[webdev] Web Design Update: May 8, 2009

Fri May 8 06:17:45 CDT 2009

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 7, Issue 45, May 8, 2009.

An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design 
and development.

++ISSUE 45 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: DREAMWEAVER.
04: EVALUATION AND TESTING.
05: EVENTS.
06: FLASH.
07: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.
08: JAVASCRIPT.
09: MISCELLANEOUS.
10: NAVIGATION.
11: PHP.
12: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.
13: TOOLS.
14: USABILITY.

SECTION TWO:
15: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

[Contents ends.]

++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

Accessibility at Recovery.gov
By Jim Thatcher.
"Continuing to look at Obama administration web sites, let's check out 
http://Recovery.gov, the web site set up by the administration to 
monitor and explain the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. It is 
disconcerting how serious the issues get..."
http://www.jimthatcher.com/recovery.htm

Postscript on Recovery.gov
By Jim Thatcher.
"...This is worse than disappointing. It is something like a bluff. 
What is especially distressing is that neither Watchfire nor WebXACT 
exist any more - and they have been off the air since soon after IBM"s 
purchase of Watchfire around June of 2007; it seems that WebXACT was 
discontinued February 1, 2008. So how then could Recovery.gov have been 
tested with WebXACT? In my report on Recovery.gov, the home page has 
two machine detectable errors but many other very serious accessibility 
road blocks.. Those two errors are technically not violations of the 
"Section 508 Accessibility Guidelines", but the depth 1 scan of 
Recovery.gov turned up 69 errors that are unequivocal violations of the 
Section 508 Accessibility Standards, 1194.22(a) and 1194.22(n)."
http://www.jimthatcher.com/news.htm#postscript

Use the Fieldset and Legend Elements to Group HTML Form Controls
By Roger Johansson.
"The fieldset and legend elements, which should always be used 
together, allow you to create and name groups of related input fields 
in HTML forms. By doing this you help users understand how the input 
fields are related..."
http://tinyurl.com/cbqcmk

Autoplay is Bad for All Users
By Emma Sax.
"Autoplay is a bad idea not just for accessibility but for usability 
and general sanity while browsing. This article will explain what the 
problems are, where to find backup for arguments and what you can do if 
autoplay is a must have..."
http://www.punkchip.com/2009/04/autoplay-is-bad-for-all-users/

Learning About Video and Captioning
By Becky Gibson.
"...I used Camtasia 6.0 to record a demonstration video using the Dojo 
Sample Mail application with the JAWS 10 screen reader. I then used the 
IBM DigiCape program to transcribe the audio for me. That is certainly 
a big help! It is much easier to edit the captions than to have to try 
to transcribe it all myself. And, the Freedom Scientific folks might 
get a chuckle that 'screen reader' often got transcribed as  'supreme 
leader'..."
http://tinyurl.com/cdbmve

The alt Attribute is NOT for Tooltips
By Robert Nyman.
"I'm am so tired of the never-ending misunderstanding of the alt 
attribute versus the title attribute..."
http://robertnyman.com/2009/05/07/the-alt-attribute-is-not-for-tooltips/

CSS Background Images Cannot and Should Not Have Alternate Text
By Roger Johansson.
"I sometimes see people asking how they can provide alternate text for 
CSS background images. The answer is that you can't. Neither should you 
need to..."
http://tinyurl.com/ddzlcz

How to Provide Alternatives to Non Text Content on a Website
By Virginia DeBolt.
"A web content accessibility guideline published by the W3C (World Wide 
Web Consortium) states that website creators should provide text 
alternatives for any non-text content, so that it can be changed into 
other forms people need, such as large print, braille, speech, symbols 
or simpler language. Here are some tips for ways to do this..."
http://tinyurl.com/dhafyn

How POUR is Your Blog
By Glenda Watson Hyatt.
"With all of this talk about monetizing your blog and using your blog 
to generate business, and hence, generate an income, how POUR is your 
blog?..."
http://www.doitmyselfblog.com/2009/how-pour-is-your-blog/

