Better Connected 2006
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Published today, it's an in-depth review of all of the UK's local authority websites. Biggest disappointment was that only 3 of the 450+ sites reviewed achieved AA conformance, despite it being a requirement for english authorities under the ODPM's targets.
Some interesting comments from SOCITM, who suggest on the Guardian site that "You would have to be a fantastic optimist to think that even 5% will get near 'AA'", and that AA may be too high a standard. Isn't that a self-fulfilling prophecy?
Coverage at:
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Dan Champion, Champion IS, Mooch Marketing, Revish
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of course, unless they publicly say how they assess conformance, they may find themselves between the devil and the deep blue sea. Granted, RNIB have experience in the field, but so far as I'm aware, there aren't any public documents indicating "we will consider you pass checkpoint x.y IF" and "we will consider you fail checkpoint x.y IF"... for example, the EU/Cabinet Office/RNIB report out last november suggests all fixed width sites would fail AA. Not everyone agrees with this view. Have the RNIB taken this stance here?
No one said AA conformance was going to be easy. In fact, some of us have said more or less the opposite. But nor is achieving sexual equality; nor is elimintating discrimination on the basis of race or ethnic group. But I don't hear anyone arguing we should maybe allow "a little bit of discrimination because it's hard to get rid of".
However, rather than everyone blame the government, bear in mind a) this is what the EU recommend; and b) if people wrongly tell the government their sites are accessible, it's a bit late to turn round and complain if they get found out... there is no longer any excuse in the public sector for sites to be inaccessible to users with disabilities.
As that sportswear company would say... Just do it.
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Jack Pickard The Pickards Information Services| Blog | Twit
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| JackP wrote: |
| Have the RNIB taken this stance here? |
Obviously they didn't do a full audit on every site. A mixture of automated testing, user testing and manual technical testing was used.
Looking through the criteria that were used it's at best a finger-in-the-air indicator, and rather than claiming that the sites reached a particular level of WCAG conformance it would have been more valid to say they didn't fail the tests carried out as part of the report.
| Quote: |
| there is no longer any excuse in the public sector for sites to be inaccessible to users with disabilities. |
Indeed, or in any other sector for that matter.
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Dan Champion, Champion IS, Mooch Marketing, Revish
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| JackP wrote: |
| Have the RNIB taken this stance here? |
No, we didn't fail sites for having fixed width.
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pix
http://www.pixeldiva.co.uk
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Another point to remember is that the ODPM edict for local authorities to make their sites accessible is only due on 31st March. So to conduct this research back in November was always going to produce weaker results than the same research would do in about five weeks time.
As Socitm say in their report however, the situation isn't going to change on a national level any time soon.
I daresay there are at least a few local authorities who are still working on updating their sites, and will only go live at the end of March. At least this target means that accessibility is now on the radar for local government, and I think there'll be many who'll start to look more seriously at it over the coming months.
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| pixeldiva wrote: | ||
|
Thanks. Hope you didn't take this as a criticism of yourselves - it more sprung out of Dan's call for transparency in testing method, as unfortunately we all know there's more than one way to interpret a guideline:
| WCAG 10.1 wrote: |
| Until user agents allow users to turn off spawned windows, do not cause pop-ups or other windows to appear and do not change the current window without informing the user. |
Now, I take this to mean "if you want a new window, a pop-up, or to change the current page, you must warn the user first".
Others have taken it to mean "do not under any circumstances cause pop-ups or new windows to appear, and as a separate issue, do not change the current window without informing the user"
That's the kind of thing I was driving at. If it is stated exactly how each checkpoint has been interpreted then theoretically anyone else carrying out the same checks would get the same results.... almost as if you were using Bobby (grin).
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Jack Pickard The Pickards Information Services| Blog | Twit
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I must admit I have some sympathy here. It would appear that the best way to achieve a high rating in these things is to do the work properly (obviously I know), but also to offer as little as possible online. The less is online, the less can go wrong.
Also the way that some of these projects are set out makes life difficult at the sharp end. From experience of a nameless local authority and wondering whether their situtation is the norm, is it usual to have more managers on a web project than people having to write the project?
Sorry a little off topic.
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Red Ant
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| JackP wrote: |
| Thanks. Hope you didn't take this as a criticism of yourselves - it more sprung out of Dan's call for transparency in testing method |
No, not at all - and I totally support transparency of testing methods (as do my colleagues), if I was short in my reply it was because I wanted to get an answer to you and I was wracking my brains because I was sure the methodology had been published and I couldn't remember where or how much detail it went into (I've been off with the flu for almost the whole of last month and it hit me so hard I haven't quite got back up to speed with the rest of the world yet).
| JackP wrote: |
| as unfortunately we all know there's more than one way to interpret a guideline: |
Yup. Which can be both a good and a bad thing, depending on the situation.
| JackP wrote: |
| Now, I take this to mean "if you want a new window, a pop-up, or to change the current page, you must warn the user first".
