WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: questions from a student

for

From: John Foliot - WATS.ca
Date: Jun 22, 2004 2:05PM

> Question: "I just saw another abbreviation on the home page. I prefer to
> spell things out because although the terms might be familiar to me, some
> people have never been to an AGM. But when it is repeated... I am
> wondering
> if it is identified once on a page, does it have to be
> re-identified at every instance?"
>
> My initial response was that according to the Web Content Accessibility
> Guidelines 1.0, use and to expand the first time
> they occur
> on the page. However, this begs the question, what happens when
> individuals
> using a screen reader doesn't begin reading from the top of the page and
> they miss where the abbreviation/acronym was first spelled out?
> Is this may
> be another case where the guidelines don't mesh with reality? Or am I
> missing something fundamental when using these attributes?

There has been some debate on this issue. For clarity's sake I expand every
instance of an acronym or abbreviation. Most screen readers *will* start
reading from the top of the page unless specifically directed to a named
anchor or id within a document (a href="foo.html#bar")

>
>
> Question: "The XHTML validation doesn't like any of those non-SGML
> characters. Anything that can be done about that, besides avoiding them?"

use the proper code or named entity. We provide an accessible or the entire
iso8859-1 table version on our site:
http://wats.ca/resources/accessibleiso-8859-1table/58

The definitive reference is part of the XHTML1.0 DTD as a normative part of
the specification.
http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/dtds.html#a_dtd_Latin-1_characters

>
>
> Question: "During testing for CSS, it passed but got a warning:
> * Line :
> 0 font-family: You are encouraged to offer a generic family as a last
> alternative. Does this mean identify outside CSS?"

no -

{font-family: Tahoma, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} or {font-family:
Times, serif;} in other words, specify at least a basic family from:

serif, sans-serif, fantasy, or mono-spaced - allowing user agents to at
least approximate a font family should a specific font not be available

JF
--
John Foliot <EMAIL REMOVED>
Web Accessibility Specialist / Co-founder of WATS.ca
Web Accessibility Testing and Services
http://www.wats.ca 1.866.932.4878 (North America)