Federally enforced HTML compliance 201
gmezero writes "Well, well, well, it looks like we might finally start seeing an end to the craptacular websites that can only be viewed with "Web Browser v9.5 beta 3". Acording to an article on ZDNet, the Fed will begin forcing all federal sites and those of companies doing business with the government to be handicapped friendly. Gee maybe now we can finally seperate the "real" HTML coders from the (insert ANY page builder tool name here) loosers! " Interesting idea-it seems heavy-handed, but the article itself does a good job of explaining why this would be a good thing.
The truth about the First Amendment (Score:2)
Bzzzt, thanks for playing "Constitutionally Recognized Liberties!"
The First Amendment says very specifically that Congress is forbidden from passing laws abridging the freedom of the press. (The Fourteenth Amendment then extends the First Amendment to also prohibit State legislatures from doing likewise.) This is a Good Thing, and a great boon to the American democracy (don't forget, kids, the First Amendment is not universal -- many other democracies don't have freedom of the press held in such sacrosanct regard as we do).
However, the First Amendment does not say that the Government is compelled to do business with those whose speech they find objectionable. The Government would not be forced to publish their budgets in the newsletter of the Ku Klux Klan, for instance -- the Government would choose instead to publish their budgets in a more community-oriented paper. Hustler magazine is not invited to White House press briefings, but the New York Times and Washington Post certainly are.
The Government has no ability to say "Hey! You! I don't like what you're saying, or the HTML format you're using! Change it!"
The Government does have the ability to say, "If you want to do business with us, then you must adhere to these guidelines."
The first is an example of tyranny, of the Government quashing the free press by edict. The second is an example of capitalism, of the Government engaging in contracts and agreements with the free press.
The first is absolutely un-American, while the second is quite comfortably within the social contract the United States was founded upon.
A basic right? (Score:1)
According to half-wit Simpson, quoted in this article,"this is...a civil rights issue." Since when did anyone have a "right" to the work of another person, or to force another to make his work meet their needs?
I can't help but think that this is just the beginning of federal meddling with the net.
God save us from clueless bureaucrats.
A basic right? (Score:1)
What concerns me is not the government wanting to make their sites work for the disabled, it's Miss Simpson's assertion that "it's a basic right." It isn't. Do the government have a right to demand that companies doing business with them make their web sites conform to their standards? I don't know, I don't recall any legislation on this.
This whole thing may seem innocuous on its face, but the zealous do-gooders in the District of Corruption never stop with "good enough" and tend to take things to the extreme. I imagine this sillyness will be extended to the entire Internet in one way or another.
A basic right? (Score:1)
The last time I checked, the owner of the parking lot still has the right to determine who can park where, if at all, the feds' misguided efforts to the contrary notwithstanding.
No one wants to keep disabled people from reading their web site, they're just steamed at everyone trying to tell them how they are to use their property.
Simple (Score:1)
Chill, man (Score:1)
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Your right, but (Score:1)
I think your being paranoid about it. Think about how modern HTML is supposed to work: your HTML pages have the content, and the formatting is specified in CSS files. Thus, if someone needs huge fonts and b/w, if all the content in the HTML file should be decoupled from the formatting info in the CSS, they can just overrride your style sheet.
And, it doens't say that it's government contracted websites, it seems to imply that it's companies that do buisness with the government. So, if someone in the government want's to buy a copy or Red Hat, then all of the Red Hat sites have to conform? It's not clear, but, again, it's not something that I would put past the government.
I am inclined to think this "business with the government" language is the reporter's bad choice of words ;).
The point, IMHO, is that the government, if it wants to buy a product from some company, it should choose one that meets some accessibility standard. Not that companies are forced to meet that standard, but that unless they meet it, the government won't do business with them.
So, if someone in the government want's to buy a copy or Red Hat, then all of the Red Hat sites have to conform? It's not clear, but, again, it's not something that I would put past the government.
It's not clear, you're right. But there could be a case for it. If the government decides to spend its money on Red Hat, shouldn't the greatest number of tax payers be able of seeing what is it that their government spends their money in?
Of course, this argument, in this form, is bogus, since it can give rise to the situation you fear, that is, govt buys a single RH 6.0 copy and demands RH to rewrite their site, at RH's cost.
But make a small change in it. Now, make government restrain itself from buying stuff from companies that don't run accessible sites. Now you have given an incentive to companies for making their sites accessible (otherwise they can't compete for government PO's).
Not that I believe every single purchase government makes should be from a supplier with accessible web pages, BTW. It would be nice, though.
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Wrong. (Score:1)
Yeah, right. Handicapped people have been around for as long as civilization has been around. Can you tell me examples of special services for disabled people springing up in free market societies without government intervention?
The point is: Contrary to your first premise in the paragraph above, what if there are not enough handicapped users out there so that it should create a great market for handicapped friendly webpages? (I should add "reasonably priced" to that, too.)
Do you believe that people have a right to know where their taxpayer dollars go? And if so, do you believe that a handicapped person has any less rights in this matter?
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GUI Build Tools (Score:1)
Creating really complex web pages gets quite difficult when working exclusively in text. Sure it's possible to do, but if you have a nice WYSIWYG editor which generates standard compliant HTML, why not take advantage of it?
I'm not saying people shouldn't work in text. On the contrary, slight modifications and fixes are sometimes easier to do when working in a text editor... however when you start moving layers from one side of the page to another and working with javascript hooks.... it makes more sense to do it in a WYSIWYG editor.
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What next? (Score:1)
While blind people may not be able to use the web to its fullest, I never cease to be amazed at how well the blind (and the deaf) manage to live such normal and productive lives in the ordinary world without much in the way of assistance. It is truly a tribute to the human spirit.
More Big Brother (Score:1)
Here in Chicago, the Chicago Transit Authority claims it is spending 25% of its capital budget on ADA retrofits. This is for a system that is in horrible condition and requires a lot of capital money just to keep it running at all. I happen to think that the CTA overstates what it spends on ADA compliance, but there is no doubt that elevators at L stations cost money, wheelchair lifts for buses cost money, paratransit services cost money, etc. This is a public, not a private example, but it should demonstrate plainly that ADA compliance costs money.