Others have taken it to mean "do not under any circumstances cause pop-ups or new windows to appear, and as a separate issue, do not change the current window without informing the user" |
If it helps, we take the same view as you.
| JackP wrote: |
| That's the kind of thing I was driving at. If it is stated exactly how each checkpoint has been interpreted then theoretically anyone else carrying out the same checks would get the same results.... almost as if you were using Bobby (grin). |
Heh. You said the B word. [/beavis]
Seriously though, information about the methodology we used on BC2006 for testing to Level A is published as Appendix 10 of the report. Don't know if it goes into the kind of detail you're looking for, but it might be a start.
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pix
http://www.pixeldiva.co.uk
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(First post; please be gentle!)
I'm the lead developer for www.woking.gov.uk, one of the Councils who didn't make Level AA in this year's report. We sincerely hoped we would, so we're actively seeking to address any problems that the report found.
| pixeldiva wrote: |
| Seriously though, information about the methodology we used on BC2006 for testing to Level A is published as Appendix 10 of the report. |
Thanks for helping to clarify the situation here. I note you say "Level A" -- is there likely to be anywhere we could discover the methodology used to assess against Level AA? Unless we've really fouled up and haven't even met Level A, it's this that would help us most.
Incidentally, I've written up some thoughts regarding this for anyone who may be interested.
Cheers,
Andrew.
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Andrew Green
Article Seven / Buy Our Honeymoon / Elements or Lower
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Hi Andrew and welcome, nice to see another council web bod here.
| Quote: |
| Unless we've really fouled up and haven't even met Level A, it's this that would help us most. |
The report does show Woking as achieving Level A, so you haven't really fouled up.
Dan
PS: You might want to check your personal site in Firefox, since this is all I see:
| Code: |
| XML Parsing Error: mismatched tag. Expected: </ul>.
Location: http://www.lowerelement.com/ Line Number 81, Column 9: </div> --------^ |
Someone here who understands this stuff better than me will probably be able to tell you why...
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Dan Champion, Champion IS, Mooch Marketing, Revish
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Thanks, Dan, for the welcome, the confirmation, and the catch regarding my personal site. I've fixed the latter now!
Cheers,
Andrew.
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Andrew Green
Article Seven / Buy Our Honeymoon / Elements or Lower
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You're right in saying accessibility isn't all-or-nothing. However, achieving a particular conformance level is all or nothing. You do or you don't. As you rightly point out, you can gain accessibility benefits from individual actions (and actions not necessarily covered by the guidelines). But conformance levels are a standard to measure up to, and "nearly" achieving the standard is like "nearly" passing your driving test...
to quote your french teacher
| article7's french teacher wrote: |
| I have a word for nearly right, and it’s this: “wrong”. |
But don't be disheartened. Keep plugging away. AA is not a myth, but it's not easy either. You're on the right lines and you're obviously wanting to get there. And that is half the battle.
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Jack Pickard The Pickards Information Services| Blog | Twit
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| JackP wrote: |
| However, achieving a particular conformance level is all or nothing. |
I don't disagree with you here in the least. I probably wasn't entirely clear that I don't doubt for one minute that we're not (yet) at Level AA -- I merely felt that the outcome of the report doesn't invalidate the work already done by us and (one hopes) a fair number of other Councils in trying to get there.
I'm not sure I 100% agree with your driving test analogy, though. If you fail your driving test, you still can't drive without an L-plate and an instructor. For what it's worth, I see this as being more like failing a Swimming Challenge at school -- you don't get the certificate, but you're likely a better swimmer, and you're very much allowed in the water.
OK, maybe analogies aren't my forte.
Anyway, my main point is that to move on from here, it would be incredibly useful to be able to find out exactly where we've gone wrong.
Cheers,
Andrew.
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Andrew Green
Article Seven / Buy Our Honeymoon / Elements or Lower
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Just had a look at the first in the list of SOCITM's top twenty web sites which happened to be Brent and found the following:
- Search facility doesn't work without javascript.
- default text size of some of the links rather small.
- Tables used for layout.
- Lists not marked up as lists.
- Innapproriate and missing alt text.
- No doctype.
That was just from a brief look.
Now if it was all about A or AA levels then how did that end up in the top twenty?
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Phil Smears.
Accessibility, Usability & Compliance.
http://www.sdesign1.com
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| philsmears wrote: |
| Now if it was all about A or AA levels then how did that end up in the top twenty? |
Because it's not ALL about A or AA levels.
The Better Connected survey consists of many parts covering many areas, of which accessibility is just one.
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pix
http://www.pixeldiva.co.uk
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