Web Design Update: December 2, 2025

[Laura Carlson]

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 26, Issue 23, December 3, 2025.

An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development.

++ISSUE 23 CONTENTS.

SECTION ONE: New references.
What's new at the Web Design Reference site?
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/
New links in these categories:

01: ACCESSIBILITY.
02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.
03: DRUPAL.
04: EVALUATION & TESTING.
05: EVENTS.
06: HTML.
07: JAVASCRIPT.
08: MISCELLANEOUS.
09: NAVIGATION.
10: TYPOGRAPHY.
11: USABILITY.
12: WEBWASTE & SUSTAINABILITY.

SECTION TWO:
13: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

[Contents ends.]


++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

Animation and Carousels
By WebAIM.
"Animated elements excel at capturing and directing user attention. They also excel at distracting and frustrating users when used incorrectly…carousels are complex and can introduce significant accessibility barriers. We discourage the use of carousels…"
https://webaim.org/techniques/carousels/

AI for Good Accessibility
By Alastair Campbell.
"This is a post for the presentation I gave at Virta11y 2025. I'm not a fan of just posting slides, there isn't enough commentary and it's harder to make accessible. So this is slides and commentary, with a supplimentary video at the top…"
https://alastairc.uk/presentations/ai-for-good-accessibility/

Crystal Preston Watson - Fireside Chat (Video)
By Steve Faulkner.
Steve and Crystal Preston-Watson discuss the critical intersection of digital accessibility and AI, covering the limitations and ethical concerns of AI in the field, while also touching upon Crystal's personal creative pursuits, such as her tech-themed improv show and her upcoming accessibility conference, CrystalCon.
https://youtu.be/ktV1cT_JAqA?si=1UeXqjjBbONQc9zh&t=1251

An Accessible Pagination Pattern (Or Two)
By Martin Underhill.
"…At its simplest, pagination requires that the user: Has a mechanism to navigate from page to page
Understands their current position within the pages…"
https://www.tempertemper.net/blog/an-accessible-pagination-pattern-or-two

Accessibility and Usability: Inline Field Validation vs. Constantly Active Submit Button
By Sheri Byrne-Haber.
"User researchers have exhaustively explored the pros and cons of having the submit button active throughout form entry versus validating each field before allowing the user to proceed, and only exposing the submit button when there is a valid value in every mandatory field…"
https://buttondown.com/access-ability/archive/accessibility-and-usability-inline-field/

Ads and Accessibility Mismatch
By Erik Gustafsson Spagnoli.
"Ads online today are not built with accessibility in mind. I've asked if there are good ad-platforms out there and the answer is a silent tumbleweed rolling slowly across the dessert. Why is it like this? Time for advertisement platforms to step up…"
https://axesslab.com/ads-and-accessibility-mismatch/

The Idiot Sandwich - On Embedding Alt Text
By Terence Eden.
"Alt text is great. It allows people who can't see an image to understand what that image represents…"
https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/11/the-idiot-sandwich-on-embedding-alt-text/

Can You Make Toast Messages Accessible?
By Adam Silver.
"I will answer this question, but it's best explained by telling you about the post I wrote on LinkedIn last week…"
https://adamsilver.io/blog/can-you-make-toast-messages-accessible/

5 Reasons Why WCAG AA Compliance Does Not Mean Your Website Is Accessible
By Craig Abbott.
"There's a common misconception, that if you meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, to level AA, then your website is accessible…"
https://www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2025/5-reasons-why-wcag-aa-compliance-does-not-mean-your-website-is-accessible/

The Accessibility Problem With Authentication Methods Like CAPTCHA
By Eleanor Hecks.
"CAPTCHAs were meant to keep bots out, but too often, they lock people with disabilities out, too…"
https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2025/11/accessibility-problem-authentication-methods-captcha/

Testing Methods: Location
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.4.8 Location is a Level AAA conformance level Success Criterion. It represents the highest standard of accessibility, ensuring that every user can orient themselves within a website or application through clear navigational context…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-location/

Testing Methods: Link Purpose (Link Only)
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.4.9 Link Purpose (Link Only) is a Level AAA conformance level Success Criterion. It challenges us to go beyond compliance and design for true understanding. Every link should communicate its purpose through its text alone, without relying on surrounding context or visual cues…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-link-purpose-link-only/