By saying that Muni could have avoided the lawsuit by providing an alternate format, you only prove my point. If the web format isn't accessible, no one can have it. To put up text would require additional money to both assess the requirements for the blind, create the files, and then maintain them. They would probably take the easy way out and produce text only documents, thus taking away a potentially useful graphical feature from the vast majority of the people who are not blind. (Actually, I oppose PDF myself, but that's because I think the format sucks).
As for not wanting my charity, the disabled certainly don't want to be labeled as receiving charity, but in fact they do want to force me to spend money providing facilities for them. They want the law to force businesses to provide these facilities - again, regardless of any demonstrated need - then the business passes the cost along to its customers and owners. I guess technically it isn't charity since it's not voluntary, so we'll have to label it a tax.
To say that because each and every disabled activist isn't a radical is just a dodge. It's certainly a valid criticism of the free software community that it has a large percentage of flamers in it. It is no less valid to say that there are a large number of extremists among the disabled activists. Of course disagree with them (as I do) and you'll be labeled "able-ist", a version of the "race card" I notice that you couldn't resist trotting out at the earliest opportunity.
Like I say, we should build facilities for the disabled where they make sense. Curb cuts are cost effective. Ground level ramps at buildings are usually cost effective. If demand for disabled services are there, other less cost effective services might be warranted. But it is ridiculous to say that every facility constructed everywhere must be fully accessible to the disabled without regard to cost or whether or not they will be used (which is what the ADA requires) it simply wrong.
Other services (such as paratransit) for the extremely disabled should be provided by government agencies out of social service funds.
More Big Brother (Score:2)
While I think we should provide for the truly disabled (which compose only a tiny fraction of the outrageously large number of people the government classifies as disabled), the ADA is a terrible piece of legislation. It is rooted in the philosophy of a twelve year old kid, who whines when "Jimmy gets to have a BB gun" and wonders why he can't have one too. Fundamentally, the premise behind this law is that if each and every person can't have something, nobody should have it.
Of course the proponents call it "civil rights" legislation. But real civil rights don't require other people to spend huge amounts of their own money. The ADA is really a huge tax bill. It forces private America to spend large amounts of money on facilities and assistants for the disabled without regard to benefit/cost, how many people will actually use them, etc. If the government had actually passed a huge tax increase and used it to pay for these things, the people would have rebelled. So instead, the government just passes a law the makes businesses pay for it, which gets passed on to consumers as a hidden tax.
Make no mistake, taking care of the disabled is a matter of charity, not civil rights. The disabled advocates demand that (often hurling vicious insults that would never be tolerated from anyone else at government officials who won't do what they demand. I know, I've sat through public meeting on this) this be treated as a civil rights issue so they can have "dignity". It's just a way to disguise the handouts they receive.
Don't get me wrong, for those people who are truly disabled (such as those who are paralyzed) I fully believe that the government should raise funds via taxes to provide services and accomodations for them. Many of these people suffer a tremendous drop in quality of life as a result of their disability and any compassionate society would do what it can to help these people. The mentally ill should receive treatment. Businesses should get tax breaks and assistance for employing disabled individuals. Reasonable facilities such as accessible restroom and curb cuts should be provided. But these should be provided as matter of charity and kindness, not entitlement. Making it an entitlement only leads to ever more demands and ridiculous claims and lawsuits (the list is endless, examples on request).
It's all crap. (Score:1)
Please, don't go blaming corporate mutation of a bad language for even worse code. No matter what NS or MS did, it doesn't change the fact that lots of people (webwankers?) use img src="whatever.gif" and leave it at that without the kinder, gentler height= and width= for graphics-enhanced browsers, let alone an alt= tag for Lynx, the preferred ADA-Compliant browser where I work. And it certainly wouldn't change the fact that Corporate-made GUI HTML spawners will screw up pretty bad -- anybody seen MS Publisher HTML? It converts the file to a
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Kiez Kah-se'
Some Guy Out West
Big Brother Actually Helping Us? (Score:1)
If the government regulates the proper use of HTML, this could be a great benefit to the internet as a whole. It starts with making pages handicap accessable, which isn't that difficult from a design standpoint.
If we're lucky, the government will carry this on to browsers. What I wouldn't give to force browsers to follow a stardard so that I can design under one and know that it will work with other browsers equally well.
This is just the benefit to the designers. Give the blind people a break. They're already blind, isn't that challenge enough without people making things more difficult for them out of sloth?
What about Java. (Score:1)
I worry about that because where I work we want to develop a user interface that will need Java, and we are federally funded so this law could affect us.
(What we want to do is not even possible in a CGI form, so that's why we are looking at Java.)
Also, some things don't make any sense for handicapped access anyway - for example making a site that produces roadmaps be accessable to blind people on braille terminals makes zero sense. If they can't see the site, they can't see the maps it produces either.
What else is new... (Score:1)
Whoever wrote the headline (hemos?) didn't read the article carefully.
I've noticed a lot of that recently -- people will submit articles (sometimes not having read them all the way through themselves), then they get posted, and other people get all up in arms over a headline and blurb that have been sensationalised.
-lee...not suggesting anything more that that people actually read through and understand articles before they submit. it'd save everyone a lot of trouble in the long run.
Downside? (Score:2)
Second, I'm concerned at whether the gov't will enforce wrong-headed design on the web. In the above example of a RA file with no textual companion, it would seem logical to me that the solution is to develope a speech-to-text browser plug-in, not to mandate that the site in question pre-translates the audio. I'd much rather see the gov't make grants to the innovative companies that develop software to translate existing pages into handicap-friendly pages than to go down this path. Plus, translation software makes *everything* accessible, not just those companies that deal with the gov't.
Hehe, fixed already! :) (Score:1)
Big Government at it again. (Score:1)
presented to handicapped users in any valid format.
