Posts in category: Web Standards
The Web Standards Project was introduced in 1998, when a bunch of great developers tried to promote Web standards and make the Web accessible for all people around the globe. This effort is being supported by some very important software companies such as Adobe, Mozilla, Microsoft and many more.
The International Liaison Group is one of the children of the group. All the people who participate in it we try, among other things, to find and translate useful articles around Web standards. We have done a lot of things lately, we are about to do a lot more but we need your help.
The previous week one of the two leaders of ILG, Henny Swan, published a new blog entry at the official website where we ask for some translators or anyone who is eager to find some decent articles.
Regarding the greek readers of this website I can tell you that right now we have 3 articles in greek. Two of them were written by me and there is one more written by Henny for CSS3, the greek online magazine around design & development.
So if you’d like to participate in this, you can take a look at the links I gave you above and contact the ILG or me to help you. It would be great if you also wanted to promote Web standards. We are waiting for you!
Let’s see what is what: W3C is the association of people and companies who are responsible for the evolution of the Web. W3C’s CSS Working Group is another team of people who take care of CSS and determine the new editions of the platform. This group consists of W3C developers and huge companies such as Adobe, Mozilla, Opera, Apple, IBM, Microsoft, Google. There ‘s no question about the importance of the group.
What really happens in there? Since yesterday there were no designers participating in the group. It sounds ridiculously dump. We are talking about people who implement what the group determines. An equivalent would be a car company which doesn’t give cars to drivers in order to test the new models.
The second thing is such companies can’t get organized easily and work together towards a common target. We are currently using CSS 2.0 and the question is when are going to move to level 2.1? Apparently, not soon.
The result of all these frictions is designers who remain still and keep developing websites the typical way whereas evolution is one step away.
The Opera & Microsoft battle
Opera now publishes an antitrust letter against Microsoft. The letter affords the whole Web community and in there Opera accuses Microsoft for harming Web standards and the whole industry by not focusing on what the group tries to implement and by keeping Internet Explorer a part of Windows. You don’t have to be an expert to see that this letter is a bomb which is going to spoil the whole effort.
Obviously, Opera is theoretically correct. All versions of Internet Explorer, except for the latest one, are far from good. This won’t make Opera create better products and the already slow moving CSS Working Group will stop for good. Furthermore, it is unfair in my eyes. How will Microsoft take it? Will Microsoft guys hug the Opera ones for their tenderness? I don’t think so. I only wish Microsoft ignores Opera.
For all the people who use CSS in their everyday routine this battle is one more car crash which leaves us behind. We do only need the CSS 2.1 specification but also the CSS 3.0, the way Jina Bolton described it in an extraordinary presentation (.pdf file - 7.9MB).
Now what?
Andy Clarke an invited expert in CSS Working Group went further and requested the disbandment of the whole group. He also talked about a new group consisted not by browser vendors but by people who care about the evolution of CSS because this is central to the success of their profession. It is difficult to say if this is going to work really.
How easy is to say “OK, I am going to disband this group and create a new one” when the current participants are the Web? How easy is to leave e.g. Google people out now and ask them later to support the new standards you made without them? It is important to understand that we don’t only need such companies but we also want them in because they are good.
As designers and developers we do need a helping hand in both the areas of creativity (call me CSS, XHTML etc.) and browser’s support. The current form of CSS Working Group needs an overhaul. It sounds rational enough to me to think of a new, smaller and much more flexible team consisting of designers, developers and browser vendors. I am afraid that what is rational is at the same time the most complicated thing in the world.
It is not very difficult to realize how many people can’t access the Web the way we do. It only takes a look around. It is selfish to believe, even without saying so, that these people need the Web less than we, healthy people, do.
Handicapped people have to overcome some terrible difficulties in their every day life e.g. cross the city on a wheelchair. In most cases a better life for these people means that the state needs to do certain things e.g. provide them such a wheelchair. Beaurocracy, time and money bump procedures.
When it comes to the Web things are less complicated because a website is made by experts and for experts is certainly easier to work with best practices. It may be not simple but it is certainly easier than buying wheelchairs for handicapped people.
