Newsletter issue #20 - 1st November 2005
This issue
Hello and welcome to the November edition of the Webcredible newsletter!
In this issue:
- Feature article: 8 guidelines for usability testing
- Top tip: Minimise noise for screen reader users
- Useful program: UITest Site Check
- Top link: SitePoint forums
- New articles in October
- Webcredible news in October
Enjoy!
Feature article: 8 guidelines for usability testing
In professional web design circles, the usability testing session has become an essential component of any major project. And quite right too - usability testing has been shown to improve websites' conversion rates by up to 1000%. Most organisations choose to outsource usability testing, but if budgets don't permit this then read through these 8 guidelines and give it a go yourself!
Read this article in full at http://www.webcredible.co.uk/user-friendly-resources/web-usability/usability-testing.shtml.
Top tip: Minimise noise for screen reader users
Working through a web page with a screen reader can take much longer than for a fully sighted web user. As such, it's essential that unnecessary noise is minimised, and ideally eliminated. Here are a few techniques to get you started...
- Short, succinct (or null) ALT text ALT text for images must describe the information contained in the image - and nothing more. ALT text on websites too often contains superfluous, unnecessary information, making it harder for screen reader users to extract the useful on-page information. Keep ALT text short and succinct, and if the image is purely decorative assign it null ALT text (
alt="") so it gets ignored by screen readers. - Avoid unnecessary punctuation Every form of punctuation gets announced to screen reader users. "." is announced as “full stop”; "/" as “forward slash”. As such, avoid any non-essential punctuation. For example, remove those colons from form labels; avoid using "..." at the end of a sentence; and take out the ">>" from submit buttons. If you must keep these items there, insert them as background images through the stylesheet, so they don't get announced to screen reader users.
- Remove vertical bars It's quite common to use vertical bars to separate items in a horizontal navigation menu. Unfortunately each time you insert a "|", screen readers will announce, “vertical bar”. This means, that in any one navigation menu, around 50% of the words a screen reader user will hear are “vertical” or “bar”. If you want to keep the vertical bars, insert them as a right (or left) border to each menu item through the stylesheets.
- Don't use tables for layout Each time a table is used, screen readers announce the existence of the table and its rows and columns. Use lots of tables, nested within each other, and you've got a usability nightmare for screen reader users. More modern screen readers are getting quite good at spotting layout tables and are ignoring most of them, but to be on the safe side use stylesheets for layout, not tables.
Useful program: UITest Site Check
Enter the URL of your website into Site Check and it'll automatically run your site through a number of online validators.
You can use this program at uitest.com/en/check.
Top link: SitePoint forums
Got a question about anything at all to do with web development? Visit the lively SitePoint forums where you're bound to find help from a broad range of expertise.
Check out this useful site at www.sitepoint.com/forums.
New articles in October
Read these and many other articles at www.webcredible.co.uk/user-friendly-resources.
Webcredible news in October
- Usability Guide available for free download
- Tim Fidgeon joins our team
- Virtual tour of usability lab now online
- Usability training and support available
- Webcredible to present at Techshare
Read these news stories in full at www.webcredible.co.uk/about-us/latest-news.shtml.
Training courses
Courses continue to sell out well in advance! Our next training courses will take place in our training centre in Aldgate, London in November and December:
- Writing for the web training - Monday 21st November. For more information and to reserve your place before it fills up please consult our writing for the web training page.
- Web usability training - Tuesday 22nd November. For more information and to reserve your place before it fills up please consult our web usability training page.
- Web accessibility training - Thursday 8th December. For more information and to reserve your place before it fills up please consult our web accessibility training page.
- Advanced CSS training - Friday 9th December. For more information and to reserve your place before it fills up please consult our advanced CSS training page.
About Webcredible
Based in London, UK, Webcredible is a user experience consultancy. Tailor-made usability, accessibility & design solutions include:
- User-centered design
- Accessible web design
- CMS services
- Usability
- Accessibility
- Training
- Website review lite
Please contact us on 0870 242 6095 or info at webcredible.co.uk, or consult www.webcredible.co.uk for further information.