Web Manager University – Spring 2008
Class Title: Meeting 508 Requirements: Rules and Tools
| Instructor: | Mike Paciello, The Paciello Group | |
| Date: | April 8, 2008 (Tuesday) | |
| Time: | 9:00 am – 4:00 pm (EST) | |
| Place: | Admin Office of the U.S. Courts |
Directions |
| Fee: | $200 for federal, state, or local U.S. government employees; $300 for non–government participants. |
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Course Description
This course will cover the key accessibility laws, standards, and guidelines for federal websites, with emphasis on Section 508. You'll learn how to design and test your websites and applications so that they are accessible to people with disabilities, and how to implement accessibility coding techniques to ensure accessibility.
Topics to be covered include:
- Web accessibility standards
- Assistive technologies
- Key design principles
- HTML accessibility techniques
- Evaluation and repair accessibility problems
- Advanced accessibility techniques
Discussions of topics will cover the following aspects:
- Description of the issue, including references to their corresponding guidelines
- Examples that illustrate the issue, using assistive technology, a particular browser type or an evaluation tool
- Step-by-step description of the solution for this issue, including simple code examples and demonstrations
- If applicable, interactive sessions, during which attendees can participate in identifying and solving issues
What You Will Learn
At the end of this course, you'll be able to:
- Interpret accessibility laws, policies, standards, and guidelines and how they may affect your customers' approach to web accessibility
- Implement a design and requirements process for maximizing your site's accessibility
- Design and code accessible websites, applications, and multimedia
- Use tools required to design accessible websites
- Develop and implement test processes that include people with disabilities
Course Outline
9:00 AM – Introduction
9:05 AM – Background
- History (people with disabilities before and after the introduction of the WWW)
- Different types of disabilities, related issues, and solutions
- Moral obligations
- Legal obligations
- Business reasons
- Assistive technology
- Accessibility standards
9:30 AM – Accessibility Issues and Text Alternatives
- Why textual alternatives are important
- The situations where textual alternatives are needed
- Solutions for applying text alternatives
- Overview of what makes a good alt text
10:00 AM – Form Control Placement
- Importance of correctly labeling form controls
- Labeling methods
- Label positioning
- Importance of grouped context in form controls
10:30 AM – Break
11:00 AM – Document Structure and Orientation
- Importance of semantically correct markup and a logical document structure
- Headings
- Lists
- Context
- Use of color in web content
- Overview of problems associated to use of color
- Overview of techniques for using color in an accessible manner
11:15 AM – Keyboard Focus
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Visual Focus
- Issues related to visual focus
- Strategies for applying a clear visual indication of focus
- Tab order
- Natural tab order vs. custom tab order, including techniques
- Skip links
- What and who they are for
- How to implement them
- Issues with skip links in different major browsers and assistive technologies
- Choosing between visual and hidden skip links
12:00 PM – Lunch
1:00 PM – Using Data Tables
- When to use data tables
- Overview of available elements and attributes for an accessible data table
- Importance of table headers
1:30 PM – Multimedia
- Captioning auditory content
- Creating accessible Flash movies
2:00 PM – Break
2:15 PM – Accessibility Evaluation and Recap
- Demonstrations of different types of evaluation tools
- Step–by–step hands–on demonstration of how to make an inaccessible website accessible, covering all topics discussed in the course.
3:00 PM – Section 508 Panel Discussion
Section 508 coordinators from several government agencies will join us to discuss their experiences and strategies for building awareness of accessibility issues and how they ensure that their websites meet Section 508 requirements. Come prepared to ask questions of your peers and hear what they've learned.
Who Should Attend?
This course is developed for Web designers, Web developers, and usability specialists. Students should have an understanding of HTML and Web design.
About the Instructor
Mike Paciello is founder and president of The Paciello Group, LLC., a software accessibility consultancy. For more than 20 years, Mike has served as an international leader, technologist, and lecturer in the areas of assistive technology, usability, and accessible interface design.
In 2006, Mike was appointed co-chair to the U.S. Federal Access Board's Telecommunications and Electronic and Information Technology Advisory Committee (TEITAC). In 1997, he received recognition from former President Clinton for his work in the creation of the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).
Mike is the author of the first book on web accessibility and usability, Web Accessibility for People with Disabilities and is chiefly responsible for founding the International Committee for Accessible Document Design (ICADD) and W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).
Return to the Spring 2008 Schedule of Classes
Last Updated: March 19, 2008