There's no way to change this. But the article
is not about making music available to deaf people,
or graphics available to the blind; instead, it's making content that *can* be represented in words
and sentances (Such as tax forms, new bills in
Congress, contracts, EULAs, documentation for
software products, etc etc) into a form that all
web users will be able to access. And this form
already exists: It's called HTML (at least,
as defined by the W3C). If a page is written
in an HTML 4.0 compatible manner, then those with
disabilities will be able to use the page
without hassle by the browsers specifically made
for them.
If you have Real Audio or Flash or other A/V content on a site, then it should be possible
to present a text-version of the above without
too much extra work. For example, if a
site made available Clinton's State of the Union
address as an RA stream, they can also make it
text only and present that as well. If, on
the other hand, the A/V material is eye or
ear candy, as opposed to useful content, then you
can simply provide, as ALT text, that the material
is only for presentation only, and need not be
heard or seen to appriciate the rest of the content
on the sight (Namely, this can be done with ALT="").
But in all serious, this is a *good good good* thing. The HTML and the Web space in general has
been polluted by the Browser Wars, and taking
steps to finally distill the waters such that
there is one standard that *all* browsers on
*all* platforms for *all* users can understand
and present without difficulty.
(And if you want some more fun, read up in
comp.infosystems.web.authoring.html, and look
for a loon called Schlake who thinks the entire
ng is out to get him.)
Where'd you get HTML compliance out of all that? (Score:1)
there in the fact that many pages that are layed
out using Tables (as opposed to CSS) come out
as gobblitygook on most browsers used by the
handicapped (specifically, ones for the blind).
Also, this will require those that use images
to include ALT tags to make sure that the pages
are navigatable.
And in the end, this makes it a better web for all
of us.
RE: IE V5.0 Problems (Score:1)
Eat the social darwinists (Score:1)
And as far as the social darwinists who seem to hate any charity towards their fellow humans, Universe! People who would check any code before installing it onto their box will let just about any stupid meme infest their brains. Clue phone ringing! We don't have a free market economy - never did. Look at all the corporate handouts, tax cuts, subsidies, etc. we give out! Make one move towards helping out actuall human beings, however, and some people get all in a tizzy. How dare that big bad government give my money to some starving half blind quadrapelegic person! I want them to give my money to ConglomoChem so they can compete with those nasty foreign companies.
What makes me most sad is when people take the meanest, most selfish and self indulgent parts of a philosphy and use them as a stick to bash others. We all know governemnt is a Bad Thing(tm) according to libertarian party dogma, but hey, this is a free association issue. We wouldn't limit a company's or individual's freedom to associate with whomever they choose, according to whatever guidelines they want to set, but let the government say they won't do business with people who don't comply with certain (minimal, sensible) guidelines regarding information accessibility, and all the libertarians and social darwinists get all irate.
Making sure everyone has equal access to information is a Good Thing(tm) and a prerequisite to a real free market.
Disabled = disinterested? (Score:1)
Suppose I made some product which would be of no interest to any persons with any sort of disability?
I'd be interested if you could give an example; I certainly can't think of any.
Disabled = disinterested? (Score:1)
The
Disabled = disinterested? (Score:1)
Disabled = disinterested? (Score:1)
No, read his statement again:
Suppose I made some product which would be of no interest to any persons with any sort of disability?
He was suggesting that there is some product he could make which would be of no interest to anyone with any disability. That's what I was disagreeing with. He'd obviously not considered the needs of disabled people very carefully.
I'd suggest you've fallen into the same trap. Many people who are registered blind actually have some eyesight, but need extremely strong and unusual prescriptions - they'd be very interested in an opticians site. People who've lost limbs often want their replacement limbs to look unobtrusive, hence interest in well-padded footware like running shoes, and gloves.
I must admit defeat on the subject of people without any ears though!
As to whether I'd want someone to say "do it anyway", I understand that that's the point of the "Americans with Disabilities" Act - to enforce companies to make provision for disabled access to their services, even if there is no evidence of strong demand for such access. This move is just an extension of that same philosophy into the Information Superhighway (© Al Gore).
I guess one of the drivers for this policy is that government departments have to be seen to be non-discriminatory employers. If you believe the stats on the zdnet article, that would imply that up 1 in 30 government employees "have vision problems" (sic). That's probably a lot of employees who, unless something positive is done, will find their jobs harder to do as business moves more and more into internet technologies for their interactions.
Disabled = disinterested? (Score:1)
Businesses, once "forced" to hire disabled workers (by no longer having an excuse not to) usually find them to be especially motivated workers.
Absolutely - I've worked with a wheelchair-bound woman, and when I consider the challenge getting into work was for her, I can see how the rest of the day was a doddle for her! The difficulty is in forcing people to think a little before making silly decisions which inadvertantly put disabled people at a disadvantage.
Signs of the Apocralypse... (Score:1)
smart move. (Score:1)
One needs to understand the semantics as well as the syntax of HTML. Tables aren't for layout - period.
Big Government at it again. (Score:1)
Lets say you are interested in the development of the Linux kernel. Every day you go to http://www.flashykernelnews.com to read the latest about the kernel developments. Unfortunately one day you get run over by a car and you lose your sight. Are you now not interested in the Linux kernel developments? Because now http://www.flashykernelnews.com is not accessible to you anymore.
'They make a product that is of no interest to a disable person like you'.
When used correctly HTML is accessible without any additional cost. Producing multiple versions (tape, braille, whatever) have additional costs. BUT of course all govt material should be accessible to all its citizens. Any other way would make people that can't access the govt material second rate citizens. If they are they shouldn't pay one dime to this govt that treating them like that.
smart move. (Score:1)
Btw, I have no problems with tables or images - when they are used correctly.
Artists that express themselves in sound or visually should do just that. Those forms of expression are mostly inaccessible.
HTML on the other hand was created to address these problems. People that misuse HTML is flipping the bird to all people with disabilities who had a great chance to a better life with HTML.
I want to be a fly on the wall when one of these artists/web designers explain for their blind son/daughter that they can't access daddy's/mommy's work because daddy/mommy has been 'creative'.
smart move. (Score:1)
If you want to tell the user agent how to visually render your pages it should be through style sheets. Using tables are a bad hack that is undermining the benefits of HTML.
