Web Design Update: October 20, 2020

[Laura Carlson]

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 19, Issue 17, October 20, 2020.

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

++ISSUE 17 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: MISCELLANEOUS.
08: TOOLS.
09: USABILITY.

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

[Contents ends.]


++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

Dialog Focus in Screen Readers
By Adrian Roselli.
"Creating an accessible dialog on the web is trickier than it should be…"
https://adrianroselli.com/2020/10/dialog-focus-in-screen-readers.html

Nothing About Us Without Us… Including Pizza: The Practice of
Designing with Accessibility in Mind
By Cyndi Wiley.
"Designing with accessibility in mind means including people who
experience disabilities in all stages of the design process…"
https://educators.aiga.org/nothing-about-us-without-us-including-pizza-the-practice-of-designing-with-accessibility-in-mind/

An Opinionated Guide to Accessibility Testing
By Iain Bean.
'I got 100/100 for accessibility on Lighthouse, that's good enough right…'
https://iainbean.com/posts/2020/an-opinionated-guide-to-accessibility-testing/

Introduction to Web Accessibility (Video)
By Michele A. Williams.
"Geared towards technology professionals (current and future), this
video explains what we mean by 'making technology accessible' - that
is, the inclusion of users who have disabilities in the consideration
of how we create technology…"
https://mawconsultingllc.com/webinars/webinar-intro-to-accessibility/

A Better Way to Make and Keep Websites Accessible (Video)
By Ken Nakata.
"Thanks for joining this webinar entitled A Better Way to Make and
Keep Websites Accessible. I'm Samantha Sauld from 3Play Media, and
I'll be moderating today. I'm joined today by Ken Nakata, Principal of
Converge Accessibility…"
https://www.3playmedia.com/resources/recorded-webinars/wbnr-10-15-2020-keep-websites/

Understanding SC 2.5.3 Label in Name
By Sathish Kumar.
"Imagine you are using the voice control feature in iPhone or Windows
recognition software to see how they work. When you are trying to
activate a link 'Sign in' which you visibly see, the speech input
software, software is not able to activate the link…"
https://www.digitala11y.com/understanding-sc-2-5-3-label-in-name/

Accessibility Checklist to Design Products That People Will Love… and Use
By Nadiya Abrosimova.
"Accessibility is a broad topic…"
https://uxdesign.cc/accessibility-checklist-195da7ab64fb

Technology Accessibility Quality Measures
By Sarah Horton.
"What can we learn from healthcare quality initiatives to help us make
progress in improving the quality of the technology we rely on for our
health and well-being, focusing specifically on measures related to
accessibility for people with disabilities…"
https://sarahhortondesign.com/2020/10/19/technology-accessibility-quality-measures/

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines for Mobile
By Rob Whitaker.
"This is an excerpt from my recent APress Book Developing Inclusive
Mobile Apps: Building Accessible Apps for iOS and Android…"
https://www.capitalone.com/tech/software-engineering/wcag-accessiblity-guidelines-mobile/

An Evaluation of Accessibility of Covid-19 Statistical Charts of
Governments And Health Organisations for People with Low Vision
By Rubén Alcaraz-Martinez and Mireia Ribera-Turró.
"…Overall, the reviewed charts offer a reasonable level of
accessibility, although there are some relevant problems affecting
many of the low vision profiles that remain to be solved. The main
problems identified are: poor text alternatives in both, raster images
and SVG charts; the incompatibility with a keyboard interface;
insufficient non-text contrast against adjacent colours (in chart
elements such as bars, lines or areas), no customization options; and
the lack of an optimized print version for users for whom reading on
screen is challenging…"
http://www.elprofesionaldelainformacion.com/contenidos/2020/sep/alcaraz-ribera.html

Accessibility: The Missing MVP Requirement (Video)
By Alberto Orsini.
"We are joined by Claudio Vera, accessibility advocate, and Sr.
Analyst of Accessibility at Royal Caribbean. During our conversation,
we discussed how Claudio first got into accessibility, how early we
should all learn accessibility, why accessibility needs to be part of
requirement planning for all products, and where the industry as a
whole is headed…"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nn2yoEJTNW4