Comments on the Ontario Accessibility Spec, April 2009 edition
By Joe Clark.
"I submitted comments via Sharlyn and stated that the Ministry of 
Community and Social Services had a week to contact me or I'd publish 
my comments. They didn't, so here we are..."
http://joeclark.org/access/crtc/AODA/April2009/

+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

Hiding with CSS: Problems and Solutions
By Roger Johansson.
"...In most cases, using display:none to hide an element is a bad 
choice that reduces accessibility. I thought this was a well-known 
fact, but apparently there are many who are not aware of it being a 
problem. For that reason, here is a quick explanation of the problem 
and a suggestion for an alternative technique (that I also thought was 
well-known)..."
http://tinyurl.com/cb93hr

CSS Content, counter-increment and counter-reset
By Estelle Weyl.
"I have never used the counter or increment properties since they 
aren't supported in IE7 or earlier, nor are the :before pseudo 
elements, or content property. Since IE8 does support all of these, 
soon we may be able to include these CSS properties, so I thought I 
would explain them..."
http://tinyurl.com/c6wapq

The Problem With Rounded Corners
By Niels Matthijs.
"Rounded corners. They were already a big deal a couple of years ago, 
and even though several solutions exist today, they still present a 
hurdle which can't be taken with much grace. When CSS3 was revealed, 
one of the first announced features was the border-radius property, 
enabling us to apply rounded corners through css. Remember how happy we 
all were? Hold that thought, and run through this article to see how 
that idea is already failing, even before it found its way into each 
modern browser..."
http://www.onderhond.com/blog/work/trouble-with-rounded-corners

Better Font Families in CSS
By Lorraine Nepomuceno.
"font-family is one of the most widely used CSS properties, and with 
good reason: sometimes you can change the entire feel of a design with 
this one property. But selecting fonts for your stack also greatly 
influences your design's readability and accessibility- which, 
ultimately, is what's most important in any web design. That is, if you 
want your visitors to actually read your content..."
http://www.devlounge.net/design/better-font-families-in-css

Zoomfusion
By Jeremy Keith.
"...Either a whole swathe of my peers are confusing elastic and liquid 
layouts or I'm missing something fundamental..."
http://adactio.com/journal/1576

Shifting my Opinion on CSS Animations
By Jonathan Snook.
"...I believe I have done a 180 on this. Why and how, you might ask?..."
http://snook.ca/archives/html_and_css/shifting-opinion-css-animations

Covering the Implication and Basics of CSS Animation
By Jonathan Christopher.
"Over the past few months, I've been embracing progressive enhancement 
on a new(er) level..."
http://tinyurl.com/cxmhm6

+03: DREAMWEAVER.

Standards and Accessibility with Dreamweaver
By Virginia DeBolt.
"...Emily Lewis and I gave a talk for Webuquerque. Here's  the 
presentation:  Standards and Accessibility with Dreamweaver..."
http://tinyurl.com/dcnlh9

+04: EVALUATION AND TESTING.

Where Do Heuristics Come From?
By Dana Chisnell.
"Recently I had the honor and pleasure of working on a project for the 
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to develop style 
guidelines for voting system documentation. Yawner, right? Not at all, 
it turns out. It made me think about where guidelines and heuristics 
come from for all kinds of design..."
http://tinyurl.com/d4rl8m

+05: EVENTS.

Paris Web
October 8-9, 2009.
Paris, France.
http://www.paris-web.fr/2009/Date-et-lieux-des-conferences

+06: FLASH.

Effectively Providing Alternate Content for a Flash Application
By Todd Perkins.
"Flash has an undeserved bad wrap in the Search Engine Optimization 
world. Some SEO experts even warn not to use Flash, because many search 
engines have trouble indexing Flash content. While Flash content is 
searchable by Google, it's critical to use Flash wisely if you want 
your applications to be searchable by all search engines..."
http://www.insideria.com/2009/04/effectively-providing-alternat.html

Debugging Flash Applications with Firefox Extensions
By Tiffany B. Brown.
"...ExternalInterface requires you to test interaction between the 
movie and its container. One way to do this is using the Firebug 
console..."
http://tinyurl.com/cdopq3

+07: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.