Testing Methods: Section Headings
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.4.10 Section Headings is a Level AAA conformance level Success Criterion. Content must be organized with descriptive section headings that clearly communicate structure, relationships, and hierarchy…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-section-headings/

Testing Methods: Focus Not Obscured (Minimum)
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.4.11 Focus Not Obscured (Minimum) is a Level AA conformance level Success Criterion. It ensures one simple yet critical truth: users must always be able to see where they are on the screen…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-focus-not-obscured-minimum/

Testing Methods: Focus Not Obscured (Enhanced)
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.4.12 Focus Not Obscured (Enhanced) is a Level AAA conformance level Success Criterion. It ensures that when an element receives keyboard focus, it remains entirely visible within the viewport, not partially hidden, not tucked behind a sticky header, and not buried beneath an overlay or modal…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-focus-not-obscured-enhanced/

Testing Methods: Focus Appearance
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.4.13 Focus Appearance is a Level AAA conformance level Success Criterion. It ensures that users can clearly perceive which element currently holds keyboard focus. While seemingly straightforward, this requirement addresses a critical aspect of user experience: visibility and clarity of interactive elements…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-focus-appearance/

Testing Methods: Pointer Gestures
By Dennis Deacon.
"WCAG 2.5.1 Pointer Gestures is a Level A conformance level Success Criterion. It ensures that all users, regardless of dexterity, motor ability, or input method, can fully engage with a website or application…"
https://www.dennisdeacon.com/web/accessibility/testing-methods-pointer-gestures/

WCAG2.1 Addition - Success Criterion 1.4.10: Reflow (Level AA)
By Gian Wild.
"The purpose of this standard is to ensure that content remains readable and accessible on mobile devices. In simpler terms, it is about making sure your website is responsive…"
https://www.accessibilityoz.com/2025/11/wcag2-1-addition-success-criterion-1-4-10-reflow-level-aa/

WCAG2.1 Addition - Success Criterion 1.3.5: Identify Input Purpose (Level AA)
By Gian Wild.
"The purpose of each input field is to clearly define its intended function. Collecting user information can be automated when the input field's label correctly identifies it, allowing the computer to input previously agreed content…"
https://www.accessibilityoz.com/2025/11/wcag2-1-addition-success-criterion-1-3-5-identify-input-purpose-level-aa/

WCAG2.1 Addition - Success Criterion 1.3.4: Orientation (Level AA)
By Gian Wild.
"Mobile content should be usable in any orientation. In some cases, the mobile device can be affixed, set to a specific orientation and cannot be rotated by the user…"
https://www.accessibilityoz.com/2025/11/wcag2-1-addition-success-criterion-1-3-4-orientation-level-aa/

WCAG2.1 Addition - Success Criterion 2.5.4: Motion Actuation (Level A)
By Gian Wild.
"The goal here is to remove the need for users to manually move their mobile devices. …"
https://www.accessibilityoz.com/2025/11/wcag2-1-addition-success-criterion-2-5-4-motion-actuation-level-a/

WCAG2.1 Addition - Success Criterion 2.5.3: Label in Name (Level A)
By Gian Wild.
"In accessibility, it is important that the accessible name of controls matches their visual label, especially when labels include text or images of text. The accessible name should accurately reflect the information presented visually, as this helps users who rely on assistive technologies…"
https://www.accessibilityoz.com/2025/11/wcag2-1-addition-success-criterion-2-5-3-label-in-name-level-a/

A Better, More Accessible Media Player (Video)
By Equalize Digital.
"In this episode, Amber and Steve interview special guest Joe Dolson about Able Player, a free, open source accessible HTML5 media player project. Learn about the project, how Joe got involved, and general recommendations around implementing accessible media on websites in 2025, and beyond…"
https://youtu.be/fVPNBZXyGH8?si=4Qd4y4WQpTzCAkwN&t=744


+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

A Minimal CSS Starter
By Jens Oliver Meiert.
"…I'm not actually working with a 'CSS starter' in my projects, and I wouldn't call the following the 'Meiert CSS starter,' but here are a few things I do (and don't do) in my web projects…"
https://meiert.com/blog/a-minimal-css-starter/

Direction-Aware Arrow Shape Using Corner-Shape
By Temani Afif.
"We can use the new corner-shape to draw different CSS Shapes. And since it relies on border-radius, we can use the logical properties to create a direction-aware arrow that adjusts based on both the direction and the writing mode…"
https://css-tip.com/arrow/

