In the United States there is estimated to be 30 million Internet Users with a Disability. Some Disabilities are temporary (i.e. broken wrist) while others are permanent. Accessibility generally boils down to two main concerns: helping the vision-impaired (including color blindness) and helpting those with motor dysfunctions. Vision and Physical Disability problems each have their special needs. Disabled users have different needs depending upon their impairment and ZipLabor attempts to welcome all these users.
This WebSite striving to be validated by the US Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (Section 508) and the more stringent European Web Contents Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 1.0). ZipLabor attempts to allow access for all and has addressed the following:
- Flashing Marquees:
- The WebSite has eliminated Flashing Marquees because they can cause epiteptic Attacks. The WebSite has also eliminated all Animation. Shame on 90% of all website and their advertisers that use this method of Attention Getter.
- Italic Links:
- All HyperLinks on the WebSite are Italic. Color Blind Users can not distinguish if a link exists without some indication and slanting the link separates it from the rest of the text. Two common forms of Color Deficiency are potanomaly/deuteranomaly and Profanopia/deuteranopia. These deficiencies affect 1 in 12 individuals, have reduced sensitivity to combinations of Red, Green and Blue. This is why we use a Yellow background on the headings of our web pages. We also use underlining text decoration on most links and increased the size of the links.
- Text and Background Color:
- When foreground and background color are similar, color blind users have a difficult time seeing the print. We have attempted to keep the font color and backgrounds as distinct as possible and make each page easily visible to all users.
- TabIndex:
- Many Disabled Users can not use a Mouse. Each page of the WebSite uses TabIndex which allows users to use the keyboard for navigation. The Tab Key moves to the pages links, and the user may simply press the Enter Key.
- AccessKey:
- On ZipLabor, Alt + 1 (pressing the Alt key and the Number 1 at the same time) allows a user to Skip the pages Navigation system and go directly to the Pages Content. The majority of Users who might benefit from AccessKey have no way of knowing which AccessKey number or letter to Press, therefore, they can not benefit from it. Until the Web Industry Standardizes AccessKey, including them on a WebSite is somewhat Idealistic.
- Images:
- We have removed most Images from the WebPages, are working on removing all. We maintain images in our Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). Moving Images off screen allows Text Browsers and Readers to efficently operate and eliminates the need for Alt Keys on Images.
- Skip Navigation:
- Each page on the WebSite contains a Skip Navigation Link (Ctl+1 on Macs), which allow certain devices to go directly to the Pages Content. Text Browsers confront the Link immediately while at the same time the Link remains invisible to main stream browsers.
- Non-CSS Browsers:
- Browsers that are not Style Sheet Compliant will display the content of a CSS web page in a text format. ZipLabor tries to properly use XHTML tags (i.e. h2), although it is not as pretty, all the information (including links) are displayed.
- Image Replacement:
- Image replacement is a useful means of putting your heading content in your XHTML file as text, by overlaying an image, so that you still get all the benefits of pretty fonts in your headings without compromising the benefits of screen reader accessibility. Image Replacement is a accessibility benefit because by hidden Content that still exists and will be read by Screen readers.
- Text Zoom:
- Most modern browsers have a Text Zoom. Because of this, we did not include a link to resize text.
- Alt for Images:
- We have included an Alt key for all images written in the web pages, although Alt descriptions on images is unnecessary since we move then off of the Web Pages..
- Monitor Size:
- ZipLabor make no assumptions of users monitor size and thus wrote its WebPages to work on 32 inch as well as 9 inch monitors. The fixed-width layout is arguably the easiest of the Layouts to achieve. Our Labout is a hybrid of techniques, also known as fluid layouts, flexible layouts, liquid layouts and elastic layouts. Our Full Width Layouts are useful for people with reduced vision or Cognitive disorders. Web Pages expand and contrast as browser width expands and contrasts.
- JavaScript:
- ZipLabor uses JavaScript, which increase the users experience. JavaScript is built into most browsers and many Users turn off JavaScript, mistakenly believe that it is a Security Risk. The WebSite is fully functional with JavaScript turned off.
- Summary Attribute:
- We have removed all tables used for page layout on the WebSite, which caused are pretty form layout to disapear (we are working on this). We do use Tables for data. Data Tables take a Summary Attribute whose purpose is to provide a description of the Tables purpose and Structure. The Summary Attribute is especially helpful to nonvisual viewers of the Content.
- Link Size:
- Many users have a problem using a mouse. ZipLabor has made all the links larger and each page uses IndexTabs to help these users.
- Labels:
- We are implementing that all Form input items use labels, which increases usability for people using assistive devices. With labels, Screen readers relate text to form elements. These Readers bring up list of labels to audibly scan through the form pages. The Label element also help assisting technology like screen readers understand the relationship betwwen a textual label and a Form Element.
ZipLabor makes its WebSite available to many different devices including: Text Browsers; Screen Readers; Palm Pilots; Mobile devices; Web-Enabled cell phones; and wireless devices. ZipLabor has increased its Accessibility at No/Low additional Development Cost and at the same time has made its Web Pages more accessible to Search Engines.
ZipLabor has made its Site more Accessible in nontraditional browser environments. This WebSite strives to make its WebPages accessible to all users and many devices. We hope to improve in this area and encourage all websites to join us in making Accessibility the Norm. Your Comments and Suggestions about the WebSites Accessibility are WelComed.