[WEB4LIB] Re: js/css/dhtml and accessibility

[Daniel Messer]

It is programmes like this that make online ads so ineffective. Don't get me 
wrong, I use similar software myself to block ads. But the point is that it's 
far easier to filter out an online ad than it is a print ad. With print, you 
usually have to look at the ad even to rip it from a magazine.

As to the fly-out menus, I kind of like them, but I think they're going to 
get quickly overused. I was at a site a while back that had two or three fly-
outs for each menu item. This kind of muddled the site and made it harder to 
use. I believe you're right that they require the JAVA to be turned on in 
your web browser. Forcing this upon people does seems to be very 
inappropriate as many people I know do not use JAVA unless they totally 
cannot get by without it. My way of thinking is that, just like writing code 
for a programme, anyone writing code for a webpage has to assume certain 
things from the end user, i.e. that the user has JAVA turned on, that they're 
using a graphical browser, etc. From what I understand, the majority of 
people use graphical browsers (of some type) and have the JAVA turned on. 

I would hope that designers research their viewing base a little and make 
informed assumptions, but as we all know, this is not always the case.

Dan


Raymond Wood <raywood at magma.ca> said:

> Free software like 'Junkbuster' will block web page ads - I know it runs on 
> Linux, but I don't know about Windows.
> 
> I use a text browser that supports tables and frames for most of my web 
> browsing.  This of course eliminates the ads, and speeds up the page 
downloads. 
>  I use a graphical browser when I actually need it.
> 
> On a different note, I notice that more web pages are using a combination 
of 
> javascript and CSS to produce 'drop-down' or 'fly-out' menu navigation 
> structures.  While these are interesting tools, it does concern me that 
core 
> navigational functionality seems to require client javascript to be 
activated in 
> these cases.  This means that text browsers and browsers with javascript 
turned 
> off may experience more difficulty navigating these kinds of web pages -- 
or 
> does it?  I am curious to know what others on this list think of the fly-
out 
> menu phenomenon in the context of web page accessibility.

-- 
The subject in question...
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Daniel Messer
Technologies Instructor
Yakima Valley Regional Library
dmesser at yvrls.lib.wa.us
509-452-8541 ext 712
102 N 3rd St  Yakima, WA  98901
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When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.
                                         -Hunter S. Thompson