+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE. - Volume 13, Issue 23, December 4, 2014. An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. ++ISSUE 23 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: HTML5. 04: JAVASCRIPT. 05: MISCELLANEOUS. 06: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. 07: USABILITY. SECTION TWO: 08: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site? [Contents ends.] ++ SECTION ONE: New references. +01: ACCESSIBILITY. Web Accessibility - Embedding Inclusion By Jonathan Hassell. "Most organizations are either oblivious to, or terrified about, web accessibility...I learned directly where I believe most organizations want to be from the heads of diversity and inclusion of the top blue-chip corporations in Europe at a meeting of the Vanguard Network in 2011. Here, the event's chairwoman spent a whole hour asking each of the delegates what one thing would really make a difference to their organization's inclusion practices, if they could achieve it. When delegates were asked to vote for which contribution they felt was the most important, the following was the unanimous choice: 'What I want is to strategically embed inclusion into my organization's culture and business-as-usual processes, rather than just doing another inclusion project.'" http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=1081 Online Security and Privacy for People with Cognitive Disabilities - Challenges and Solutions By John Rochford. "...Web security and privacy technologies often block people with cognitive and/or physical disabilities..." https://clearhelper.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/online-security-privacy-for-people-with-cognitive-disabilities-challenges-solutions/ 3.1.1 Language of Page By Rakesh Paladugula. "The default human language of each Web page can be programmatically determined. (Level A)" http://www.maxability.co.in/2014/11/3-1-1-language-page/ W3C Web Accessibility Initiative - 2014 in Review By Scott Hollier. "As the end of another busy year approaches, it's worth looking back at the year that was and the significant contributions WAI has made..." http://www.accessiq.org/news/w3c-column/2014/12/w3c-web-accessibility-initiative-2014-in-review When to Use the Null alt Option for Images By Virginia DeBolt. "The standards set in WCAG 2.0 state..." http://www.webteacher.ws/2014/12/02/use-alt-option-images/ +02: EVALUATION & TESTING. A 6-Hour Usability Test in an Agile Environment By Jeff Sauro. "Agile development often leaves little time for usability testing. By narrowly focusing your research questions and tasks and using unmoderated testing tools, you can, in a short time, answer design questions with data from users. When working under time constraints, break large studies into smaller ones, and quickly find out what doesn't work-aligning with the spirit of Agile and Lean methodologies..." http://www.measuringu.com/blog/agile-usability.php The 7 Deadly Sins of User Research By David Travis. "...Here are 7 examples of poor user research practice that I've come across in my work with clients - along with some ideas on how to fix them..." http://www.userfocus.co.uk/articles/7-sins-of-user-research.html +03: HTML5. Sour. Me Fish. Like! Like, BBQ/HTML Is Easy By Niels Matthijs. "...when I look at the standard output of most CMSes (and even custom back-end development) today the output is still light years removed from reaching that basic quality level that's needed to do some proper front-end work. They are at the level of sentence 3. They may claim to output html, but in reality what they output doesn't make the slightest sense. They don't care about the language that html is supposed to be, instead they only see abstract hooks for css and javascript..." http://www.onderhond.com/blog/html-is-easy On the Accessibility of Web Components. Again. By Bruce Lawson. "...I'm a fan of web components. But I’m increasingly worried about the messaging surrounding them." http://www.brucelawson.co.uk/2014/on-the-accessibility-of-web-components-again/ Building an Accessible Disclosure Button - Using Web Components By Cedric Trevisan. "Web components are the next step in building modern web applications and a great way to prototype accessible widgets..." http://www.paciellogroup.com/blog/2014/06/accessible-disclosure-button-using-web-components/ Now HTML 5 is Finished, W3C Boss Jeff Jaffe Discusses What Comes Next By Jack Schofield. "Now HTML 5 has finally been standardized, Jeff Jaffe, the W3C's CEO, wants to get people talking about what to do next. His suggestion is to build an application foundation to underpin the Open Web Platform - an operating system for the web..." http://www.zdnet.com/now-html-5-is-finished-w3c-boss-jeff-jaffe-discusses-what-comes-next-7000036254/ +04: JAVASCRIPT. The Difficulty of Finding Out How to Use WAI-ARIA Correctly By Detlev Fischer. "Even with the best of intentions and diligent searching it is still rather difficult to work out how to correctly use WAI-ARIA - even for rather simple use cases..." http://www.bitvtest.eu/articles/article/lesen/aria-confusion.html +05: MISCELLANEOUS. Writing-First Design By Jonas Downey. "A quick way to measure a designer’s maturity is to watch what they do at the beginning of a project...Putting writing first improves your chances of success in the final product. It’s good practice, and it makes the rest of your job easier..." https://signalvnoise.com/posts/3801-writing-first-design +06: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS. Terms Defined in the W3C ARIA 1.1 Specification By Webplatform. https://specs.webplatform.org/html-aria/webspecs/master/examples/aria11definitions.html It is Blue Beanie Day - Let's reflect By Chris Heilmann. "Today we celebrate once again blue beanie day. People who build things that are online don their blue hat and show their support for standards based web development. All this goes back to Jeffrey Zeldman's book that outlined that idea and caused a massive change in the field of web design..." http://christianheilmann.com/2014/11/30/it-is-blue-beanie-day-lets-reflect-bbd14/ +07: USABILITY. The Continued Decline of the Homepage By Gerry McGovern. "Google is your new homepage. Every page you have is a homepage for someone. We must think beyond the traditional homepage." http://gerrymcgovern.com/new-thinking/continued-decline-homepage Web, Design, User Experience: 32 Myths to be Dispelled By Behance.net. "UX Myths project is a project of the Hungarian user experience designer Zoltan Gocza, who was also assisted by Zoltan Kollin as well as Dario Venneri as translator. This website collects considerations on the user experience, all derived from tests, studies and specific articles that motivate those working with the web to be wary of the many, too many, myths that circulate among professionals (and others) on the subject of user experience applied, for example, to a website..." https://www.behance.net/gallery/19641639/Web-design-user-experience-32-myths-to-be-dispelled Eight UX Experts Tell You How to Create Great Mobile Experiences By Lauren Cramer. "We're celebrating the upcoming 2015 UX Immersion Mobile Conference by giving you the videos from the UXIM 2014 talks..." http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2014/12/01/free-videos-on-creating-great-mobile-experiences/ [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 Drupal Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/drupal.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 HTML Information. http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/html.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.]