Accessible Taxes? A Blind Consumer's Experience with the US Tax System

One of the most common, and least enjoyable, experiences of citizens of the United States is that of filing income tax forms. This year, Sachin Pavithran, who is blind, attempted to complete the forms and file them without assistance from sighted friends. Find out whether he was successful or not.

Bohman, Paul, Shane Anderson and Sachin Pavithran. WebAIM (2004). Articles>Web Design>Accessibility>Government

Accessible Web 2.0 Applications with WAI-ARIA

Our web applications can suffer from inaccessibility problems due to inherent markup limitations. Martin Kliehm helps us sort through the WAI specs for Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) to increase usability.

Kliehm, Martin. List Apart, A (2007). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Ajax

Accessible Web Design

We encourage developers of web pages to consider the full spectrum of visitors to their sites. Listed below are some resources that may be helpful in creating pages that are accessible to everyone, including those who have disabilities.

University of Washington-Seattle (2001). Design>Web Design>Accessibility

Accessible Web Typography: An Introduction for Web Designers

Text is your flexible friend; it can be transformed into audio or braille; used to describe non-text elements; and be presented visually in an infinite number of sizes.

Byrne, Jim. Scotconnect.com (2003). Design>Typography>Web Design

AccessibleNet.org

Accessible directory of links and resources to help policymakers and web designers make informed decisions about Web accessibility.

Ogston, Matthew. AccessibleNet (2003). Design>Accessibility>Web Design

AccessiBlog

AccessiBlog was a weblog of articles and sites dealing with the topic of Web accessibility (though it is no longer updated).

Clark, Joe. AccessiBlog (2003). Resources>Web Design>Accessibility>Blogs

Accessing Form Elements Array with JavaScript

This article shows how you can access an array of HTML form elements using JavaScript.

DevBay (2005). Design>Web Design>DHTML

Accesskeys: Unlocking Hidden Navigation

Your favorite applications have shortcut keys. So can your site, thanks to the XHTML accesskey attribute. Accesskeys make sites more accessible for people who cannot use a mouse. Unfortunately, almost no designer uses accesskeys, because, unless they View Source, most visitors can’t tell that you’ve put these nifty navigational shortcuts to work on your site. Stuart Robertson unlocks the secret of providing visible accesskey shortcuts.

Robertson, Stuart. List Apart, A (2003). Design>Web Design>Information Design

Accountability of Accessibility and Usability

Focus on your users, all of them. Learn from mistakes currently made on the Web. If a user can't fill out a form, they can't buy anything from your site. People turned away by unusable sites will probably try a competitor's site. Don't be the site that turned people away. Make your Web site as usable and accessible as possible. It's the business savvy thing to do. It's the right thing to do. If you don't, someone just might force you legally to do it or threaten to sue.

Pavka, Anitra. Digital Web Magazine (2002). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Usability

Achieving High Visibility on the Global Web - How to Prepare Your Web Site for Translation

Is there a demand for your products or services outside of your domestic market? If so, how are you marketing to this group of potential customers? How do you overcome language and cultural barriers? Web Localization, which is the process of translating your web site into your customers' languages and adapting to local markets, is an essential step toward establishing a market presence.

Iler, Huiping. WTB Language Group (2005). Articles>Web Design>Localization

Achieving Success with Intranet-Based Online Documentation  

To key to achieving a successful online documentation implementation on the intranet is to understand that the resulting system is indeed a 'system.' The need for well-written, formatted and structured documents is necessary but the interactive framework in which those documents exist is equally important. It is crucial to understand the role of each individual involved in the system from Reader to Author and I.T. provider.

Frost, Edward D.J. STC Proceedings (2001). Design>Documentation>Intranets>Web Design

Acrobat 6 Pro, a New Forms Layout Tool?

I was recently asked by my employer to do some research on various form designer packages to see what they had to offer. Right around that time Acrobat 6 was released, but to consider it a fully featured forms 'layout' tool was the last thing on my mind. Little did I know that I would soon change my mind. After working with Acrobat 6 Pro for a while and getting to know all the new and useful tools it has, it gradually started to dawn on me that it offers form design and layout capabilities that one could only dream about with the previous versions of Acrobat.