People who have accessibility problems are a few, no?
Not exactly. The list below shows groups of people who can’t access the Web the way we do. It also shows how they access it. No, they are not a few.
- Blind users
Web users who have no sight at all may utilize a screen reader, which reads the content of the web page, or rather the HTML, back to them. This software, which sits between the user and the browser, sifts through the HTML markup and the technology deciphers what needs to be read aloud and what should be ignored.
- Partial or poor sight
People who wear glasses might land in this category. To take full advantage of the Internet, users with partial or poor sight need to be able to enlarge the text on web pages.
- Color blind users
It is estimated that one in 12 men and one in 200 women have some form of color blindness. Enough contrast is one of the various ways to help them view a page without difficulties.
- Deaf users
Deaf users are able to access the Internet in much the same way as non-deaf people with one key exception — audio content. If it’s a key function of your website for people to be able to hear a message, then be sure to provide written transcripts at the very least.
- Keyboard users
Some of your site users don’t have access to a mouse when browsing the Internet. Try putting yourself in their position by navigating your website using only tab, shift-tab, and the return keys.
The list goes on but I won’t go further.
How we can help
So what does it take to help such people? How Wed designers, developers, webmasters etc. can be involved? We can do several things actually:
- Understand handicapped people. Put ourselves into their shoes for a moment and try to act like they have to.
- Learn about WAI. WAI is a part of W3C which works around accessibility. It is a great movement for a great cause. We need to support the group. The less we can do is to apply the guidelines provided by it.
- Learn about WaSP, Web Standards and the use of standards. WaSP is a group of Web experts, works for standards and evangelize them in order to help all people around the globe to have access to an equitable Web. You can read even in this website about Web standards.
- Become better by taking accessibility into account. Write accessible code. It takes study and time but it is rewarding. It is equally important to realize that using better practices isn’t a matter of trend but a real need.
- Talk about accessibility. We blog, we write in forums, we chat. Why not for accessibility too? We should also help our customers learn about it and explain them why is important for them to provide their customers great services.
- Be helped by the government or private sectors, depending on for whom we work. It was great to see a while ago a lawsuit over web site accessibility for the blind which became class action. I hope this is a clear message for all people who avoid work towards accessibility
What else does it take?
Accessibility goes beyond technical actions. It is strongly attached to semantics as well. A website might pass validation tests. This doesn’t make it fully understandable though. Web semantics talk about writing code a way which conveys meaning to people who can’t read the words at a web page.
Let’s see an example: a list of fruits might be written in HTML as a paragraph. Each fruit is separated from the previous and the next one by a line break. The same list could be supported by the relevant list tags in order to let a blind user understand what is about. Obviously, the latter is the proper one.
So it is important not only to look accessible but to feel too. Using semantics is great help for blind people and developers. A great article around Web semantics, Semantics — Why Bother?, is a good place to start from, in case you haven’t heard the term before.
Can all websites be accessible?
Yes, but it is not always simple. There are certain levels of accessibility. Each level includes a list of criteria which must be fulfilled in order to be a website accessible. The first level is simpler than the second and the third one. On the other hand each level affords users with different disabilities.
Every website can be accessible but not all websites are the same. The larger the site the more difficult to sustain it clean. The more people they contribute to it the easier to destroy accessibility. But don’t forget that a popular site attracts more people, among them handicapped too.
OK, I own a website which sells products or provides services. Why should I pay more to have it accessible?
The cynical view: business is business. Everyone who sells needs to increase his potential buyers. If you keep your website accessible, more they will see it, so you increase the possibility to sell you stuff.
The humanistic view: It all has to do with ourselves. We need to offer people the same opportunities to do things. I certainly can’t write a manifesto about the good and the bad things in life and I am pretty sure that nobody would read it. In such cases I call to my mind the, not so rare, scenario of being myself someone who can’t see. You can do it too from time to time. The more we do it the better for all of us.
Focus on the important aspects
Web designers often think: “My website passes all validation tests. So I did the best for my visitors. Right?”.