Top Layer Troubles: Popover vs. Dialog
By Stephanie Eckles.
"Have you ever tried to set z-index: 9999 to solve element layering issues? If so, you've been fighting a fundamental CSS concept of stacking contexts…"
https://htmhell.dev/adventcalendar/2025/1/

Brand New Layouts with CSS Subgrid
By Josh W. Comeau.
"…In this tutorial, I'll show you some of the exciting new things we can do with subgrid. Along the way, you'll learn the basic mechanics of subgrid. We'll even go over the most common gotchas…"
https://www.joshwcomeau.com/css/subgrid/

Cross-Browser Anchor Positioning
By James Stuckey Weber, Miriam Suzanne, and Eric
A. Meyer.
"With the release of Firefox 145, CSS anchor positioning is available in all browsers. It's still behind a flag in Firefox, so it isn't Baseline Newly available quite yet. Join James Stuckey Weber, Miriam Suzanne, and Eric Meyer of Igalia as they talk about the emerging patterns, the rough edges and changes to the spec, and what the future holds for anchor positioning…"
https://www.oddbird.net/2025/11/20/winging-it-26/


+03: COLOR.

Web developers, do you know how limited your automated color contrast tests really are?
By Robert Dodd.
"…Hopefully, what this article has demonstrated is that testing for text contrast can be much more complicated and labour intensive that it may otherwise seem, and that we definitely need our automation tools to help us more than they currently do…"
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/web-developers-do-you-know-how-limited-your-automated-robert-dodd-sxuse/


+04: EVALUATION & TESTING.

How the Right UX Metrics Show Game-Changing Value
By Jared M. Spool.
"There's a story I want to tell you. It's a story that emerged out of my recent work with a UX team. They used this story to excite their executives on how recent UX improvements made a substantial business impact…"
https://articles.centercentre.com/how-the-right-ux-metrics-show-game-changing-value/

Get the Responses You Want: Designing Diary Study Entries
By Celine Santoso.
"Design diary entries that get high-quality responses by balancing closed, open-ended, and multimedia questions."
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/diary-study-entries/


+05: EVENTS.

Virtual Web Accessibility Training
December 9-10, 2025.
Online
https://webaim.org/training/virtual/

Creating Accessible Digital Content and Presentations (Part 2)
December 10, 2025
Online
https://mainecite.org/trainings/creating-accessible-digital-content-and-presentations-part-2-december-10-2025/

Accessibility in Technology Procurement and Use
December 11, 2026.
Online
https://webaim.org/training/procurement/

Ready, Set, Access: Planning to Bridge the Digital Divide
December 17, 2025
Online
https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/ev/reg/jxh5njw

TechAccess Oklahoma 2026
March 2-3, 2026.
Online and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, U.S.A.
https://techaccessok.org/

World Information Architecture Day
March 7, 2026.
Global
https://www.worldiaday.org/


+06: HTML.

A Complete Guide to the HTML Number Input
By Ollie Williams.
"Removing the increment/decrement buttons…Desktop browsers display tiny up and down arrow buttons called spinners (in Chrome you need to hover the input to see them)…"
https://olliewilliams.xyz/blog/guide-to-html-number-input/


+07: JAVASCRIPT.

Accessibility and ARIA (Video)
By Russ Weakley, Andrew Downie, Rafal Charlampowicz, and Sara Soueidan.
"ARIA is a powerful tool for web accessibility, but it is often misunderstood and overused. In this Ask the Professionals session, held on 13 November 2025, industry experts break down exactly when ARIA is necessary and when native HTML is the better choice…"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lPNvoIGhlQ

Creating a More Accessible Web With ARIA Notify
By Aaron Gustafson.
"…The ARIA Notify proposal is clear, concise, and far more likely to get used and - more importantly - used properly…"
https://www.aaron-gustafson.com/notebook/links/creating-a-more-accessible-web-with-aria-notify/

CSS-in-JS: The Great Betrayal of Frontend Sanity
By Alexander T. Williams.
CSS-in-JS promised simplicity but delivered performance issues. Learn why ditching it for native CSS solutions leads to faster, more maintainable web apps…"
https://thenewstack.io/css-in-js-the-great-betrayal-of-frontend-sanity/


+08: MISCELLANEOUS.

