New guidelines boost web access
January 26, 2009 Computer News
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has announced a new standard to make sites more accessible to older and 
disabled people.
Version 2.0 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) will apply to text, images, audio and video and it also covers web applications.
The guidance is designed to address barriers encountered by people with visual, hearing, physical, cognitive and neurological disabilities and older people with access needs.
WCAG 2.0 explains how to make content:
·   Perceivable – including descriptive text for images, audio captions, flexibility of layout and colour contrast
·   Operable – making sites usable with keyboards and improving navigation
·   Understandable – making content easier to read and input more logical
·   Robust – ensuring that content and applications are compatible with assistive technology such as screen readers and magnifiers
This is important if the guidelines are to become a unifying, international standard for web accessibility.
Publication comes shortly after the British Standards Institute (BSI) issued a draft standard on accessible websites. The draft standard recommends the involvement of disabled people in the development of websites and suggests automated tools to test for accessibility.
User experience
Three people with disabilities where requested to point out the barriers they encountered when using websites. The testers were asked to look at price comparison sites as an example of a typical task many people perform online. They found big differences in the ease with which they navigated around sites.
Since conducting these trials, Confused.com says it has updated its website to improve access for people with disabilities.