Big Government at it again. (Score:1)
I won't force anyone to use HTML in a correct way, but a government should do what is best for all its citizens. It is a good thing they are enforcing this on their own sites.
I don't want govt to legislate this however. I will do my best to make things hard for those that do misuse HTML though.
Where'd you get HTML compliance out of all that? (Score:1)
A table is for marking up tabular data not for you to mimick a newspaper.
It's all crap. not ! (Score:1)
Hakon W. Lie's style sheet proposal (http://www.w3.org/People/howcome/p/cascade.html) that influenced CSS greatly came in Oct 1994. At the same time Netscape released Navigator 1.0. Version 2 came about a year later and still no sign of style sheet support in it. Say hi to FONT, BLINK et al though.
In contrast Viola (http://ftp.sunet.se/pub/www/clients/viola/) supported tables in May 1994 (looking at the screenshots at Sunet) and had rudimentary style sheet support. Heck, just look at the screenshots and consider where we are 5 years later.
Will Big Brother take the place of Jesus? (Score:1)
All these so called "web designers" try to accomplish is to map their previous experiences of newspapers and such to the WWW. The WWW is not a newspaper. It is a different media with a different way to do things.
If you want full control over the visual appearence of a page you should use postscript or PDF. What you are doing now is no better than MS creating their own version of Java or trying to change the meaning of "open source".
Bobby? Where can we find it? (Score:2)
http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL has lots of information on accessibility in general.
Excess Government Regulation (Score:1)
The government in the USA seems to regulate EVERYTHING they can thing of for the sole purpose of justifying thier existance. IMHO, thier purpose is to insure that no one infringes on anothers freedoms. And, it's not my god give write to use whatever browser I wish and force companies to comply to writing web pages that I can read.
Given our politicians known backgrounds, I suppose this affects porn sites most.
Your right, but (Score:1)
I finally got threw to it, and it does say for the disabled. But, I found something very uncomfortable about some of the wording.
Standards, yet, no definition what so ever about how or what is to be standardized. This potentially could mean black in white, with everything written with an H1 tag so it's easy to read. I don't doubt that something that stupid is possable.
And, it doens't say that it's government contracted websites, it seems to imply that it's companies that do buisness with the government. So, if someone in the government want's to buy a copy or Red Hat, then all of the Red Hat sites have to conform? It's not clear, but, again, it's not something that I would put past the government.
I don't like the looks of it still, but I do see more clearly where it's comming from. I would probably say that if the government were to put all thier money and energy into something to accomplish this goal, it might be better served by writing some guidlines that SUGGEST how to make sites better for the disabled, and spending some time working on the disabled side (better browser preformance for disabled, etc).
Legal requirements imposed seems a bit much, and I think I am against it still. Maybe someone should from a privately funded project using GNU/GPL tools, to promote internet access for the disabled, and make things easier for them. Now, that would not only get my support, but it would also get some of my cash.
Get Realistic. (Score:1)
Me: Legal requirements imposed seems a bit much, and I think I am against it still.
AC: but if someone is too lazy to use tags then the best browser in the world isn't going to describe a picture to them.
I shouldn't be making light of this, but this is actually humorous. K, if it should be a law, will we have special net police who track down the lazy evil villans who forget to put ALT tags in thier HTML, and imprison them for, what, say 5 years? "what are you in for man?" "Who me? Oh, I sold software to the government, and didn't put ALT tag's in my web page..." "oh, I ran a mall public internet kiosk, and forgot to put a 'warning, some internet web sites may cause dizzyness' sign on it."
Ack... Spend money on awareness, not legislation. You really think the legal system, police, courts, judges, and all that don't have enough stupid laws to deal with, now THIS should be a law?
YES! (Score:1)
Simple (Score:1)
However, I find a disturbing trend among the people posting here: those in favor of this idea seem to insist that all WYSIWYG editors are evil and are the cause of this problem. Actually, they're not: a perfectly Lynx-compliant site can be constructed in an editor.
What makes these sites unaccessible is stuff like images without ALT tags, recorded speeches when a transcript is not posted, and things like that. Now granted, I tend to work a lot in "hand-crafted HTML" myself, but I use a WYSIWYG editor for the basic design (I then hand-code the pages based off of that design). Nonetheless, I make sure my page displays acceptably in all sorts of browsers, from Netscape to IE to iCab all the way back to WebTV and Lynx. Sure, I do use enhancements in some places, but never those which cripple the page on another browser (or, if they do, I provide alternative access to the data). It's not terribly difficult.
WYSIWYG editors are not Bad Things. It's the designers who misuse them. These editors are meant to be tools, not crutches.
The law in AU as I know it... (Score:1)
Simple - but not quite that simple (Score:1)
If you want to check conformance to usability guidelines and have some advice on what you could do to improve usability try Bobby
Disabled = disinterested? --> Weak Arguement (Score:1)
I could be shopping for someone else. I could be doing research on a product or company.
Missing the point (Score:1)
In the above example of a RA file with no textual companion, it would seem logical to me that the solution is to develope a speech-to-text browser plug-in, not to mandate that the site in question pre-translates the audio.
And which browser does your plug-in work with? Please don't say, "all," because that's not believable. The point is to make the page content available to all regardless of the browser used. That pretty much requires the accessability features mentioned.
Doug Loss
Federal mandates are WRONG! (Score:1)
I cannot believe the comments that I am reading - re: Standards are good - Don't you realize what this is? It is a gigantic infringement on our 1st Amendment rights, not to mention the involvement of a burdensom federal bureaucracy in the fastest growing economic force in the world. Actions like these stifle economic growth, not encourage it.
Yes, its a good thing to make your HTML easy to use by everyone (you hit more markets by doing this, more customers and more money) BUT IT ISN'T THE FED'S BUSINESS how I design my webpages.
