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Re: Accessibility criteria

for

From: Moore, Michael
Date: Jun 15, 2007 10:20AM

Martin wrote:

I've been asked to look it Accessibility criteria, so that we can
develop a list of criteria for our organisation similar to the one's
listed here:
http://accessites.org/site/criteria/

Mike's reply:

I would start with the criterial listed at the site that you have linked
above, I would agree with just about everything there. Some of their
criteria, like using a strict dtd and avoiding layout tables are more of
a best practices "standard" than absolutely require for accessibility
but you should seriously consider adding them to your list.

Next, review the WCAG and Section 508 guidelines and make sure that you
understand the reasons behind those guidelines. An excellent resource is
the book by Jim Thatcher et. al. "Web Accessibility, Web Standards and
Regulatory Compliance" (2006, ISBN 1-59059-638-2).

Finally there are some excellent web resources available through WebAIM,
the organization that sponsors this list, <http://www.webaim.org>;,
Knowbility, another non-profit organization that is a leader in
accessibility training <http://www.knowbility.org>; - check out their AIR
Judging form, and the WEB Standards Project (WASP)
<http://www.webstandards.org/>;. The checklists and evaluation templates
that we are currently using here at the Texas Department of Assistive
and Rehabilitative Services were developed using those resources.
Accessibility and usability is critical for our organization to function
since we serve the disabled community of Texas (over 4 million people)
and have over 200 staff members who rely on assistive technology to
perform their jobs.

Mike Moore

"If you don't have time to do it right,
when will you have time to fix it?"