What We Have Learned

Designing to a W3C standard and validating the coding allows all devices accessing the website to effectively display the information on the page. This removes any guesswork the computing device, accessing the website, must make when incorrect coding is used. This benefits people using:

HTML provides descriptive tags that give form and structure to the web page. There are six different tags that define headings (h1 - h6). There are tags that define lists (ordered, unordered and definition lists), and there is a tag that defines paragraphs (p). There are also general tags (div and span) that can be made to look like the more descriptive tags listed above. We choose to use descriptive tags whenever possible because all devices accessing the website need to know what text is a heading, what text is in a list and what text is a paragraph if they are to convey the information accurately to their audience. Proper web page structure allows the technology being used to "decide" the best way to accurately present text in a heading.

Proper page form and structure is needed for all devices that must interpret the coding and change the format in order to display the content to their users.

Display information in all graphic images using "Alt tags" - HTML Alternative Text Tag Attribute.

Graphics are pictures that display on the screen. Many devices cannot determine the content of a picture. We use the ALT attribute in every image tag to describe, using text, all the information contained in that image.

The ALT attribute in the image tag lets devices that cannot display graphics know that this image displays the information as described in the tag. For example,

The Centre for Inclusive Education logo displays at the top of every page with the following code:

<img src="images/IElogo90.gif" alt="The Centre for Inclusive Education" width="169" height="180" />.

Information is best displayed with form and structure

We also had to decide how to most effectively display the information on our website. We decided that large blocks of information are best displayed using HTML tags because the tags give the information form and structure. This lets the technology determine the most effective way to present the information to its audience. The Alt attribute can be used to provide the information in a graphic but the information provided this way is bland because the information in headings, lists and paragraphs all have the same emphasis. The Alt tag has no way to make certain pieces of information stand out. HTML coding is much better at giving structure to information, and as a result we use HTML to format large blocks of text.

Hand-held devices do not effectively display large (width and height) graphics.

To display a large graphic on a hand-held device the graphic is resized until the graphic can be completely displayed on the screen available. Small text and other information provided in a graphic that is 750 pixels wide is not displayed effectively on a hand-held device that must shrink the size of the graphic down to display it on its screen. We limit the width and height of the graphics on this website to no more than 250 pixels, whenever possible, to enable hand-held devices to present the information effectively.

Hand-held devices have a small display screen where they display the information published on a website. The display screen may be as small as 4 or 5 cm square. These devices display information from a website in the sequence in which it appears in the page source code; as users view each page on the website, they would have to scroll down through the navigational links before they could get to the main content on the page. This problem is even greater for people using screen readers or Braille terminals because they would have to listen to, or read all of the navigational links before they could get to the main content on the page.

We decided to offer people a way to avoid the navigation when they first access a page. We provide a link at the start of the navigation menu (the link appears only to people using aural, Braille or hand-held devices) to allow people to jump to the main content of the page. A second link is provided at the bottom of the page, allowing individuals to link back to the navigation menu if desired.

Through this small modification, people with hand-held devices and people using assistive technology can access the information on our website in a similar manner as people using a standard full sized computer screen. This small modification makes our website much more accessible.

Many people have difficulty reading text that is too small for them to comfortably see. We decided to let people modify the size of the text on our web pages by setting the text sizes with values that can be adjusted by changing the settings in the visitor's browser. The size of all the text on our website can be modified by going to View - Text Size and modifying the size as required. This option is available in Internet Explorer, Netscape and Firefox. Other browsers have similar text formatting options.

Sometimes, people with limited fine motor co-ordination have difficulty clicking on small links. We decided to make all our links out of text (or provide textual equivalent areas for all links) and allow people to change the size of the text in the links. This enables our visitors to increase the size of the clickable area of all our links and more easily navigate our website.