Screen Readers and 'display:none'

When an element is hidden with display: none, the browser doesn't generate a box for the element; the element is not visible on the screen, and the layout of the page isn't effected by the element. As screen readers are supposed to read the screen, it makes sense that they do not announce content that is hidden with display: none.

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio (2007). Articles>Web Design>Accessibility>CSS

User-Defined Access Keys

Access keys are a contentious area of accessibility, as they can sometimes clash with the shortcut keys used by user agents. One method to get around this problem is to allow users to define their own access keys. This post suggests a PHP class that allows users to define their own access keys.

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio (2006). Design>Web Design>Accessibility

WCAG 2.0 Baseline Concept

In order to encourage vendors of non-W3C technologies to include accessibility features in their technologies, and in recognition of emerging technologies that are beneficial for the Web, WCAG 2.0 is technology neutral. Rather than list each technology that the guidelines cover, WCAG 2.0 introduces the concept of a baseline. This post attempts to explain what is meant by this baseline concept.

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio (2006). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Standards

Wireless Markup Language (WML) Tutorial: Getting User Input

The Wireless Markup Language (WML) is the markup language used to make sites suitable for viewing using a WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) device. If you don't have a WAP device to view the pages, you can get a simulator by downloading the Wireless Companion from YourWAP.

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio. Design>Web Design>Wireless Web>WAP

Writing a Good Accessibility Statement

Accessibility statements are an ideal place to empower visitors to your website. Most accessibility statements are too technical, and don't necessarily address the needs of the visitor. Those that do address the needs of visitors often have the information lost in a myriad of other information that is unlikely to be understood by the average visitor to the website. What should and shouldn't be included in an accessibility statement?

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio (2006). Design>Web Design>Accessibility>Writing

WCAG and the Myth of Accessibility

Kevin Leitch explains why he feels that the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines have failed in their mission to ensure that web content is accessible to all.

Leitch, Kevin. Juicy Studio (2004). Articles>Web Design>Accessibility>Standards

The HTML Scope/Headers Debate

The HTML working group have decided not to include the headers attribute in the HTML 5.0 working draft, as they believe the scope attribute is sufficient for associating header cells with data cells. With simple and most complex tables, this is a reasonable assertion, but doesn't work with overlaid and irregular tables, where the associated headers aren't in the same column or row.

Lemon, Gez. Juicy Studio (2009). Articles>Web Design>Standards>HTML5