Information Architecture and Design Strategy: The Importance of 
Synthesis during the Process of Design
By Jon Kolko.
"During the process of design, Designers attempt to draw connections 
between seemingly disparate ideas; they examine quantitative data 
provided from marketing and qualitative data gathered from end users, 
and before they can begin designing, they must make order out of the 
chaotic mess of research. The connections that can be formed during 
this synthesis phase frequently hold the keys to 'innovation'. 
Designers visually explore large quantities of data in an effort to 
find and understand hidden relationships. These visualizations can then 
be used to communicate to other members of a design team, or can be 
used as platforms for the creation of generative sketching or model 
making. Frequently, the action of diagramming is a form of synthesis, 
and is a way to actively produce knowledge and meaning...This paper 
investigates the elements of Design Synthesis that are common to both 
Information Architecture and Design Strategy."
http://www.jonkolko.com/writingInfoArchDesignStrategy.php

Information Architecture: Synthesis Techniques for the Muddy Middle of 
the Design Process
By Jon Kolko.
"Information Architecture has arisen as a field related to interaction 
design. It is commonly found embedded within the profession of computer 
science, and is associated with the creation of complicated software. 
This relatively new field exists to make meaning out of data, and can 
be applied to disciplines that have little to do with computing or even 
technology. This paper provides an overview of established Information 
Architecture modeling techniques, and discusses how they can be applied 
to the industrial design process during the synthesis phase of design. 
The text reflects on the nature of this messy and critical period in 
the design process, and offers methods of quickly making information 
and even knowledge out of data. Finally, the text briefly describes the 
changing nature of professional demands on students entering industry, 
indicating that Information Architect may be a lucrative alternative 
job title for students graduating from Industrial Design programs."
http://www.jonkolko.com/writingInfoArchAsSynthesis.php

+08: JAVASCRIPT.

Using Fieldsets Outside of Forms
By Mike Davies.
"The focus on using the most appropriate markup in JavaScript enhanced 
pages has raised an interesting problem about the use of form elements 
outside of a form. And using a fieldset to group these elements 
together is proving to be a very useful way of making them 
accessible..."
http://tinyurl.com/co3c8c

Debugging JavaScript: Handling Runtime Exceptions
By Rob Gravelle.
"The Error object provides a number of properties to help you display 
more meaningful error messages to the client and more useful debugging 
information to you, the developer. In this article, we'll go over how 
to use the Error object to handle runtime exceptions."
http://www.webreference.com/programming/javascript/r32/

Jaws Scripting Accessibility Links
By Leonie Watson.
"...The script enables the user to move backwards and forwards between 
links with the rel="accessibility" attribute value. Where no such links 
are present, Jaws reports using the standard short or long message 
formats, depending on the user's verbosity settings..."
http://www.tink.co.uk/content/jaws-script-accessibility-links.php

+09: MISCELLANEOUS.

Multitasking is a Myth
By Rachel McAlpine.
"It's about concentration..."
http://www.contented.com/contented/?p=554

+09: NAVIGATION.

The Shelf Life of a Skip Link
By Henny Swan.
"Most things have a shelf life and technology on the web is no 
different. Tricks and hacks that once seemed to save the day sometimes 
need to be retired as newer technologies or techniques get 
implemented..."
http://www.iheni.com/the-shelf-life-of-a-skip-link/

Swine Flu, H1N1 Virus, Novel Flu
By Gerry McGovern.
"...if you want to tap the full potential of search you  must add human 
management: analysis, trend spotting, connecting  the dots. Search is 
the greatest laboratory of human behavior that has  ever existed. When 
words such as "swine flu" go wild on the Web, you must use those words 
because otherwise you will not be found. If you are not found then you 
are not useful. Before you have any chance of shifting the debate, you 
must first become part of it. Using the wrong words is like ships 
passing in the night: you are going one way and your customer is going 
another."
http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/nt/2009/nt-2009-05-04-swine-flu.htm

+10: PHP.