If there are enough handicapped users out there then that should create a great market for handicapped friendly webpages. You could even go so far as to create an organization that tests and awards a 'handicapped friendly' logo to pages that are handicapped friendly. But don't go and use the force (yes, force, as in the barrel of a gun or trigger of a bomb) of Government to make everyone else comply with your own personal adjenda or beliefs. Use the free market. It has been shown to work wonders.
Brian
Big Government at it again. (Score:1)
I think it's dubious to argue that a requirement I include descriptive ALT tags for images and make pages that are navigable without using image maps (not requiring pages to be without image maps, just giving an alternate form of navigation), if (and only if) I wish to do business with the government, somehow affects my ability to speak freely and openly.
If you make a product that's of no interest to any disabled person, that doesn't mean a disabled person might not be browsing your site as part of their job function. (Suppose they're a purchaser for an agency.)
People should keep in mind that HTML 4.0 requires those alt tags for just these reasons, and has several other required features which make pages more accessible to the disabled. A page that's strictly HTML 4.0 compliant (or compliant with a future successor, more than likely) is likely to pass a "disability test" without modification.
Last but not least, I think a pure "free market rah rah rah" attitude would be that any customer is free to set whatever requirements to do business with them that they want, and there's no reason that shouldn't extend to government agencies as customers just like it does to private groups. If you think it's just too much to comply with the requests of a potential customer, you're free to not do it, and they're free to go to someone who doesn't feel that way.
NetPositive and others "non-standard" browser (Score:1)
what i don't like when i look a site are all the buggy java applet that take forever to load and does not work with NS/IE and really don't work with N+ or Voyager
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Where'd you get HTML compliance out of all that? (Score:1)
A well designed, HTML complient site fails gracefully down to the lowest common denominator browser, and a well designed HTML complient site is attractive and easy to navigate be it viewed in Lynx of IE5.
If you had a better understanding of the technology, you wouldn't be making the comment you made.
This is NOT about HTML compliance!!! (YES IT IS) (Score:1)
HTML allows for you to put anything you want into that page, but you better allow for alternate methods to view the content when the target browser isn't available.
Compliance doesn't mean you can't build a garbage page, only that it be designed for everyone to share in the garbage to the best of their ability.
This is a Good Thing(tm) (Score:1)
Is it a tax on companies? Not really. The Federal government has always had standards for companies that want to work with it (frome safety and health issues to civil rights). The companies have always had a choice, though. If they didn't like the government's rules, they could do business with someone else.
Even private companies have standards they hold one another to when conducting bussiness.
Finally, even if you don't care about people with disabilities, there is a very good reason for the Federal government to be pushing standards compliance: effeciency. If every company keeps using non-standard (and incidentally non-accessable) HTML, every document will have to be examined or at the very least, undergo further processing befor it can be integrated with standards compliant data. We the tax payers will save money and time by mandating that standard HTML, XML, CSS, and even DOM and RDF are used.
To me, it appears that the ultimate benefits of requiring accessibility will reach far beyond simply allowing more access to government docs. This effort will help all of us be more standards compliant, reducing the need for re-processing data and wasting time that could be better spent understanding its meaning.
NYS Already does... (Score:1)
smart move. (Score:1)
sure, the net is more then the us, but the us doesn't have to be alone here. somewhere on the european union's website (http://europa.eu.int) are noises about disabled rights (i hope). wonder if the eu and it's member states can enact similar legislation?
time to go find my mep...
smart move. (Score:1)
>the syntax of HTML. Tables aren't for layout -
>period.
It's easy to be an HTML purist when such statements are true, but I've seen some really well laid out sites that use tables for such a purpose. I'm all for accessability, but what a bland tasteless web we'd have woven if it weren't for some of these enhancements (ie. tables, images).
Face it, the web isn't just for engineers and the odd computer scientist any longer. Strip out all of the advertising, and it's the people's web. How can an artist express him/herself with only a gray background and some ugly browser-defined font?
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
Ummm.... (Score:1)
This is good (Score:1)
They made TCP/IP compulsory for Milnet and Arpanet. Was this a bad decision? Nope.
Now let's just hope that no-one can subvert w3c. Otherwise the government will have to ratify each w3c standard instead of leaving w3c to work things out itself.
More $$$ Consulting Fees for me!!! (Score:1)
Being text-mode friendly would be nice, but it might cripple a few things. If you designed your site sanely it wouldn't matter though.
umm... (Score:1)
not being picky but... (Score:1)
that page looks screwed in IE5 (Score:1)
that page looks screwed in IE5 (Score:1)
Oooohhh... (Score:1)
Complete BS (Score:1)
I bet you're imagining HTML-cops policing every website and didn't bother to even read the summary to see that it's a government standard. As in government pages and government business. Believe it or not, there are other specs you have to follow when you do business with the government too.
But I guess it wouldn't be slashdot if people actually read and comprehended, would it?
I beg to differ. (Score:1)
Any connection to enforced HTML standards is implied, not stated. "Standards" are to be "unveiled" - this could mean tighter compliance requirements so that crippled browsers (no pun intended) or it may mean a set of plaintext guidelines that bear resemblance to handicapped building access laws. It makes no connection at all to "clean code" in the article.
Hence my criticism. But, of course, with no understanding of technology, who am I to talk?
--Tiger
Where'd you get HTML compliance out of all that? (Score:2)
Did anyone actually read this? The article's simply about enforcing handicap access to websites - making sure that special multimedia content is accessible in alternate form by people who aren't capable of using that content.
Not one word did I see that said anything about HTML standards compliance. For all we know, they can still crapulate out those super-non-standard pages, and provide a little text link that says, "Go here to see all this in boring
Proof these articles, guys. Sure, forcing HTML standards compliance is a dream many
--Tiger
Specious... (Score:1)
The Government does have the ability to say, "If you want to do business with us, then you must adhere to these guidelines."
Let's not forget that the government is so incredibly huge now (thanks to legislation like this, ironically), it's virtually impossible to avoid doing business with the government if you're doing any business at all.
Now who knows what "doing business with the government" means (the sloppy journalism was commented on earlier), but that's irrelevant to the argument at hand.
