Accessibility

Web accessibility is (based upon what i read) a very important part of the internet. Its implementation as far as disabled accessibility is as it has always been important and necessary if you are creating a very public site. However in practice it seems that not all sites are accessible for screen readers. According to a few websites about accessibility the aspects that need to be paid attention to the most is alt tags and keeping content presentation and actions separate so that screen readers can access the sites content. The alt tag can be very important since there are so many images on websites. One site suggested that the best practice for alt tags is to not describe the image but instead to narrate the intent of the image. Is the image being used for a link or is it simply a design aspect. But yet another site recommends that since links are identified by screen readers as links there is no point is describing the image as a link but rather to say where the link takes you to. Another point was with the use of display: none or visibility: hidden tags. One site suggested they should be used only when they helped to convey information only apparent to sited users. Not to provide additional accessibility or content that sited users would miss out on. After reading more on the subjects and more subjects such as font size and using ems instead of pixels to size fonts and pages it is painfully clear that it is not clear. There are many arguments as to what is best practice. But depending on what side you choose accessibility is important for an equally important reason of improving how your site functions on devices other than computer screens; such as cell phones or PDA's. These devices often have text only based browsers and if you design your site to be easily accessible for screen readers they will be easier to navigate with cell phones or PDA's. As far as resources for keeping your sites compliant there are various software based programs that will navigate your site and provide information. And there are a lot of really good websites that provide tips, ideas, and the latest information on accessibility. I personally feel that the more people have access to your sites the better the site will work. Keeping readable fonts that have good contrast are scalable and easy to understand is not only good for accessibility it will often make good design sense.