5 False Claims 1-Line 'AI' Accessibility Script Vendors Make (Video)
By Eric Eggert.
"They claim to be the be-all and end-all of all accessibility worries:
'AI' accessibility tools. They say they provide '100% WCAG 2.1
compliance'. They say it only takes one line of JavaScript to 'fix
your website for accessibility'. Who are 'they'? VC-backed companies
that promise affordable, effortless compliance for your website. If
you think 'that sounds too good to be true', you're right…"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-3xlUarxRQ

More Lawsuits Filed Against Companies Using Accessibility Plugin/Overlays
By Sheri Byrne-Haber.
"ADP has been sued for inaccessibility despite using a popular
overlay. The rest of the cases involving overlays have been small
potatoes by comparison…"
https://medium.com/@sheribyrnehaber/more-lawsuits-filed-against-companies-using-accessibility-plugin-overlays-1cc539d493b2

House Bill Introduced to Require Accessible Consumer Facing Websites
and Mobile Apps
By Minh Vu and Julia Sarnoff.
"Seyfarth Synopsis: Congressmen Budd and Correa try to address
website and mobile app accessibility in a new bill called the Online
Accessibility Act."
https://www.adatitleiii.com/2020/10/house-bill-introduced-to-require-accessible-consumer-facing-websites-and-mobile-apps/


+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.

Alternative Text for CSS Generated Content
By Adrian Roselli.
"Relying on images that come from CSS has always been risky from an
accessibility perspective. CSS background images, in particular, must
either be purely decorative or be described to the user in some way…If
you want to find a solution that works for each major platform, then
do not use the CSS approach yet. Stick with images…"
https://adrianroselli.com/2020/10/alternative-text-for-css-generated-content.html

Focus Management and Inert
By Eric Bailey.
"Many forms of assistive technology use keyboard navigation to
understand and take action on screen content…"
https://css-tricks.com/focus-management-and-inert/

Focus Rings
By @amfaulty.
"The most important piece of effective keyboard navigation is being
able to know where focus currently sits on the page and visualizing
when that focus moves. This indicator is referred to as a Focus Ring.
The following sections provide background information on our
requirements for an effective focus ring and how various approaches
fail to satisfy them. The final suggested API is outlined in the
Proposed API section at the end, and can be read independently…"
https://www.notion.so/Focus-Rings-4459faa9d1f643728ca8dde145a89900

The :focus-visible Trick
By Chris Coyier.
"Always worth repeating: all interactive elements should have a focus
style. That way, a keyboard user can tell when they have moved focus
to that element…"
https://css-tricks.com/the-focus-visible-trick/

min(), max(), and clamp(): Three Logical CSS Functions to Use Today
By Una Kravets.
"Learn how to control element sizing, maintain proper spacing, and
implement fluid typography using these well-supported CSS functions."
https://web.dev/min-max-clamp/


+03: DRUPAL.

Drupal for Higher Education: How Schools Succeed
By Suzanne Dergacheva.
"Not only is Drupal the second-most popular CMS among universities
surveyed in 2019, but the larger the school, the more likely it is to
be using Drupal…"
https://evolvingweb.ca/blog/drupal-higher-education-how-schools-succeed


+04: EVALUATION & TESTING.

Predicting the Number of Usability Problems Using Average Problem Occurrence
By Jeff Sauro and Jim Lewis.
"…A key step in determining the appropriate sample size for a
formative (problem discovery) usability study is estimating problem
frequency (p)…"
https://measuringu.com/predicting-n-usability-problems/

The Value of Ethnographic Research and Contextual Inquiry
By Lylo Trotta.
"Studying the contexts in which people experience a product or
application is pivotal in developing an understanding of how they
engage with it…"
https://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2020/10/the-value-of-ethnographic-research-and-contextual-inquiry.php

Remote UX Research: Advantages and Disadvantages, Part 2
By Jim Ross.
"What are the disadvantages of remote UX research and how can we
minimize them as much as possible to get the best results…"
https://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2020/10/remote-ux-research-advantages-and-disadvantages-part-2.php

Tips for Conducting Remote UX Research and Testing, Part 1
By Janet M. Six.
"This month in Ask UXmatters, our expert panel provides some helpful
tips about conducting effective remote UX research and usability
testing…"
https://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2020/10/tips-for-conducting-remote-ux-research-and-testing-part-1.php

Research Repositories for Tracking UX Research and Growing Your ResearchOps
By Kara Pernice.
"Organize user research in a research repository to communicate and
track insights across teams and over time for success and to grow
ResearchOps."
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/research-repositories/


+05: EVENTS.