I Don't Get It... (Score:1)
Web Accessibility URLs (Score:1)
Accessibility [htmlhelp.com] by Web Design Group
best accessibility meme: gracefully degrading pages
Signs of the Apocralypse... (Score:1)
The end is nigh!!!!!
Standards friendly VS Lynx Friendly (Score:1)
Also, as far as these new rules go, Lynx friendlyness may be more likely mandated than actually being standares-friendly. After all, some disabled people are considered disabled because they have this problem called 'blindness' - they have to use speech programs to read web pages to them, and anything that is Lynx friendly will go very smoothly through a speech program. Things that are not lynx friendly will not work well with those readers at all.
And after teaching HTML and WWW design at my U for three years, I'm allowed to rant about people with poor design skills all I want, I've marked over 500 of the most horrid web site projects on the planet, and less than 300 of the good ones. Ugh. Glad I moved on to a different job with no marking involved, and very little HTML.
A basic right? (Score:1)
Well, since it's the Government's web sites that are most affected by this, and the sites of those who do buisness (other than just paying taxes) with the Government, I think not only do people have a "right" to see it, but the makers of the pages (Government and the companies doing federal contracts) have a responsibility to the people to make that information available to all of them. And what is the main requirement that's going to be put on them? Make your sites legible. Damn, that's really gonna crimp their style, ain't it? (For those who think I'm being sarcastic, think again. Most Web designers today seem to think that the harder it is to read a page, the more "stylish" it must be. Excuse me while I puke.)
At last HTML that is HTML (Score:1)
umm... (Score:1)
Not really, they put a new interface on it, which actually responds when I tell it to do things. It's the weirdest thing - I think IE knows that I don't like it or something. Also, the next version of NeoPlanet is supposed to be based on the Gecko engine, which means that it will be 100% standard compliant.
Ummm.... (Score:2)
smart move. (Score:1)
Images aren't forbidden. They just need alternative content (possibly none) specified for those who can't or don't want to view images. Tables aren't forbidden. They're best used for row x column situations, but if they
You're not limited to a grey background either. You are bound to the fact that I can turn off your background color, and use my own. The same thing with fonts. What you think is a nice font, I'll probably find butt-ugly and hard to read. So I'll use my own.
If your web site breaks because of these things, you're done a very poor job of understanding the web. The web is not strictly a visual medium. A visual rendering is just one possibility.
Complete BS (Score:1)
Print what you want, how you want. That's the whole drive behind creative expression! If it's mandated that I must express myself in a particular way, it's not censorship, but it is definitely limiting my freedom to express myself how I see fit.
Big Government at it again. (Score:1)
If I was the one hit by a car, would the loss of my sight by my problem, or someone else's? That's the point here...this is just one more step in the relentless drive by our government to make everyone's problems everyone else's problems.
Complete BS (Score:1)
With few exceptions, the First Amendment has been held to protect exactly that right.
Does this mean I can use linux to fill out FAFSA? (Score:1)
How long before ALL pages will have to do this? (Score:1)
Sounds a little paranoid to me.
More Big Brother (Score:2)
I think you really don't have enough context or understanding of the ADA to be as critical of it as you are. As is usually the case, you also appear to confuse the provisions of ADA with the entitlements of SSI. For the most part, ADA doesn't cost anyone anything. Damages awarded in civil suits against those who fail to comply cannot be considered a spending provision.
Fundamentally, the premise behind this law is that if each and every person can't have something, nobody should have it.
There is simply nothing in the legislation which offers this opinion. If you are implying that the Muni PDF case does, you are wrong. The problem there is that Muni was unwilling to provide the PDF documents in any other format. Had a text only format had been available there would be no court case. period. No one asked them to get rid of PDF.
There are many other examples of this type of bonehead intransigence by government/ semi-government/ big companies who serve the public. You say that this type of law is another example of big brother, I say the opposite: it enables people to fight big brother. Do you imagine that these byzantine bureaucratic agencies would change their policies without the law suits?
With few exceptions nobody but lawyers makes any money from the lawsuits, but that rarely is the point for the people pursuing them. The Muni elevator's lawsuit settled last year resulted in a settlement of approx. $14000 for each of the complainants. For the two and half years of work they put into the suit, that's peanuts -- even for the supposed welfare bums you imply most of the disabled are.
BTW, curb cuts were not invented as part of the ADA legislation -- guess what -- it took a lawsuit. Before the lawsuit had even reached trial it had become standard practice for city engineers all over, not just in the US to specify them in construction projects. As is obvious to anyone, they don't cost more, but why was it that they had not been implemented earlier? It took a little fear to spur the actions of the otherwise good thinking city engineers.
The disabled advocates demand that (often hurling vicious insults that would never be tolerated from anyone else at government officials who won't do what they demand. I know, I've sat through public meeting on this)
That's some people. I don't like the way that some open source advocates behave either. What you said would been immediately unacceptable to most people if you had used the word "black" or "Jew" or "Gay" instead of "disabled". Stereotyping the disabled as a bunch of whining freeloaders is offensive to me.
Don't get me wrong, for those people who are truly disabled...charity and kindness...
If you are not happy with the criteria by which disability is defined then work to change it. (I also think it is too broad and this dilutes people's respect for the measures which are meant to provide equality). Most of the disabled don't want your charity. (Many who would want it probably would still want it if they weren't disabled--it has nothing to do with being disabled). Next time you are at one of those public meetings, offer $50 to the loudest disabled advocate. Get back to me if you survive.
smart move. (Score:1)
Many more sites block Netscape. (Score:1)
Is there a special force that keeps you away from Netscape?
I'll tell you a site that isn't blocked for MSIE. - www.netscape.com
It may be blocked by BackOffice (as seen on their howto page) by you'll get around that.
Then you download the installer and you have a nice new browser.
When I have to use the computers in my school, they have MSIE.
I have kindly asked for Netscape (being that they erased it when I installed it),
and now everyone can use his/her favorite browser (unfortunatly some prefer MSIE for some reason).
Sites that blocks MSIE are preserving our freedom, even though they actually block it.