I agree, but why you don’t take one more step? Take the most of accessibility by making it an everyday practice. Think of it before the beginning of a new website. Change the way you approach your work, the Web and your clients.
It is better to focus on what is really important, not on a validation error. Important aspects could be:
- Can someone read your content when your CSS is disabled?
- When your JavaScript is disabled?
- Does your Flash website come with a second one built in plain HTML for handicapped users?
And the list goes on.
Welcome to the accessibility world.
Before I go off there is a thing needs to be clarified. Accessible websites don’t mean ugly, dull, un-sexy websites. Web standards are here to help us keep our well crafted websites accessible.
There is a myth around this issue which springs from designers who don’t take the time or don’t have the guts to evolve. Do not miss an outstanding message from A. Rutledge around this myth: Web Misunderstandards.
What is already said could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship… or a boring theory about helping hands in the Web. It is up to us to make it accessible too.
[The list of groups of handicapped people was borrowed from: A List Apart - What Is Web Accessibility?]
Allright, you might never wanted to know or were afraid to ask, but microformats are here to change the way we provide and acquire information so I decided to write a few things about them.
What are microformats?
According to the official announcement…
Designed for humans first and machines second, microformats are a set of simple, open data formats built upon existing and widely adopted standards.
It doesn’t make sense. Can you clarify it?
OK. Microformats are simple semantic code which can be used in a website in order to provide or acquire information about personal data (name, email, address etc), events, reviews etc.
Yes, but can’t I provide such information anyway? Why microformats are useful?
Of course you can. With microformats you let a visitor use the provided information. For example a visitor can store you details in his address book, or find you in a Google map or save the date of an event in his Google Calendar.
How can I use microformats in my webpage?
If you write code, semantically correct code, it is very easy. You just have to use specific classes for specific microformats. The xhtml tags remain untouched, unless you screw them.
If you don’t, you still can use one of the online microformats generators and then copy and paste the output in your page.
Can this information be shown the way I want?
Yeap. You just have to edit a bit your CSS file and add some style to the classes I mentioned above. It’s really easy.
So you think everything is so easy. Don’t you hide me something?
Not at all. The only thing you need is to spare some time to get used to the idea and to be able to respect Web semantics.
I need some examples.
First things first. You can download my vCard and save me among your contacts.
In order to see how far this thing goes you need to download one or two Firefox extensions. These extensions will inform you if a website provides microformats data and how you can use it.
Are you sure microformats are important?
I will tell you three words: Google, Technorati, Flickr. Do I need to say more?
Allright, I am convinced. Now I need some links to start doing things. Where should I go?
You can start from the official microformats page. Don’t forget to take a look at the excellent (and overwhelming) article of Smashing Magazine about microformats.
A few months ago I talked about my participation in ILG. For you that you didn’t read the post, I remind you that this group consists of Web professionals who aim to promote global use of standards to ensure an equitable Web. ILG is a part of WASP.
ILG works on volunteer basis. By the time I joined the group I was wandering whether we could manage to achieve something - anything at all. As a natural born Greek I remained sceptic about the result of this effort. It looked to me we couldn’t be easily organized while we live so far away from each other.
Of course we haven’t reached our destination. However things in ILG go great. I can’t announce anything yet, but I can talk about how smoothly we communicate, work together, bring ideas and carry out things. The group leaders, Glenda Sims and Steph Troeth are also great. They work hard, they know how far we can go and most of all they are openhearted, polite and mature.
Someone could argue that since we are all volunteers everything is easier. I partly agree. It is easier to leave the group, avoid responsibilities and exploit the success. Exactly the same reasons make it difficult. Anyone who has been a part of a team would say so as well.
In the end, the volunteer character of a project makes no difference. Who cares if the pace is a bit slower? Who cares if the target is a bit lower? Sooner or later any participant will reveal his personality and the real reasons behind his actions.
I personally believe in the group and I am pretty sure we will succeed. If we make it, everyone will benefit. I hope during the following months we will come out with everything that Glenda and Steph have designed. So please stay tuned.
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