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6 How to design your website

You should have carried out the exercise suggested in Section 5, clarify your aims and objectives before you even begin to look for a web designer.

Your website will need to look attractive, be quick to load and easy to use and, of course, you will want to make sure that it is accessible to everyone. In a later section we will explore what is meant by an accessible website. First, here are some suggestions about how to hire a web designer and what initial questions you should ask them.

Choose a web designer

At the time of writing, there are not many web design firms in Scotland who are marketing themselves as expert in the area of accessible web design. The Making Connections Unit is creating a list of websites that are well designed but also accessible, as part of their current "good looking and accessible" campaign. The designers of the websites on this list may be a useful starting point (see www.mcu.org.uk).

You need to do some research in order to find out which designers might be appropriate for your organisation's needs. You can do this in a number of ways: by asking other organisations who have used web designers for recommendations; by surfing the web yourself to find out which sites you particularly like and finding out who designed them; and by following up on companies that advertise the fact that they build accessible websites.

Once you have found a selection of possible designers and looked at some of the websites they have built to see if you like them, run them through the accessibility checker Bobby on bobby.watchfire.com/bobby/html/en/index.jsp to verify their access claims.

When you have a list of likely candidates contact them for further information. Here are some questions you could ask:

Specify as a condition of your tender document that the resulting website must conform to the World Wide Web Consortiums Web Access Guidelines available at www.w3c.org. There is some debate on what level of conformance is appropriate. Guidance from the Making Connections Unit at Glasgow Caledonian University currently recommends Level Two but some would say Level One and others Level Three. At any rate, it is important that the guidelines have been considered and adopted by whoever you choose to design your website.

What is meant by accessible web design?

The Internet is, and will increasingly be, used by local and national government, banks, educational establishments, shops, information providers and indeed in every conceivable area of life to deliver information and services. Internet delivery of information and services is slowly replacing more traditional methods. As alternative methods disappear, so does choice - and it becomes critical to ensure that new delivery methods are accessible to everyone.

Currently almost 75 per cent of all website traffic is image-based. Multi-media-rich sites are inaccessible to many disabled people; e.g. a blind or visually impaired person who uses a speech synthesiser cannot make sense of information on the World Wide Web when it is purely graphics based.

There are approximately 1.7 million individuals in the UK who are unable to read standard print with ease, 17 million adults with literacy problems and 1 million people with learning difficulties (Informability Manual Central Office of Information; Gregory, Wendy 1996 HMSO ISBN 0117020389).

Watch your language! Adopt strategies throughout the process that will help you match your writing to the needs and knowledge of your readers. For help, advice and training on using jargon-free, straightforward language contact the Plain English Campaign at www.demon.co.uk/plainenglish.

Web accessibility issues for particular groups

This section identifies some of the main considerations you must make in relation to the way groups of people with different disabilities can access your website.

A key point to remember, however, is that disabled people are not the sum total of their disability, they are individuals with varying abilities, backgrounds and levels of support. As individuals they will also have a wide range of interests and will use the World Wide Web for different things.

As this guide is specifically about disabled people we have concentrated on impairment-related guidance. However, if you are committed to accessibility, there are also a number of other factors you may want to take into account, depending on the focus of your website. If you want to ensure that your website is accessible to other potentially excluded groups we suggest you go to www.pat15.org.uk. This is a government initiative that, amongst other useful things, is identifying the specific needs of different minority ethnic groups, women, young and older people as well as disabled people. It provides lots of ideas on accessibility as well as links to all kinds of interesting initiatives taking place in the UK and elsewhere.

Blind or visually impaired people:

“ With the help of synthesised speech and Braille display technology, even completely blind people can use the Web. ”

RNIB: www.rnib.org.uk/digital/hints.htm

The access needs of blind or visually impaired people can be as variable as the number of blind or visually impaired people visiting your website. Flexibility therefore is the key to ensuring that your website is accessible to everyone. Those with some vision may need to be able to enlarge text (or make it very small), or change the contrast or colours on the web page. Others will have software installed on their computers to enable them to ëhearÃ- web pages via synthesised speech, or to read the web page by using a Braille display. You must ensure that the design of your web pages does not make it difficult for a blind or visually impaired person to be able to customise the page for his/her own needs.

Designing a website to be accessible to a blind or visually impaired person - or indeed for anyone - can be a complex subject. The following general principles apply to designing for blind or visually impaired users, but are just as relevant to all groups:

There is very useful, more detailed information about designing for blind or visually impaired users at www.rnib.org.uk/digital/hints.htm.

Deaf/hard of hearing people:

Although it may not be immediately obvious how a predominantly visual medium like the web can be inaccessible to people who are deaf or hard of hearing the following points are worth noting.

Many deaf or hard of hearing people - particularly if they are sign-language users - do not have highly developed reading skills. Sign language is a different language from standard written English. Some people who use sign language therefore have a limited reading vocabulary. The use of simple, clear language will help to ensure that deaf or hard of hearing people can access the information on your web pages.

If you use audio or video provide text-based transcripts and closed captioning. Closed captioning on the web when not directly embedded within the video consists of a link to a 'script' of the video - the link to the script should be located close to the video clip.

Guidelines for implementing captioning for video can be found at www.samazdat.com/pac2.html in an article by Mike Paciello. For more detailed information about web accessibility for deaf people, see www.weizmann.ac.il/deaf-info/cc/

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Physically or mobility impaired people:

For people who have difficulty using their hands or whose hand/eye co-ordination is restricted, the following guidelines can improve access.

Remember to consider the physical access to the computer itself. If a website is being designed for use in a public kiosk, the kiosk should be accessible to wheelchair users.

People with learning disabilities:

There are of course marked differences in cognitive skills between individuals with learning difficulties - however here are some general rules worth applying.

Design simple uniform screen layouts (with the option of only viewing one thing at a time), use plain language and avoid pages overloaded with too many distractions or too many choices. For the same reason avoid long lists of links unless they are arranged in logical groups of no more than five or six links each.

The combination of auditory information, pictures, and text helps to reinforce navigation and actions for those who have a short attention span or are easily distracted. This will also be useful for those who cannot read (over 80 per cent) or are surfing the web with assistance. Auditory information should be clear, simple and repeatable.

Other suggestions include:

For more detailed information see www.otal.umd.edu/UUPractice/cognition/

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Last update: Monday, April 14, 2003 at 1:01:26 PM
The Making Connections Unit is based in the School of Law and Social Science in Glasgow Caledonian University.

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