[Web4lib] RE: Web technologies and public access

[Stewart Baker]

Having just recently given a presentation at a job interview for a web
design job, I thought I may as well comment on this thread.

While it's certainly true that "content is king" when it comes to the
internet, I can't accept the statement that design is thus completely
unimportant.  A good design, far from being something people will just
coolly sit back and say "That's a nice design" about, is what will make or
break your website.  Websites which are well designed with the users in mind
make it far easier to 1) get to and 2) understand the content than sites
which are just text thrown on a page with little to no formatting.  This is
the same in business, and other forms, of writing: If your content is not
well laid-out it doesn't matter how beautiful or concise it is, because
nobody will read it anyway.  (See someone else's example of shakespeare in
garish colours)

On an aside, does anybody know how PHP is treated under ADA compliance
stuff?  My gut feeling is that it's not a problem as long as the PHP's HTML
output is properly done, but I'm not certain on this.  Somebody at the
interview mentioned that things like javascript or flash can sometimes cause
problems for the visually impaired, so I've been meaning to ask someone
about PHP as well.

-- 
Stewart Baker