WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

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Re: Hyperlinks displaying as blue text only

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From: Michael D. Roush
Date: Jun 3, 2009 12:55PM

Mark Guisinger wrote:
> I've noticed on the WebAIM site that the links in the navigation show
> as blue text. When you mouse over them they underline and the
> background changes colors to a yellow highlight. My question is ...
> Does this meet Section 508 paragraph c and WCAG 1.0 checkpoint 2.1?

To specifically quote WCAG 1.0 checkpoint 2.1...

"Ensure that all information conveyed with color is also available
without color, for example from context or markup."

Links are, by their very nature, established by markup. So, any HTML
link is already marked up as a link. The information that a link is
present is conveyed by markup, not just the presence of blue (or blue
underlined) text.

So, even if the links were the exact same color, font, weight, etc., as
the surrounding non-link text on the page, they would still be links by
virtue of the markup.

Think of it a little bit in the reverse... the difference in color is
applied to give sighted people (who cannot immediately discern from a
visual interface) whether text is marked up to be a link or not unless
there is some visual difference to indicate such. The browser has no
such incapacity and can easily tell links from non-links even if they
are all 12-point black arial with no underlining. Tabbing through links
and other such browser-based activities function as expected.

To my way of thinking, there is no violation of the checkpoint here.
Whether that translates into greater ease-of-use is, as always, a far
different discussion.

Michael