Accessibility for all
At WJP Software, we are always trying to improve the accessibility features of WCS. Last week James attended the Accessibility Festival and learnt some new and interesting facts about accessibility for websites which he wanted to share.
One of the interesting quotes was
“Why are we still talking about web accessibility? It’s been around for 30 years.”
It jumped out at James, as it is something that a lot of people are suddenly latching onto. It’s always been there and should have been thought about by everyone, even when websites were being built years ago. It was not, though!
At WJP Software, we ensure it is baked into our system. This means the sites are accessible – straight out the box - and users just need to think about additional content they add.
Although James has been talking about how to make sites accessible for a few years, a simple way of remembering this came out of the festival. This is where the “SCULPT” acronym came in.
- Structure - (Is the structure of the content suitable, are you using the correct headings and formats for displaying data).
- Colour – Use strong colour contrast between any text and background colours.
- Use of Images – Use alternative text to describe the image. Imagine how you would explain it to someone.
- Links – What does it link to? Describe your link. Never use click here.
- Plain English – Use clear, uncomplicated language with no jargon.
- Table Structure – Use simple tables without merged or split cells.
All of these help anyone with accessibility issues access your page and make it understandable. In the end, they will return to it and use it more. Because we are so passionate about accessibility, our clients can be confident that the system provides them with accessible pages, and then any content you are writing can be checked with our built-in accessibility checker. This will highlight and fix any error that you have.
If you would like James to talk to you or a group about accessibility, please use the contact form to get in touch.
Published: 26/05/2021 Published by: WJPS
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