The PMs Role in Preventing Digital Ableism
By Homer Gaines.
"Ever hear of a "disappointment room?…"
https://rightbadcode.com/the-pms-role-in-preventing-digital-ableism

Reference Guides
By Chris Ferdinandi.
"Short, focused guides on a bunch of things I've learned or care about…"
https://gomakethings.com/guides/

Group Note Draft: Web User Agents
By World Wide Web Consortium.
"The Technical Architecture Group has published the first draft of a Group Note titled Web User Agents. Web user agents include both web browsers and other intermediaries between end-users and the web. Each user agent serves its user, not any of the other constituencies. A user agent owes its user various duties, which should be established through collective discussions and embodied in the various standards that user agents implement…"
https://www.w3.org/news/2025/group-note-draft-web-user-agents/


+09: NAVIGATION.

Accessibility Info Bites - the Anatomy of an Accessible Link
By Jacinta Gregory.
"Links are the backbone of the web, but are yours truly accessible? Here's how to make sure everyone, including people with disabilities, can navigate your links with ease…"
https://intopia.digital/articles/accessibility-info-bites-the-anatomy-of-an-accessible-link/

Designing Effective Contextual Menus: 10 Guidelines
By Kate Kaplan.
"Contextual menus reduce clutter and interaction cost but have low information scent. Prioritize clarity, consistency, and proximity to balance the tradeoffs."
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/contextual-menus-guidelines


+10: TYPOGRAPHY.

Can You Measure the Impact of Typography?
By Oliver Schöndorfer.
"…it's important to isolate typographic changes - separate from layout or other adjustments. Test them:
* Site-wide
* Limit to typographic changes only (sizes, spacing, weights)
* Alternatively, test font changes (same layout, different fonts) This is a first step…"
https://pimpmytype.com/cro-typography/


+11: USABILITY.

Checkout UX 2025: 10 Pitfalls and Best Practices
By Kathryn Reeves.
"…In this article, we provide 10 ways to improve Checkout UX across desktop sites, mobile sites, and apps…"
https://baymard.com/blog/current-state-of-checkout-ux


+12: WEBWASTE & SUSTAINABILITY.

Font Sustainability and Accessibility Analysis
By Rose Newell.
"I finally put together some research on the relative benefits of:
* Converting TTF to WOFF2
* Subsetting for a given language or chosen Unicode ranges
* Removing unused axes (e.g., optical size or width - not often used in practice) and weights (e.g., anything outside 400 to 700, for similar reasons)…"
https://codewordcreative.com/better-fonts/

[Section one ends.]


++ SECTION TWO:

+13: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

Accessibility Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/accessibility.html

Association Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/associations.html

Book Listings.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/books.html

Cascading Style Sheets Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/css.html

Color Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/color.html

Drupal Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/drupal.html

Evaluation & Testing Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/testing.html

Event Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/events.html

HTML Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/html.html

Information Architecture Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/architecture.html

JavaScript Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/javascript.html

Miscellaneous Web Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/misc.html

Navigation Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/navigation.html

PHP Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/php.html

Sites & Blogs Listing.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/sites.html

Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/standards.html

Tool Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/tools.html

Typography Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/type.html

Usability Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/usability.html

WebWaste & Sustainability Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/webwaste.html

XML Information.
https://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/xml.html

[Section two ends.]


++END NOTES.


+ SUBSCRIPTION INFO.

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The Web Design Reference Site also has a RSS 2.0 feed for site updates.


+ TEXT EMAIL NEWSLETTER (TEN).

As a navigation aid for screen readers we do our best to conform to the accessible Text Email Newsletter (TEN) guidelines.  Please let me know if there is anything else we can do to make navigation easier. For TEN guideline information please visit:
http://www.headstar.com/ten


+ SIGN OFF.

Until next time,

Laura L. Carlson
Information Technology Systems and Services
University of Minnesota Duluth
Duluth, MN U.S.A. 55812-3009
mailto:lcar...@d.umn.edu


[Issue ends.]

Laura L. Carlson
Information Technology Systems and Services
University of Minnesota Duluth
Duluth, MN U.S.A. 55812-3009
http://www.d.umn.edu/itss/training/online/webdesign/

W3C Invited Expert
Accessibility Guidelines Working Group
https://www.w3.org/groups/wg/ag/participants

Pronouns: she/her/hers