FAQ
What is Accessibility?
Accessibility refers to a website being accessible to everyone. Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can understand and navigate with the web, and it also benfits others, such as older people, who may have more difficulty using web based services. Accessibility can also assist people such as those who have limited knowledge of the Internet, who are colourblind, and have motor difficulties. Other disbailities may inlcude blindness, deafness, and learning disabilities such as Dyslexia.
The general idea is to make your website as accesible as possible, so that if anyone came to your website that identified with any of the above, they would still be able to use it. In some countries it is illegal to discriminate against people who can and cannot use your website, so it is very important to consider when developing a website.
Some of the basic features that an accessible website should include are:
- Access Keys. These provide keyboard short cuts to pages and links so the mouse doesn't need to be used
- Good use of colour and contrast so that people who have limited sight or are colourblind can still read the content
- A sitemap, which shows people who are unfamiliar with your website where everything is
- All images have alt and title tags so that if an image does not load for some reason, there is alternative text in it's place so the user can see what should have been there. This also helps for people who have text readers, as they cannot "read" an image, but can read out the alternative text so the listener knows what is there.
- Keeping images and web pages small so that people with slow internet connections can still use your site easily.
Cabbage Tree Creative can assist you in making sure your website is as accessible as possible.
Further information