Over the past many commercial sites (many, but not all of them belong Microsoft somehow),
have blocked Netscape for Money and World Domination.
It's a positive thing that someone stood up against them.
Alas, that's not all of it.
Sites that have been generated by Frontapge,
Use broken MSIE HTML to force the use of MSIE.
They "block" Netscape or any other non-msie page, and are very common.
And should I mention "sorry you must use ActiveX" sites?
Many sites like that, contain also ? instead of 's, if we browse them with linux.
I can tell you, that almost every commercial site never cares, and we are being "blocked".
Generaly as a policy, I decide not to give a damn over the users of MSIE.
I won't block them or anything,
but they have a full choice to use netscape,
and for the cost of being enslaved to Microsoft, they better do.
"If you want a good browser use Netscape, otherwise, don't complain and just go away".
(I don't respond to emails with doc attachments too)
See the point?
Sometimes a political stand, is much more important then a content.
---
Simple (Score:1)
Tell me where I can buy leaded gasoline in the US, and then it might matter. I'm serious, I've got an old (pre-1973) car that loves leaded gas.
It is actually simple to make any car designed to run on unleaded gas work with leaded gas... You just have to remove the catalytic converter and replace it with a properly sized piece of straight pipe. Of course if you live in a state with emissions checks, your car will flunk. Luckily for me, we have no emissions checks or inspection where I live.
At any rate, your question was actually backwards. It was the federal government who required that all cars be able to run on unleaded gas when they forced all cars sold in the US to have catalytic converters on them whether they could meet the tailpipe emissions without one or not (because GM, Ford, Chrysler, etc. complained about Volkswagen and Honda being able to meet emissions without a converter and thus being able to build a cheaper car).
So even in the world of cars, the government gets their hands into "standards", and is often forced to bow to the interests of vendors.
Why I don't think this will work (Score:1)
In other words, I don't believe it's just using certain tags, etc., that make a page difficult/easy to read for a handicapped person, anymore than it is for anyone else. That opinion comes from some effort spent in designing pages and imagining how they might "sound" through a speech synthesizer.
If they just mandate ALT tags, alternatives to scripting, etc., this will certainly improve the situation, but not rule out a large number of pages that will be hard to navigate.
But I'd be delighted if a visually impaired person weighed in on this issue!
Big Government at it again. (Score:1)
Disabled = disinterested? (Score:1)
It would also seem that the cost of converting your websites, supporting the disabled users who buy these products etc, might just mean that you figure that you may not wish to support them.
*Shrug* I am all for an individual making a choice to offer or use a service.
Big Government at it again. (Score:2)
Standards are good. However, following standards does not mean that one will produce good code or content.
I am not too sure if I like the comment about folks who use 'page builders' to build their sites is very valid. I am sure there are some very good writers, artists, musicians who would not be on the web if they didn't have a GUI environment.
This move also takes away some freedom of choice by the webmasters. While I can understand that government sites are required to follow certain guidelines why would I as a possible supplier have to follow them? Suppose I made some product which would be of no interest to any persons with any sort of disability?
How does this affect companies like Real? Macromedia? Adobe? The companies that have invested a fair amount in producing good tools for graphics savvy sites?
Lastly, if one extends this back to publishing on dead trees, will the govt insist that all its publications be made available in braile? Will all govt phone lines have teletype available for the deaf? Hmmm .. the Clinton hearings would sure have had some interesting moments if they had showed some of the testimony in sign language ;-)
Shri
How long before ALL pages will have to do this? (Score:1)
Many more sites block Netscape. (Score:1)
So you use Explorer at work? Is there a special force that keeps you away from Netscape? I'll tell you a site that isn't blocked for MSIE. - www.netscape.com It may be blocked by BackOffice (as seen on their howto page) by you'll get around that. Then you download the installer and you have a nice new browser.
Many institutions have extremely strict policies on what can and cannot be done by their end users. Software installation is usually on the "Cannot do" list.
(unfortunatly some prefer MSIE for some reason).
I happen to prefer IE, thank you very much. I wish MS would get their heads out of the sand and port it to Linux.
Sites that blocks MSIE are preserving our freedom, even though they actually block it.
Sites that block IE haven't figured out that MS's lock on the desktop has more to do with Win, Office, and undocumented APIs as well as OEM deals, not browser dominance. They do not (yet?) own the W3C. The choice of user agent is not political.
Alas, that's not all of it. Sites that have been generated by Frontapge, Use broken MSIE HTML to force the use of MSIE. They "block" Netscape or any other non-msie page, and are very common. And should I mention "sorry you must use ActiveX" sites?
That is so not true. Frontpage may not generate perfect HTML, but Navigator (not Netscape! That really bugs them!) usually renders it fine. Granted, Navigator doesn't always render table cell backgrounds correctly, but that's hardly Frontpage's fault.
Many sites like that, contain also ? instead of 's, if we browse them with linux. I can tell you, that almost every commercial site never cares, and we are being "blocked".
The question mark/apostrophe thing is an issue of character sets. I've often run into the same problem when converting documents from Mac -> PC and back again. Again, not an issue of political importance.
Sometimes a political stand, is much more important then a content.
And sometimes, you'll just annoy people into thinking people with your stance are bothersome and immature.
Mike
--
Finally! (Score:1)
---->8----
THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Listen as hope and peace try to rhyme.
Michael Jay Sherman
[LINK]
[LINK]
[LINK]
[LINK]
[LINK] [LINK]
"...A Porsche is not built to be something for everyone. But
everything to someone."
Obi-Wan and Darth Maul slashdot.org Open-source software SGI Irix 6.5
Episode I
© 1999 Michael J. Sherman m.sherman@erols.com Nedstat Counter
---->8----
Hmmm... How about some "alt" tags?
the nice thing about standards... (Score:1)
It would also be nice if they decided to coordinate with W3C on these issues, or adopt the W3C accessibility recommendations, but I'm not holding my breath.
Complete BS (Score:1)
Television isn't even held to these standards even though it is much wider used. The government dosen't force the use of closed captioning and thats how it should be.
