[webdev] Web Design Update: January 8, 2011

Sat Jan 8 05:04:27 CST 2011

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 9, Issue 28, January 8, 2011.

An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web
design and development.

++ISSUE 28 CONTENTS.

SECTION ONE: New references.
What's new at the Web Design Reference site?
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/
New links in these categories:

01: ACCESSIBILITY.
02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.
03: EVALUATION & TESTING.
04: EVENTS.
06: MISCELLANEOUS.
06: NAVIGATION.
07: USABILITY.

SECTION TWO:
08: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

[Contents ends.]

++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

Guidelines for Accessible Forms
By Steven Datt.
"In an age where user feedback and interaction has become so popular,
accessible forms have become that much more important. Many sites have
already embraced making their forms accessible, and done a pretty good
job of it, but inevitably some will still lack that little extra
something - as small as an inappropriately named label through to no
accessible features at all..."
http://www.webcredible.co.uk/user-friendly-resources/web-accessibility/accessible-forms-guidelines.shtml

Five Myths About Accessibility Myths
By Matt May.
"...In an effort to focus our energies a little better, I’ve put
together the problems I find with the “accessibility myths” genre. And
since it is better, pedagogically speaking, to present material in a
form that the audience finds comfortable, here they are: five myths
about accessibility myths..."
http://www.bestkungfu.com/archive/date/2011/01/accessibility-myth-myths/

Federal Government Files a Motion for Reconsideration in the Jodhan Vase
By Catherine Roy.
"...1.) I want to see a stop to a waste of time and resources that
pursuing this request for Reconsideration represents. 2.) I want to
see a real plan for making Canadian government websites accessible to
all people with disabilities, including the treatment of existing
content in lieu of this dangerous blanket notion of handling “stored
content” upon request. 3.) I want all stakeholders (government, people
with disabilities, industry experts) to be contributors to that plan
and to the solutions therein. 4.) And then, I want to see the
government roll up its sleeves and do the work."
http://www.catherine-roy.net/blog/2011/01/01/reconsideration-jodhan-case/

You Reap What You Sow: The Australian Government's Report on PDF Accessibility
By Duff Johnson.
"This article analyzes the recent Australian Government's study into
the Accessibility of the Portable Document Format for people with a
disability (hereafter "the Report"), published in November, 2010 by
the Australian Government Information Management Office (AGIMO)
together with Vision Australia, a consultancy."
http://www.appligent.com/talkingpdf-AGIMO-Report-Assessment

PDF vs HTML for Organisations
By Alastair Campbell.
"...There is a good reason why HTML websites are more likely to be
accessible than PDFs in this context: the interface..."
http://alastairc.ac/2011/01/pdf-vs-html-for-organisations/

No JAWS 11 in 2011
By Terrill Thompson.
"...So, we faced quite a dilemma in 2010. Do we avoid using the HTML5
<header> element, solely because JAWS 11 can't handle it in Firefox?
...In October 2010, JAWS version 12 was released. It took me until
late December to finally get around to installing it (busy year), but
now that I've done so, I'm pleased to find that the <header> bug has
been fixed..."
http://terrillthompson.blogspot.com/2011/01/no-jaws-11-in-2011.html

Try Audio Describing a Painting
By Royal National Institute of Blind People.
"Think of your favourite work of visual art. Now try describing the
essence of it by writing it down or saying it out loud to yourself in
about 200 words..."
http://www.rnib.org.uk/LIVINGWITHSIGHTLOSS/LEISURECULTURE/ARTSCRAFTS/PAINTING/Pages/audio_description_painting.aspx

+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

CSS 101
By Thierry Koblentz.
Comprehensive CSS site.
http://www.css-101.org/

The CSS3 Object-Fit and Object-Position Properties
By Chris Mills.
"A common problem in CSS concerns how to control the aspect ratio of
replaced elements, such as <img> or <video>. For example, you might
want to have all images occupy the same space on a page, but not
distort and lose their aspect ratio when someone uses an image file
that isn't quite the right size. Resizing and letter-boxing the image
slightly to conserve the aspect ratio is a much more elegant solution
than squashing and stretching an image to fit. Or you might want to go
the opposite way, and force letter-boxed items, like HTML5 <video>s to
conform to a specific width and height — maybe you want all videos to
be a specific aspect ratio, and want a solution where ones with
different aspect ratios automatically appear correctly?..."
http://dev.opera.com/articles/view/css3-object-fit-object-position/

Why Use Classes or IDs on the HTML Element?
By Chris Coyier.
"I'm frequently seeing ID and class specifications to <body> and
<html> elements. I'm curious as to why one would do this? If it is
unique to either element, then why not specify body or html in the
CSS?..."
http://css-tricks.com/why-use-classes-or-ids-on-the-html-element/

CSS Quick Tip: CSS Arrows and Shapes Without Markup
By Nate Cavanaugh.
"...Today I'm going to show you a way to add in these visual hints
without having to create any markup..."
http://www.yuiblog.com/blog/2010/11/22/css-quick-tip-css-arrows-and-shapes-without-markup/

