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RE: drop down menus

for

From: Jon Gunderson
Date: Jul 31, 2003 1:33PM

A person with a visual impairment cannot ignore the sub menus if they
happen to move the mouse over the sub menu hot spot on the page.

Jon


At 01:29 PM 7/31/2003 -0500, Jim Thatcher wrote:
>I thought the question concerned the use of JavaScript to display a sub-menu
>when moving the mouse over a main menu item or link - whether these could be
>accessible.
>
>The tutorial (http://jimthatcher.com/webcoursea.htm#Webcourse10.d) tried to
>answer that by saying that if all the links of the "sub-menu" are easily
>available on the page opened by the main menu item link, then yes - the
>advantage of someone using the JavaScript sub-menus is nominal.
>
>I didn't intend to be commenting about fonts or colors or anything else,
>just whether or not the drop-down menus could be accessible. I think Yes,
>essentially by ignoring the sub-menus.
>
>Jim
>508 Web Accessibility Tutorial http://jimthatcher.com/webcourse1.htm.
>"Constructing Accessible Web Sites:" http://jimthatcher.com/news.htm
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jon Gunderson [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
>Sent: Thursday, July 31, 2003 11:53 AM
>To: <EMAIL REMOVED>
>Subject: RE: drop down menus
>
>The referenced tutorial says that pull down menus are a "relatively minor
>convenience for sighted (mouse) users". If I have a visual impairment and
>have user styling enabled on the web browser these pull down menus are a
>major problem. If I change font size these menus fall apart in terms of
>reflow and obscure content. If I change colors the menu text becomes
>transparent to the background text and this results in a spaghetti of over
>lapping text, which is totally unreadable.
>
>I characterize these problems as major accessibility problems. Just try
>some of these websites yourself with user styling of text enabled on the
>browser.
>
>Jon
>
>
>At 08:44 AM 7/31/2003 -0500, Jim Thatcher wrote:
> >There's a discussion of drop down menus in the "Web Course",
> >http://jimthatcher.com/webcoursea.htm/#webcourse10.d with the NSF.gov site
> >as an example.
> >
> >Jim
> >508 Web Accessibility Tutorial http://jimthatcher.com/webcourse1.htm.
> >"Constructing Accessible Web Sites:" http://jimthatcher.com/news.htm
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: NutHouse Studios [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
> >Sent: Wednesday, July 30, 2003 9:23 PM
> >To: <EMAIL REMOVED>
> >Subject: drop down menus
> >
> >I was wondering if it's possible to make drop down menus for navigation
>that
> >
> >are accessible? For an example of what I'd like to do, see:
> >http://www.wcc.cc.il.us/ and view the top menu that includes Prospective
> >Students, Current Students, etc. I know that they're not using ALT tags,
> >but I was just wondering if the use of drop down menus is possible.
> >
> >Thanks for your time - max c.
> >
> >_________________________________________________________________
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> >
> >
> >
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>
>Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
>Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
>Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
>MC-574
>College of Applied Life Studies
>University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
>1207 S. Oak Street, Champaign, IL 61820
>
>Voice: (217) 244-5870
>Fax: (217) 333-0248
>
>E-mail: <EMAIL REMOVED>
>
>WWW: http://cita.rehab.uiuc.edu/
>WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
>
>
>
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Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
MC-574
College of Applied Life Studies
University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
1207 S. Oak Street, Champaign, IL 61820

Voice: (217) 244-5870
Fax: (217) 333-0248

E-mail: <EMAIL REMOVED>

WWW: http://cita.rehab.uiuc.edu/
WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund



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