Introduction to Arrays and Hashes in PHP
By Peter Shaw.
"An array is a list of a certain variable type, where each item in the 
list can be referenced by a unique index number, usually starting at 0. 
Think about it in real terms as you might think about a shopping 
list..."
http://www.phpbuilder.com/columns/peter_shaw04282009.php3

Loops and Decisions in PHP - The ABC's of PHP Part 8
By Peter Shaw.
"In any given computer language (PHP is no exception) there has to be a 
way to allow the running code to decide between doing 2 different 
things..."
http://www.phpbuilder.com/columns/peter_shaw05062009.php3

+11: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.

Whipping Boy
By Shelley Powers.
"I noticed a passing twitter message from Laura Scott. It said One 
word: standards. Firefox follows w3c standards. Internet Explorer does 
not.  She wrote it in response to another Twitter message from tutu4lu, 
who was having problems with a web page appearing differently with IE 
than Firefox..."
http://realtech.burningbird.net/web/browsers/whipping-boy

Comic Update - HTML5 Manners
By Kyle Weems.
"...These people aren't average developers trading insults about 
trivial code snippets on small-scale projects. These are industry 
movers-and-shakers who are supposed to be working together to help 
create the standards that will define how we use HTML and other web 
technologies for years to come. I expect professional disagreement to 
occur (I'd be worried and concerned if that didn't happen). But to 
start insulting one another personally in a public discussion (or 
frankly, privately) is shameful to the entire process and the entire 
community that is depending on them to do a good job..."
http://www.cssquirrel.com/2009/05/04/comic-update-html5-manners/

Accessibility of HTML 5 Video and Audio Elements
By Bruce Lawson.
"HTML 5 has the audio and video elements that conveniently allow an 
author to add multimedia to their pages in an intuitive way. The 
advantage to the consumer is that the files will play in the browser 
with no plugins, and the data will be in the browser and therefore can 
be manipulated with scripts..."
http://tinyurl.com/cgkxpm

Multimedia Accessibility <Audio> <Video>
By ESW Wiki.
"HTML 5 needs a mechanism to allow people with disabilities to access 
multimedia content. In particular the new audio and video elements need 
accessibility evaluation and review..."
http://esw.w3.org/topic/HTML/MultimediaAccessibilty

This Week in HTML 5 - Episode 32
By Mark Pilgrim.
"Topping our list of changes this week is the new <hgroup> element..."
http://blog.whatwg.org/this-week-in-html-5-episode-32

+12: TOOLS.

The Sorry State of WYSIWYG Web Editors
By Mike Davidson.
"We got into a heated discussion in the office about WYSIWYG web 
editors today. While heated discussions are nothing new to us, neither 
side even being happy with their own argument was. When people are 
arguing over things they don't even believe in, there can be no 
positive outcome..."
http://tinyurl.com/dbbkrd

+13: USABILITY.

7 Tips for Designing for Older Users
By Marianne Markowski.
"The diversity of the 65 user group online is enormous. Designing for 
older web users is not solely about disabilities that the elderly may 
develop - it's also about their natural user behaviour and attitudes. 
Our feature article this month offers a digestive list of he most 
important design tips based on research with older users."
http://tinyurl.com/dkh4kt

The Poverty of User-Centered Design
By Andrew Dillon.
"...the set of methods employed by most user-centered professionals 
fails to deliver truly user-centric insights. The so-called 'science' 
of usability which underlies user-centeredness leaves much to be 
desired. It rests too much on anecdote, assumed truths about human 
behavior and an emphasis on performance metrics that serve the 
perspective of people other than the user. - If we could de-couple 
user-centered design and usability then there might be some benefit but 
I don't think this is as important as it might first appear. More 
important is the very conception we have of users and uses for which we 
wish to derive technologies and information resources. Designing for 
augmentation is a very real problem and a great challenge for our field 
theoretically and practically."
http://sentra.ischool.utexas.edu/~adillon/blog/archives/29

[Section one ends.]

++ SECTION TWO:

+14: 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 at d.umn.edu

[Issue ends.]