In Firefox, hover over the link you want to access, right-click your mouse to get a menu and click on “Open Link in New Tab” or “Open Link in New Window”.

In Internet Explorer, hover over the link you want to access, right-click your mouse to get a menu and click on “Open in New Tab” or “Open in New Window”.

I found other compelling reasons to avoid this habit on Accessify Forum. Kyle J. Lamson wrote“…Forcing new windows can confuse people when it opens behind the window and they do not realize it and it is really iritating when we are reading and it blocks our view.” He also mentions that some browsers or applications do not support multiple windows. He continues by adding “If I want to return to your site, I will… either back button or because usually I open links in new tabs. But if I am just using your site as a jump off point to somewhere else… then i do not wish to remain at your site and you should not force me to.”

I agree with Kyle, it’s all about giving choices and not forcing anything on the user.

So use the back button or get to know your browser. Simple and efficient shortcuts will help make your web browsing experience a better one.

Governments and now Educational Institutions, mainly Universities are taking the matter into their hands.

Blogs like www.prettysimple.co.uk/blog and contests like at www.accessibilityinfocus.co.uk encourage and pursue the issue in terms of content, design and context. I even came across a guild for accessible web designers. It is hopeful to see that web professionals consider web standards as an important facet of the web experience.

Here are the basics to remember:

• Make your menus into unordered lists,
• Place the list inside a div,
• Have an H2 header with menu title (hide it if not need to be visible),
• The ul has no left indentation (for browser compatibility),
• Use display:inline for horizontal lists,
• Breadcrumbs use nested lists,
• Be diligent.

To read more about lists: CSS Design: Taming Lists

For a preliminary review, select a page that is representative of the whole site or that most people will see. Try to choose a page that has tabular data, images and scripts. And then:

• Examine this page for alternative text,
• Divs instead of tables for page layout,
• Use the keyboard instead of the mouse for navigation,
• Test with different font-sizes and screen resolutions.

The Firebug and Web Developer extensions in Firefox will make your life easier in accessing the code and disabling images and even resizing your browser size. It might be a good idea to try a screen reader, and not to mention an Web accessibility evaluation tool like AChecker. These will enhance your understanding of the sites limitations and successes.

Another important part of evaluating a site is to get people with disabilities involved in the process. Some may have insights that other users will not.

For a complete procedure of website evaluation you have to go to the W3C – Web Accessibility Initiative page.

Although a little outdated, the WAI also provides a comprehensive checklist of accessibility guidelines (WCAG 1.0) and an useful template for the final accessibility report. They really thought of everything!

Ok, nobody likes having numbers thrown at them, but I hope that at least it impresses on you how important it is to consider people with impairments or disabilities as active members of our society and as such they should to be able to access with ease all the information everyone else can access.

You can have a look at the complete survey at the Statistics Canada website.

As a developer it is important to have a feel for what the user is getting out of your site. I found a good way to use a screen reader on any operating system (OS) without paying a dime. I am using Fire Vox. It utilizes the integrated screen reader application of any OS (Windows, MAC and Linux) and functions on your Firefox as an add-on. I tested it on a Windows XP and it worked pretty well. I got some choppiness in the sound but this is probably due to my old hardware. The only downfall for me is that I cannot easily turn it off. I would have liked to have this feature in the Fire Voxes options, but instead I have to go to the add-ons extensions list and completely disable it. Oh well, I’ll live

Let me illustrate exactly how web accessibility will improve the user experience:

• Elderly people might have a deteriorating eyesight and will need to make the text bigger. So avoid having fixed font size.
• Low literacy or little fluency in a language can ultimately alienate the user if the there’s too many words or if the text is too complex. Obviously you have to consider your target audience, but this is still worth considering as low literacy can be improved over time.
• Believe it or not, some users still have dial-up and low bandwidth is still a norm in most developing countries so it only makes sense to minimize your site’s size by separating content and layout, provide alternatives to images or non-textual content (some users might want to turn off the images) and make sure that if your CSS is turned off that your content is still ordered in a logical way.
• Having a consistent structure and a clear navigation throughout your site will make it easier for anyone, including first timers, to find their way around your site.  A good way to improve usability is to have a site plan, especially for larger sites.

So you see that web accessibility is for a lot of different people. Including them will certainly not hurt.

• People with visual impairments might use a screen reader. This is a software that will read out loud the text of the web page. They might also use a text browser and need to make the text bigger. Just think about the elderly that have weaker eyesight.
• People that have hearing impairments won’t be able to hear music or audio.  Captions or transcripts are the only ways to not alienate them.
• People with physical disabilities like reduced motor skills use assistive technologies to help them navigate through the site.
• We also need to keep in mind people with cognitive disabilities. They’ll need simple language and consistency throughout the website. This is also valid for first time web users.

There’s lots more to consider, for more read: W3C’s document on how people with disabilities use the web.

A special notice should be given to W3Québec. An organization dedicated to promote web accessibility across Québec. Another organization is Accéssibilité Web that have done substantial studies on the matter and have translated WCAG 2.0 in French.

Unlike the US, the Canadian government has yet to make an official law like Section 508. There’s still a ways to get people on board.

If you want to read more on this, check out: http://www.webaccessibility.biz/canada.htm