+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 12, Issue 22, November 21, 2013. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 22 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: DRUPAL. 04: EVALUATION & TESTING. 05: JAVASCRIPT. 06: MISCELLANEOUS. 07: USABILITY. SECTION TWO: 08: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. The National Federation of The Blind And The Association of American Publishers Applaud Introduction of 'TEACH Act' By National Federation of the Blind. "The National Federation of the Blind (NFB), the oldest and largest nationwide organization of blind Americans, and the Association of American Publishers (AAP), the leading trade association of the US publishing industry, applaud Congressman Tom Petri (R-WI) for introducing today the Technology, Education and Accessibility in College and Higher Education Act (H.R. 3505)..." https://nfb.org/national-federation-blind-and-association-american-publishers-applaud-introduction-%E2%80%9Cteach-act%E2%80%9D Bill Would Require Instructional Technology to Be Accessible to All By Megan O'Neil. "Legislation introduced on Friday in the U.S. House of Representatives would require colleges either to make instructional technology accessible to disabled students or to provide them with equivalent, alternative resources..." http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/bill-would-require-instructional-technology-to-be-accessible-to-all/48383 Captions in Everyday Use By Aadrian Roselli. "...In short, closed captions have value for all users..." http://blog.adrianroselli.com/2013/11/captions-in-everyday-use.html Caption Everything By Dave Rupert "Using HTML5 to create a real-time closed captioning system." http://daverupert.com/2013/11/caption-everything/ HTML 5 Accessibility - Exclusive Presentation [VIDEO] By Paul Bohman via Deque. "...This talk focused on the new features in HTML 5 and how they impact accessibility. Topics covered include new form input types (date, email, number, etc.), new structural tags (nav, main, etc.), native media players, and more..." http://www.deque.com/html-5-accessibility-exclusive-presentation-video +02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS. Cutting Down on Vendor Prefixes By Roger Johansson. "Most web developers currently use vendor prefixes in CSS to enable certain features in some browsers. That's fine, but sometimes I see code examples and prefix-adding tools that go a bit overboard with the support and add every possible prefix that has ever been in use (and sometimes even ones that were never used). I think there are a bunch of CSS properties that we can safely stop using vendor prefixes for, or at least considerably cut down on the number of prefixes..." http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/201311/cutting_down_on_vendor_prefixes/ How to Maintain Image Aspect Ratios in Responsive Web Design By Craig Buckler. "As series of responsive images works well if all have the same aspect ratio...But how can you set a height if images have differing sizes?" http://www.sitepoint.com/maintain-image-aspect-ratios-responsive-web-design/ Vertical Percentages in CSS By Louis Lazaris. "...using percentages on those vertical parts of a page are somewhat different in the way they are calculated, compared to other properties that take percentage values..." http://www.impressivewebs.com/vertical-percentages-css/ CSS Shapes From Images By Hans Muller. "Defining CSS Shapes with the circle, rectangle, and ellipse shape functions is easy and pretty effective if what you want are circles, rectangles or ellipses. For more complex shapes you can use the CSS polygon function. However enumerating a polygon's vertices can be tedious. Tools can take much of the pain out of the task, but it still tends to be a slow process..." http://hansmuller-webkit.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/css-shapes-from-images.html +03: DRUPAL. Digging In to Apache's Rewrite Module and Drupal By Chris Johnson. "Apache's mod_rewrite module is a powerful tool behind Drupal's clean URLs, but it can lead to some head scratching moments when attempting to implement custom behavior. In this post, we'll walk through a few examples and dig into some corner cases of Apache's Rewrite module and Drupal..." http://www.phase2technology.com/blog/digging-in-to-apaches-rewrite-module-and-drupal/ +04: EVALUATION & TESTING. How Usability Testing Drastically Improved My Client's App By Joshua Gross. "Most designers spend too much time with their designs to be objective about them. The best thing any designer can do is to collect feedback from real users. Testing uncovers pain points and flaws in a design that are not otherwise obvious..." http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/2013/11/19/how-usability-testing-drastically-improved-my-clients-app/ +05: JAVASCRIPT. Accessible JavaScript Gestures By Dylan Barrell. "One of the problems with creating accessible dynamic HTML applications that work well across multiple browser and AT platforms is the issue of keyboard accessibility on a touch device. " http://www.deque.com/accessible-javascript-gestures +06: MISCELLANEOUS. Scope Components, Not Pages By Brad Frost. "...how can you scope a project based on components rather than pages? I think a good place to start is with an interface inventory. An interface inventory is a comprehensive collection of the bits and pieces that make up your interface..." http://bradfrostweb.com/blog/post/scope-components-not-pages/ Content Choreography - Why Our Float Based Approach To Layout Should Evolve By Steven Bradley. "The easiest way to rearrange a design's layout for different devices and conditions is simply to drop one column below another when space no longer allows them to sit side by side. It may be easiest, but it's hardly the best approach..." http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/content-choreography/ Should Designers Code? By Steven Bradley. "Every industry has debates where people on either side hold rigidly to a point of view without really thinking through the issue. The world of web design is no exception and one of the debates we seem to argue about is whether or not web designers need to code to be effective web designers..." http://www.vanseodesign.com/web-design/designers-code/ Who's in Charge Here? By Tim Kadlec. "I tried to resist writing this post. I really, really did. I've ranted once about the standards process as it related to responsive images. I had no interest in going there again. I'd prefer not to be known as 'that ranty Wisconsin dude who sounds slightly Canadian when he talks'..." http://timkadlec.com/2013/11/whos-in-charge-here/ +07: USABILITY. Image Carousel Click-through Rate Analysis By Christian Watson. "Following on from my recent post about why you shouldn't use rotating image carousels I wanted to share the actual stats for a auto-rotating carousel on a key page of an ecommerce site I manage in order to look at how effective it is for showcasing multiple pieces of content..." http://www.smileycat.com/miaow/archives/006606.php Homepage Real Estate Allocation By Jakob Nielsen. "Websites spend too little homepage screen space on content of interest to users and fail to utilize modern screen sizes. And? It's worse now than it was 12 years ago." http://www.nngroup.com/articles/homepage-real-estate-allocation/ When a Tiny Task is Important to the Organization By Gerry McGovern. "If you support the customer in what they want to do they are more likely to support you...It is much more effective to have asks in relevant content, than to interrupt people with banners and donate now-buttons, when they are really trying to accomplish something completely different...It's counter intuitive to think that if you focus on customer top tasks and downplay tasks that are important to the organization, then customers will complete more organizational tasks. But it's true..." http://gerrymcgovern.com/new-thinking/when-tiny-task-important-organization 5 Steps to More Scannable Lists By Georgina Laidlaw. "It's a golden rule of web writing: use lists to make your content more scannable..." http://www.sitepoint.com/5-steps-scannable-lists/ One Error Message Does Not Fit All By Joanna Briggs. "In this week's Best Practice of the Week, we're talking about error messages and how they convey problems to users. Error messages should be specific and let the user know what they need to do to fix it." http://simplyaccessible.com/bpow/error-message-content/ Three Uses for Analytics in User-Experience Practice By Jen Cardello. In order to make the most of analytics data, UX professionals need to integrate this data where it can add value to qualitative processes instead of distract resources. http://www.nngroup.com/articles/analytics-user-experience/ Mobile Usability Problems By Erin Kissane. "Nothing quite underscores accessibility and usability knowledge like direct experience..." http://the-pastry-box-project.net/erin-kissane/2013-november-12/ [Section one ends.] ++ SECTION TWO: +08: 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.]