And to the idea that this will standardize HTML and put an end to the "This page is best viewed with" crap is also bs. All the article talked about is making disabled access more friendly. All of the unlucky webmasters are just going to have to add text to pictures and audio. It never said that the pages had to comply 100% to w3c standards. Even if 100% w3c compliance was forced, I'm sure that I'd still see all of the best viewed with crap.
Complete BS (Score:1)
Complete BS (Score:1)
Maybe you didn't even bother read it properly because I never did say all sites were subject to these standards. I was refering to the authors that this would affect and you shouldn't of assumed that I was talking about everyone.
Finally! (Score:2)
problem. I can't stand those sites that
insist on using non-standard HTML. Standards
are a *good* thing
Gee, maybe some of these web page designers will
actually have to learn HTML!
I've just been using vi to generate web pages
for the last 5 years; works fine for me, and
I certainly stick to standard HTML.
Web site accessibility is about more than ALT tags (Score:2)
The issue isn't just about using an ALT tag with your images. The use of tables as a layout device, specific font faces, specific font sizes, and colors for links and text makes an HTML page much more difficult for a differently abled person to use.
The original version of HTML was much more usable by a visually impaired person than today's HTML as implemented by Netscape and Microsoft. The biggest problem is that the Web has become a much more visual medium, and the graphics designers cared a lot more about the look of a page than the geeks who launched HTML. Those high-energy physicists who were among the Web's first users were focused on the information that was presented, not how it looked.
Cascading Style Sheets are the way to rescue the Web for people who need different access to it. CSS separates the appearance of a site from the information offered by the site.
I'm glad the feds are doing this, because the browser companies and leading Web designers are paying almost no attention to accessibility issues.
Besides, accessible HTML is generally much better written and more standard HTML, too. All Web users could benefit from more of that.
This is NOT about HTML compliance!!! (Score:3)
THIS IS NOT ABOUT HTML COMPLIANCE.
Whoever wrote the headline (hemos?) didn't read the article carefully.
I haven't a clue what the federal standards for web accessibility for the disabled will be. A good model, though, is the W3's Web Accessibility Initiative (http://www.w3.org/WAI/). If anything, the federal standards will probably be less restrictive than the W3.
It's important to note that making web pages accessible DOES NOT REQUIRE STANDARD HTML. You can meet the W3's WAI standards with Front Page98, NetObjects Fusion, or whatever . . . and you can hand-code the worst, most inaccessible pages with thoroughly compliant HTML 4.0.
Nor is this about the federal government mandating how private corporations or individuals web pages must be designed. The upcoming federal standards are about making web pages OF FEDERAL AGENCIES that comply with standards of accessibility for people with disabilities, NOT about making web pages that comply with HTML 3.2 or 4.0 standards.
Making web pages accessible is generally extremely simple if you start with accessibility in mind. It can be more difficult to go back and "retrofit" existing web sites for accessibility, depending on their complexity.
The article also says that "firms doing business with government agencies" will have to comply with the standards, though I suspect that the phrase "doing business" is an example of crappy journalism. Typically, the government only extends that kind of regulatory weight to firms that CONTRACT with the Federal government -- which is a different thing than "doing business" with the Federal government. The government might buy computers from Vendor X (i.e. "do business"), but Vendor X is not necessarily a Federal contractor.
I would definitely want to see more information about the implementation of these proposed federal standards before I believed that they could apply to everyone who "does business" with the government.
Accessibility of Web Pages (Score:2)
articles on this topic have been written --
reporters glossing over the facts in favor of
a more sensational headline, and of course that
makes it harder for the average person to
understand what's going on here.
One thing to keep in mind here is that this is
primarily a story about the federal government
deciding to mandate accessible web authoring
practices on their own pages. In one sense,
this is no different from any other large
company deciding that they will follow a certain
standard level of HTML coding on their own
websites.
In a broader sense, however, it's vitally
important that information that the government
provides can be used by everyone, and not
necessarily exclude one type of person, especially
not on basis of a disability. This is why
public buildings are wheelchair accessible
and why braille versions of documents are
made available. As required by the ADA, if you
are going to make something available to sighted
people, you also need to make it available to
people who can't see, for example.
Now, the good thing is that the proper use of
HTML (and other web technologies) actually makes
it trivially EASY to provide disabled people with
the same access to information that non-disabled
folks enjoy. The web is a very egalitarian,
platform-independent medium, better than any
we've ever had before on the planet, and if you
make your web page well, nobody should have any
problem with accessing it.
Of course, there's the rub -- the vast majority
of web pages aren't made "well", and I mean that
from a technical, HTML-pedant standpoint. The
biggest "sin" is a lack of alternative text
(ALT attributes) on image-heavy sites, and that
alone makes it very hard for people with
disabilities to use many web sites.
Now, the solution here is NOT to throw away
graphics-heavy, table-laden, multimedia
extravaganza websites. The specifications that
make the web work were designed specifically to
allow for new advances of technology while still
maintaining usability in older browsers. Adding
ALT text and other features that benefit various
users (such as disabled folks, people with older
browers, and people with the newest tech such as
web-enabled phones, pagers, or PDAs) is simple
and painless, and does not mean you have to give
up your lovely design!
So why don't people do it? Why aren't they using
HTML to its fullest and creating pages that aren't
exclusionary? It's primarily a case of awareness.
Most web designers aren't aware of the problems
nor are they aware of how easily those can be
solved. It's because of that lack of awareness
that the HTML Writers Guild created the AWARE
Center.
The AWARE Center is a special project of the
non-profit HTML Writers Guild, and the letters
stand for Accessible Web Authoring Resources and
Education. The goal of the AWARE Center is to
promote a better understanding among web authors
of the need for accessible web design and the ways
in which this can be accomplished.
You can find out more about accessible web
authoring at the AWARE Center homepage:
http://aware.hwg.org/ [hwg.org]
The site is a resource for the community and is
open to anyone, HWG member or not. If you have
any questions, you can send me email at
aware@hwg.org [mailto].
--Kynn Bartlett
Director, AWARE Center
HTML Writers Guild