Guignard, Bryan. PlanetPDF (2003). Design>Web Design>Software>Adobe Acrobat

Action Point Teorien

Action point teorien et udviklet af Geoffrey Brown i 1999, og tager udgangspunkt i, at et website skal fokusere på brugerens mål med at besøge websitet. Ved brug af action point teorien vil brugeren få en mere positiv oplevelse, og derigennem vil websitet med større sandsynlighed blive besøgt igen, frem for at brugeren prøver et konkurrerende website.

Quark, The (2002). (Danish) Design>Web Design>Theory

ActionExt

A resource with links to Actions and Extensions for Adobe GoLive.

ActionExt. Resources>Web Design>Software>Adobe GoLive

ActionScript.org

A collection of resources for writing ActionScript programs within your Macromedia Flash projects.

ActionScript.org. Resources>Web Design>Software>Flash

Active Server Page (ASP) Tutorial

Introduced in 1996, Active Server Pages (ASP) are just like normal x/html pages except they are processed on the server before being sent to the client's machine. ASP itself is not a programming language, but a platform on which any scripting language that your web-server understands can run. The most popular languages used with ASP are VBScript (a subset of Visual Basic), JScript (Microsoft's version of JavaScript) and Perl Script. This tutorial only covers VBScript.

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio. Design>Web Design>Server Side Includes>ASP

Ad Conversion Rate Influenced by Time (Not Click Rate)

Time is an important design variable to understand. Your user experience is effected by it no matter what user experience you are serving up and the rules are different for every context. For example, the "three click rule" (users must get to their destination within three clicks) applies to e-commerce primarily but not to mortgage education, financial services usability or reading the New York Times online.

Spillers, Frank. Demystifying Usability (2004). Design>Web Design>User Experience>E Commerce

ADA-508 Compliance and Usability Testing Techniques for Accessible Web Pages  

This scenario–based progression session will introduce basic usability testing concepts for developing accessible web pages, raise awareness of the need to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Section 508, and provide resources for further investigation. Emphasis will be given to interactive discussion that centers on requirements analysis for accessible design.

Reece, Gloria A. STC Proceedings (2002). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Section 508

Adaptive Organization of Tabular Data for Display

Tabular representations of information can be organized so that the subject distance between adjacent columns is low, bringing related materials together. In cases where data is available on all topics, the subject distance between table columns and rows can be formally shown to be minimized. A variety of Gray codes may be used for ordering tabular rows and columns. Subject features in the Gray code may be ordered so that the coding system used is one that has a lower inter-column subject distance than with many other codes. Methods by which user preferences may be incorporated are described. The system optionally may display unrequested columns of data that are related to requested data.

Losee, Robert M. Journal of Digital Information (2003). Design>Web Design>Information Design>Adaptive

Adaptive Technologies for the Visually Impaired: The Role of Technical Communicators    

This column examines emerging technologies of interest to technical communicators to help them identify those that are worthy of further investigation. It is intended neither as an endorsement of any technology or product, nor as a recommendation to purchase.

Ray, Deborah S. and Eric J. Ray. Technical Communication Online (1998). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Visual

Adaptive Technology Resource Centre

The Adaptive Technology Resource Centre advances information technology that is accessible to all; through research, development, education, proactive design consultation and direct service.

ATRC. Organizations>Accessibility>Web Design

Adaptive Web Sites: An Introduction

Broadly marketed Web sites face an increasingly diverse and demanding audience. Each visitor may be searching for something different, and each may have unique needs or concerns. Traditional, 'static' Web sites can try to serve these diverse users by aiming at generalized types of user. However, generalizing the audience may cause an information designer to overlook users who do not quite fit in a category. A more effective way to reach diverse audiences might be adaptive Web sites that customize content and interface to suit each individual. This paper will discuss basic concepts behind adaptive Web sites using Amazon.com, the Internet bookseller, as an example.

Wei, Carolyn. EServer (2001). Design>Web Design>Adaptive

Add Functionality to Quick, Easy Site Deployment

More than a Web content management system, Octigon President James Smith calls Octane8 a deployment platform. What exactly can you deploy with Octane8? To name a few: public Internet sites, private intranet and extranet sites; sites for the group you'll be collaborating with for the next two weeks; sites with pages that sell; and sites with pages that inform.

Pastore, Michael. Intranet Journal (2003). Design>Content Management>Web Design

Add Inspiration With Illustrations

Which comes first, the concept or the artwork? The assumption has always been that you first figure out the concept, then find the art to fit. But even if we leave many things in our life unquestioned--design shouldn't be one of them.

Will-Harris, Daniel. Typofile (2003). Design>Web Design>Graphic Design