2nk +09: PHP. 10 PHP Myths Dispelled By Jaybill McCarthy. "...here's my list..." http://jaybill.com/2008/01/02/10-php-myths-dispelled/ Mastering Regular Expressions in PHP, Part 1 By Martin Streicher. "Perl may be regex king, but PHP can slice and dice input quickly, too.." http://tinyurl.com/ypu4at Sorting 2D-arrays in PHP - Anecdotes and Reflections By prodevtips. "One of the many problems with PHP that detractors are eager to point out is the fact that the language has thousands of global functions. Without the awesome CHM version of the PHP manual - finding your way in this jungle would be a mess. Simply finding a function like array_multisort is not trivial. And even if you find it, understanding it completely is not trivial either!..." http://tinyurl.com/2729sj The Switch Statement and Arrays By James Payne. "n our last exciting adventure (back in early November), we braved crocodiles, ravenous editors, most of the PHP statements, and beginning loops. In this edition we'll cover the final statement, the Switch, and discuss arrays. So sit back, order your R2D2 robot to bring you a cold, frosty Jolt Cola, and let's get cracking..." http://www.devshed.com/c/a/PHP/PHP-The-Switch-Statement-and-Arrays/ Floating Point Comparisons In PHP and Javascript By Justin Laing. "Here's the problem. Say you're comparing two floating point numbers a (71.00) and b (71.00) to see if they are the same. The problem is if you've done any calculations to arrive at these numbers they might actually be stored as 71.00000000001. Now if one of them is stored that way and the other isn't and you compare the two to see if they are equal you'll get a FALSE as the response, even though they should be the same." http://tinyurl.com/26tqqa +10: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. Netscape Navigator Goes Quietly Into the Night By Kevin Yank. "On New Year's Eve, the news went out from AOL that the long life of the Netscape Browser was coming to an end..." http://tinyurl.com/2ywyeh +11: USABILITY. 10 Best Intranets of 2008 Jakob Nielsen. "Consistent design and integrated IA are becoming standard on good intranets. This year's winners focused on productivity tools, employee self-service, access to knowledgeable people (as opposed to 'knowledge management'), and better-presented company news." http://www.useit.com/alertbox/intranet_design.html 8 Design Mistakes to Avoid with Account Sign-in By "Jared M. Spool. "...Here are 8 common design mistakes we often see as we watch users try to create accounts and sign into the site..." http://www.uie.com/articles/account_design_mistakes/ The First Corporation was Built on Content By Gerry McGovern. "...A website that cannot identify real tasks and make those tasks easier and faster has no purpose because it delivers no value. Richard Sears might start off on a low salary, but within a year he would be the highest paid on the team. He would have proven how his words made the sale, delivered the service and built the brand." http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/nt/2008/nt-2008-01-07-sears.htm Reflections of an Interface Designer By Kevin Hale. "Going into our 3rd year, I am amazed at the number of interface challenges Wufoo's created for me..." http://particletree.com/notebook/reflections-of-an-interface-designer/ +12: XML. The Design Goals of XML By Rick Jelliffe. "One of the really neat things about the XML specification is not just that it makes its design goals explicit (I gave a twist to this idea in the Schematron standard by mentioning various non-goals too) but that the goals were really well chosen." http://tinyurl.com/2zfarr XHTML Access Module "The XHTML2 Working Group has published the First Public Working Draft of XHTML Access Module. This document is intended to help make XHTML-family markup languages more effective at supporting the needs of the accessibility community. It does so by providing a generic mechanism for defining the relationship between document components and well-known accessibility taxonomies." http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/2008/WD-xhtml-access-20080107/ [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.]