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Re: Making Content Accessible to Sighted Users?

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From: chaals
Date: Oct 8, 2016 8:13AM

Hi Brandon,

This is a pretty huge question really.

Stuff like not overlapping, not making people scroll in 2 dimensions at once - which is the thing people *really* hate - even if they zoom 500%, are generally straightforward if you don't try to force too much layout. Browsers deal with the Web ...

Colour schemes are a question of taste and culture, as well as accessibility, but there is a fair bit of literature about it, and I hope some of that is online in accessible form...

There are changes in aesthetics over time - I have seen at least 3 pretty different design aesthetics "dominate" the Web for a while. To be clearer, there are differences around the world, like there are in everything else.

Rather than trying to fit everything on a screen, make sure it is clearly broken up. You *can't* know how many words are a screenful, since screen size and the font size users want are both unpredictable - and change somewhat for individuals during a single day...

Overall, I would suggest you look for some forum where people talk about design, rather than about accessibility. Because there you will find people who know more about design :) Even better, engaging with those people is how you get a critical community to actually understand accessibility issues...

cheers

Sadly, my designs are pretty boring, and I don't know a design community :( Search engines should help.

Chaals

08.10.2016, 09:28, "Brandon Keith Biggs" < <EMAIL REMOVED> >:
> Hello,
> Of corse one uses styles (It is rather hard not to). It just becomes:
> What styles do I use? (Should links, headings and paragraphs be orange,
> silver and blue respectively over a black body? and what RGB values
> exactly?)
> Where do I place text so it is not covering pictures or vice versa?
> How do I layout a site that sighted people like to look at? (For example,
> I'm pretty sure sighted people like to see everything on one screen and so
> they don't need to scroll).
> How do I know how much text fits on one screen?
>
> For MS Word, yes, they do use specific styling for each word. So if I copy
> and paste something, then it will show up in the same style as the place I
> pasted it from.
>
> For powerpoints and excel sheets, I can type a whole essay and it's the
> same for me as one word. In fact, this is how I often take notes. (Note
> that in Excel now, I get the warning "cropped" or "overflowing" which means
> something, but when you type a "2" and get the "cropped" error, it is a
> little confusing).
> Thanks,
>
> Brandon Keith Biggs <http://brandonkeithbiggs.com/>;
>
> On Fri, Oct 7, 2016 at 6:01 PM, whitneyq < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>
>>  Surely you are not applying text display characteristics individually. You
>>  should be using styles, right.
>>  Everywhere I've worked we have made templates that include our settings
>>  for a robust set of styles.
>>  This is not primarily for a11y but for branding and consistency.
>>  Wouldn't the same thing hold true for Web using css?
>>
>>  Sent from my Verizon, Samsung Galaxy smartphone
>>  -------- Original message --------From: Maxability Accessibility for all <
>>   <EMAIL REMOVED> > Date: 10/6/16 6:44 AM (GMT-05:00) To:
>>  WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> > Subject: Re:
>>  [WebAIM] Making Content Accessible to Sighted Users?
>>  Hi Brandon,
>>
>>  I totally agree with you on the pain a blind front-designer have while
>>  developing web pages. I myself being a blind developer fall into that ache
>>  quite oftern. However for Word and excel I try to play a safe game. Eg:
>>  After writing the entire document, I will start giving the font-size,
>>  color, alignment etc depending on the hierarchy of the content. End of the
>>  task I have to rely on sighted to double sure the visual changes take
>>  effect.
>>  A primary test can be still done using the NVDA command insert + f that
>>  speaks the color, font size and the style of the word selected.
>>
>>  Looking to hear from others too.
>>
>>  On Thu, Oct 6, 2016 at 2:54 PM, Brandon Keith Biggs <
>>   <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>>
>>  > Hello,
>>  > I am wondering if any kind of thought has ever been put towards how blind
>>  > creators and designers can make their content visually appealing? Most of
>>  > this has to do with the fact blind people have no idea what looks good
>>  and
>>  > their screen reader doesn't have a setting that says "Looks good" or "Can
>>  > you move that element to the right because it is covering some text?"
>>  > But this is a huge problem because one can have the most amazing and easy
>>  > to use application or product, but if it doesn't look good, then no
>>  sighted
>>  > person is going to touch it.
>>  > What this means is that if a blind programmer wishes to do front-end
>>  > design, they can't unless they can make something that looks good. This
>>  > means that if a blind person wishes to make a Word document or Excel
>>  file,
>>  > they can make their content, but the first sighted person who reads it is
>>  > going to go crazy at all the differently sized fonts, the extra spaces
>>  that
>>  > are not visible to the screen reader and different sizes of text.
>>  > So just as there is a checklist for creators to make their content
>>  > accessible to people with AT, there should be a checklist for people with
>>  > AT (primarily screen reader users) to make their content accessible to
>>  > sighted users.
>>  >
>>  > I have asked blind programmers what they currently do and the responses
>>  are
>>  > not very reassuring. Some use prebuilt templates and just don't mess with
>>  > the defaults, some have a sighted designer who makes the site look good
>>  and
>>  > others don't do front-end.
>>  > But this is a problem I think is really big when it comes to blind people
>>  > and employment. Because if a blind person needs to make a document that
>>  is
>>  > distributed to all the employees, make promotional materials, create
>>  > templates for others to use or make powerpoints to present to bosses or
>>  > clients, there is going to be no trust, either by the blind person or
>>  their
>>  > colleagues, that the blind person can make a usable document without
>>  help.
>>  >
>>  > I would like to know if anyone knows of any resources or guidelines for
>>  > making content accessible to sighted users?
>>  > Thanks,
>>  >
>>  > Brandon Keith Biggs <http://brandonkeithbiggs.com/>;
>>  > >>  > >>  > >>  > >>  >
>>  >>  >>  >>  >>  >>  >>  >>  >
> > > > --
Charles McCathie Nevile - web standards - CTO Office, Yandex
<EMAIL REMOVED> - - - Find more at http://yandex.com