Through the Eyes of a Deaf Person with Meryl K. Evans
October 29, 2020.
Online
https://equalentry.com/register-for-through-the-eyes-of-a-deaf-person-webinar/

Accessibility Bootcamp with Karl Groves
November 4-5, 2020.
Online
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/tenon-accessibility-bootcamp-tickets-117303095717

Front-End Accessibility Masterclass with Marcy Sutton
November 6-20, 2020.
Online
https://smashingconf.com/online-workshops/workshops/marcy-sutton-nov/

Accessibility of Forms with Karl Groves
November 10, 2020.
Online
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/workshop-accessibility-of-forms-on-the-web-tickets-117303161915

Deep Dive into WAI-ARIA with Karl Groves
November 17-18, 2020.
Online
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/deep-dive-into-wai-aria-tickets-117303366527

Accessibility Bootcamp with Karl Groves
November 23-24, 2020.
Online
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/accessibility-testing-bootcamp-tickets-117544762549


+06: HTML.

The lang Attribute: Browsers Telling Lies, Telling Sweet Little Lies
By Manuel Matuzović.
"The lang attribute is an essential component in the basic structure
of an HTML document. It's important that we define it correctly
because it affects many aspects of user experience. Unfortunately, the
negative effects a missing or wrong attribute can have aren't always
evident…"
https://www.matuzo.at/blog/lang-attribute/


+07: MISCELLANEOUS.

What is the Web?
By John Allsopp.
"…what the hell is the Web? And is the Web of 1990 the Web of 2020,
and will it be the web of 2050 (rather unsettlingly the year when as
much time will have passed again since its creation). That's what I
want to consider today, and then to consider what the web might become
(that is, what you might help it become)…"
https://www.webdirections.org/blog/what-is-the-web/

Web Histories
By Rachel Andrew.
"…I intend this site to become a place to gather the stories of the
early efforts to create an open web. Timeline roughly 1995-2006
initially, purely to limit the scope of what is initially a
dissertation project for my degree…
https://webhistories.org

At Knowbility, Sharron Rush Leads the Fight for Equal Technology Access
By Hugh Forrest.
"Sharron Rush is the award-winning co-founder and Executive Director
of the Austin-based nonprofit advocacy, consulting, and training
company Knowbility…"
https://hugh-w-forrest.medium.com/at-knowbility-sharron-rush-leads-the-fight-for-equal-technology-access-8635f623e0e6

What Can We Learn From the W3C CMS Selection Process
By Janus Boye.
"There's a million different ways to select a new content management
system and having been a part of the marketplace for the past two
decades, I thought I had almost seen them all…"
https://www.cmscritic.com/what-can-we-learn-from-the-w3c-cms-selection-process/


+08: TOOLS.

AxSHammer
By Jamie Teh.
"I just started a new project: AxSHammer, a Firefox add-on providing
tools to hammer an inaccessible website into shape. See the readme for
details…"
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/axshammer/


+09: USABILITY.

Figure It Out: Getting From Information to Understanding
By Stephen P. Anderson and Karl Fast.
"This is an excerpt from Stephen P. Anderson and Karl Fast's book
'Figure It Out: Getting From Information to Understanding'. 2020,
Rosenfeld Media."
https://www.uxmatters.com/mt/archives/2020/10/figure-it-out-getting-from-information-to-understanding.php

State-Switch Controls: The Infamous Case of the "Mute" Button
By Raluca Budiu.
"On-off controls that switch between two different system states need
to clearly communicate to users both the current state and the state
the system will move to, should the user press that control."
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/state-switch-buttons/

Myths About Complex App Users (Video)
By Kate Kaplan.
"Three stereotypes explain much resistance to improving the usability
of complex applications for domain-specific tasks: that people like
the old ways, that they are experts in the existing UI, and that
training will make up for bad design. All are misleading."
https://www.nngroup.com/videos/myths-about-complex-app-users/

Always Use Thumbnails to Represent Additional Product Images (76% of
Mobile Sites Don't)
By Kathryn Totz.
"On product pages, product images are tremendously important in users'
product-evaluation experience, providing critical visual information
about key product details…"
https://baymard.com/blog/always-use-thumbnails-additional-images


[Section one ends.]


++ SECTION TWO:

+10: 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

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

[Section two ends.]


++END NOTES.


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+ 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.]