Newsletter Archives - October 2006
Note
This newsletter is maintained here for archival purposes. The content presented here may be outdated, may contain out-of-date links, and may not represent current best practices or represent the opinion and recommendations of WebAIM. For up-to-date information, please refer to the WebAIM web site.
Featured Article
OpenOffice.org and Accessibility Part 1: Writer
OpenOffice.org is a free, open source office suite, often compared to Microsoft (MS) Office. Writer is OpenOffice.org's word processor application. While there may be some concern over the accessibility of Writer as an application, in terms of document accessibility, it seems that OOo Writer and Microsoft Word have almost the same abilities and limitations.
News
NCDAE Webcast: Web Captioning and its uses in Education
Register for another free NCDAE webcast, Wednesday, Oct. 25th 1PM Mountain Standard Time (12PM Pacific; 2PM Central; 3PM Eastern) to learn more about using web captioning in education.
Telecommunications and Electronic and Information Technology Advisory Committee
TEITAC is a federal advisory committee providing recommendations for updates of accessibility guidelines issued under section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act in 2000 and under section 255 of the Telecommunications Act. You can contribute to this effort by participating in subcommittees that have been formed to review and develop these accessibility guidelines.
Tips and Resources
The Future of Web Accessibility
by Trenton Moss on webcredible.co.uk
Webcredible looks at where web accessibility has been and makes predictions of where it is going.
The Great Accessibility Camp-Out
by Gez Lemon and Mike Cherim on accessites.org
Gez Lemon and Mike Cherim compare web accessibility to a large mountain on which the summit cannot be reached in a day. It must be broken down into camps from which we continue the journey to the top. Somewhere along the way, the journey to accessibility has been divided into two primary camps: The "accessibility is for everyone" camp the "accessibility is for people with disabilities" camp. Also see a related article on 456bereastreet.com: Accessibility for All vs. for People with Disabilities.
Web Axe Interview
from webaim.org/blog, also found on webaxe.blogspot.com
Tune into last month's Web Axe interview of WebAIM's Jared Smith.
Talklets
from textictalk.com
Listen to the web using Talklets, created specifically for people with reading difficulties. Learn more about the background of talklets from the lead developer Phil Teare on juicystudio.com.
WebAIM Conference Presentations
November 8-10: Accessing Higher Ground Conference
WebAIM is pleased to announce its participation in the ninth annual Accessing Higher Ground conference on Assistive Technology and Accessible Media in Higher Education. It will be held in Boulder, Colorado on Nov. 8-10 (preconference Nov.7). This conference provides an intimate setting where between 150 and 200 attendees, most of whom have a high level of accessibility expertise, can network, discuss, and learn about accessibility.
More than 35 workshops, including hands-on labs, will be presented throughout the conference on topics including Web and Media Access, the Americans with Disabilities Act compliance, legal requirements and policy issues, and accommodations for students with learning disabilities, visual impairments, and physical disabilities.
WebAIM will present a series of hands-on and lecture sessions, including a full day preconference lab titled Web Accessibility Evaluation and Repair Methods, a lecture session on web captioning, and a second lab titled Web Accessibility Evaluation Tools and Techniques.
For a complete agenda, workshop listing, and registration form, visit the Accessing Higher Ground conference web site.
November 16-18: Refresh the Web
The Refresh the Web conference, to be held November 16-18 in Orlando, will be a great opportunity for web developers and designers to get together and discuss web standards and accessibility. The conference features two and a half days of presentations by many experts in the field. WebAIM's Jared Smith will be presenting User-Centered, Standards-Driven Web Accessibility, where he will highlight the user experience with web applications and will discuss recent changes to web accessibility standards.
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