Reset Revisited
By Eric A. Meyer.
"It was close to four years ago now that I first floated (ha!),
publicly refined, and then published at its own home what's become
known as the 'Eric Meyer Reset'. At the time, I expected it would be
of interest to a small portion of the standards community, provoke
some thought among fellow craftspeople, and get used occasionally when
it seemed handy. Instead, it's ended up almost everywhere..."
http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2011/01/03/reset-revisited/

Looking For Focus
By Eric A. Meyer.
"In the reset revision draft I posted Monday, I got tripped up by some
last-minute changes and I’m going to think out loud (so to speak, as
it were) about possible solutions...In the process of writing this
out, I think I've mostly settled on which choice I prefer, but I’d
like to hear what you think. Which option strikes you as best, and
why?"
http://meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2011/01/05/looking-for-focus/

a { outline: none; } Don't do it!
"It provides visual feedback for links that have 'focus' when
navigating a web document using the TAB key (or equivalent). This is
especially useful for folks who can't use a mouse or have a visual
impairment. If you remove the outline you are making your site
inaccessible for these people..."
http://www.outlinenone.com/

+03: EVALUATION & TESTING.

Measuring Task Times Without Users
By Jeff Sauro.
"...One of the biggest challenges to driving usability improvements
through measurement is that by the time usability is measured it's too
late to change the interface. This is especially the case for task
time which is typically only collected on fully-functioning and live
applications..."
http://www.measuringusability.com/predicted-times.php

+04: EVENTS.

In Control Web Design Conference
February 21-22, 2011.
Orlando, Florida, U.S.A.
http://2011.incontrolconference.com/

IA Summit 2011
March 30 - April 3, 2011.
Denver Colorado, U.S.A.
http://2011.iasummit.org/

Hypertext 2011
June 6-9, 2011.
Eindhoven Netherlands
http://www.ht2011.org/

UXcamp Europe 2011
June 11-12, 2011.
Berlin Germany
http://www.uxcampeurope.org/

Interact 2011
September 5-9, 2011.
Lisbon Portugal
http://interact2011.org/

+05: MISCELLANEOUS.

People of HTML5 - Bruce Lawson
By Chris Heilman.
"...The first person to feature is Bruce Lawson of Opera, co-author of
Introducing HTML5 and one of the curators of HTML5 Doctor. Bruce works
from home somewhere in the darker and unknown regions of England, and
if you haven’t had the chance to see him speak, make sure to catch one
of his talks. Also, despite his disturbing fetish for cheesy cam
effects, he really knows his stuff and is a very funny man to boot..."
http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/01/people-of-html5-bruce-lawson/

+06: NAVIGATION.

Link Checking For Old Web Sites
By Brian Kelly.
"Web sites rot.  Over time they'll start to break.  Not only will
increasing numbers of links to external resources start to break but
you may also find that the functionality provided within the Web site
may start to break.  This may be a problem if Web sites are still
being used but are no longer maintained. But what should be done?..."
http://ukwebfocus.wordpress.com/2011/01/04/link-checking-for-old-web-sites/

+07: USABILITY.

Myth #29: People are Rational
By Zoltan Gocza.
"People don't make purely rational decisions based on careful analysis
of cost and expected utility, despite what classical economics taught
us. Research findings confirm that our decisions are driven more by
our emotions than logical and conscious thinking. However, our
irrationality is predictable. Good designers, therefore, can learn
about human decision making and go beyond usability to create products
that effectively influence our behavior."
http://uxmyths.com/post/2607991907/myth-29-people-are-rational

The 5 Biggest Interface Screw Ups of 2010
By Adam Kochanowicz.
"1.) Splash Screens... 2.) ' Click here' links... 3.) Unclear dialogue
Boxes... 5.) Fanciness Over Usefulness... 5.) Bad Button Placement..."
http://uxmovement.com/resources/the-5-biggest-interface-screw-ups-of-2010

10 Best Intranets of 2011
By Jakob Nielsen.
"Knowledge management progressed from cliche to reality, based on
simpler and thus more-used features. Mobile intranets doubled."
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/intranet_design.html

[Section one ends.]

++ SECTION TWO:

+08: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

Accessibility Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/accessibility.html

Association Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/associations.html

Book Listings.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/books.html

Cascading Style Sheets Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/css.html

Color Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/color.html

Dreamweaver Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/dreamweaver.html

Evaluation & Testing Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/testing.html

Event Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/events.html

Flash Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/flash.html

Information Architecture Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/architecture.html

JavaScript Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/javascript.html

Miscellaneous Web Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/misc.html

Navigation Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/navigation.html

PHP Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/php.html

Sites & Blogs Listing.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/sites.html

Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/standards.html

Tool Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/tools.html

Typography Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/type.html

Usability Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/usability.html

XML Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/xml.html

[Section two ends.]

++END NOTES.

+ SUBSCRIPTION INFO.

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+ TEXT EMAIL NEWSLETTER (TEN).

As a navigation aid for screen readers we do our best to conform to
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+ SIGN OFF.

Until next time,

Laura L. Carlson
Information Technology Systems and Services
University of Minnesota Duluth
Duluth, MN U.S.A. 55812-3009
mailto:lcarlson at d.umn.edu

[Issue ends.]