[net-gold] [webdev] Web Design Update: January 15, 2010



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Date: Fri, 15 Jan 2010 06:17:36 -0600
From: Laura Carlson <lcarlson@xxxxxxxxx>
To: webdev <webdev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [webdev] Web Design Update: January 15, 2010

+++ WEB DESIGN UPDATE.
- Volume 8, Issue 29, January 15, 2010.
An email newsletter to distribute news and information about web design and development. 

++ISSUE 29 CONTENTS.

SECTION ONE: New references.
What's new at the Web Design Reference site?
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/webdesign/
New links in these categories:

01: ACCESSIBILITY.
02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.
03: COLOR.
04: EVENTS.
05: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.
06: MISCELLANEOUS.
07: NAVIGATION.
08: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.
09: TYPOGRAPHY.
10: USABILITY.
11: XML.

SECTION TWO:
12: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

[Contents ends.]


++ SECTION ONE: New references.

+01: ACCESSIBILITY.

A Behind-the-Scenes Peek at Automatic Captions on YouTube
By Terrill Thompson.
"On November 19, 2009 Google announced that it was launching automatic captions in YouTube. The University of Washington recently joined the list of early testers of this feature, so I thought I'd offer a sneak peek of how it works..." 
http://terrillthompson.com/2010/01/behind-scenes-peak-at-automatic.html

Transcripts on the Web
By Shawn Lawton Henry.
"It's easy and relatively inexpensive for website developers to provide transcripts for multimedia. It many cases transcripts are required by law to provide access to information for people who are deaf or hard of hearing. Transcripts are an SEO silver bullet for audio and video, and bring more people to your podcast, videos, and website..." 
http://www.uiaccess.com/transcripts/transcripts_on_the_web.html

Title Attributes
By Ian Pouncey.
In many articles and blog posts on web accessibility use of the title attribute is promoted. Unfortunately this isn't the magic bullet that many developers think it is, and I will argue for its use as a last resort..." 
http://ianpouncey.com/weblog/2010/01/title-attributes/

Can Visual Art Be Made Accessible?
Tom Babinszki.
"...The World Wide Web provides new opportunities for visual artists to
promote their paintings and drawings. And it is nice to know that
somehow, the Internet can be used to help blind people understand a form
of art that is enjoyed by many."
http://www.evengrounds.com/blog/can-visual-art-be-made-accessible

Office 2010 - Accessibility Investments & Document Accessibility
By Larry Waldman.
"I'm going to focus today's discussion on Office 2010's new document
Accessibility Checker feature. I'll end the post with a few high level
bullets of other accessibility features that we might discuss in the
future..."
http://tinyurl.com/ybcpxlw


+02: CASCADING STYLE SHEETS.
CSS Background Transparency Without Affecting Child Elements, Through Rgba And Filters 
By Robert Nyman.
"Looking at the design of most web pages today, almost exclusively all of them include some semi-transparency of elements. However, getting the desired effect in CSS is harder than one might think..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yl9n2ew

The Missing CSS Combinator - A Plea for Help
By Niels Matthijs.
Sometimes a long-lasting, nagging problem can take concrete form in the weirdest of circumstances. Something that's been bothering you for a very long time at a rather subconscious level suddenly leaps forward and calls out for immediate attention. More concretely, this article will be about a css combinator oddly lacking from our list of options, not even mentioned in the latest css3 specs (as far as I know). 
http://www.onderhond.com/blog/work/missing-css-combinator


+03: COLOR.

ColorAdd: A Color Coding System
By Daniel Fluck.
"Can this color coding system be an added value for color blind people? This is what the designer claims and what it is actually all about. I don't think so. Here are a few examples in my everyday life to support my point of view..." 
http://www.colblindor.com/2010/01/13/coloradd-a-color-coding-system/


+04: EVENTS.

Designing for Mobile with CSS3 with Dan Rubin
April 1, 2010.
Birmingham, United Kingdom
http://forabeautifulweb.com/announcing/birmingham-010410

Portal 2010
June 8-11, 2010.
Gettysburg Pennsylvania, U.S.A.
http://cnav.gettysburg.edu/portal/portal10/

Hypertext 2010
June 16-21, 2010.
Toronto, Canada
http://www.ht2010.org/


+05: INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE.

FluidIA
By Jakub Linowski, Alex Barger, and Chris Thatcher.
"fluidIA is an emerging agile design tool for prototyping rich user interfaces. The big idea behind this experiment is whether we as interaction designers, IA's, UX professionals and developers can create our own prototyping tool in an open way. Provided with access to an open design and open source process, this project kicks off with the following vision..." 
http://www.fluidia.org/


+06: MISCELLANEOUS.

Interview with Terrill Thompson
By Dennis Lembree.
"Dennis speaks with Terrill Thompson, technology accessibility specialist at DO-IT, a program at the University of Washington..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yf6qf6y

W3C's Shawn Henry on Website Accessibility
By Freelance Review.
"Shawn Henry has honored us by answering a few questions regarding Web accessibility. When she's not busy answering interview questions for bloggers like us, she leads the worldwide education and outreach effort promoting Web accessibility for people with disabilities at the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yamblv6


+07: NAVIGATION.

The Case Against Vertical Navigation
By Louis Lazari.
"...Naturally there are exceptions to every rule, and I'll discuss those briefly at the end. But first I'm going to present five reasons why vertical navigation should not be used and why designers and architects should almost always construct their sites with horizontal navigation in mind..." 
http://tinyurl.com/ybgljp9

Guideline 2.4: Focus on Information Architecture
By Olga Revilla.
"Provide ways to help users navigate, find content, and determine where they are..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yc3cxax


+08: STANDARDS, GUIDELINES & PATTERNS.

Standards Are Not Just Stuff and Nonesense
By John Foliot.
"One thing that all the cutting edge designers and boutique shops keep forgetting is that this wonderful thing we know as the 'web' (complete with HTML, CSS, JavaScript and all the newly emerging goodies of HTML5) is also used in the most mundane of ways, on web sites that simply need to communicate information to the end user without being a showcase of CSS mastery, Ajaxian trickery or the cutting edge coding examples of <canvas>, <video>, etc., etc..." 
http://john.foliot.ca/standards-are-not-just-stuff-and-nonesense/

HTML5 Business as Usual
By Jeremy Keith.
"It's been a strange week in HTML5. The web-and Twitter in particular-has been awash with wailing and gnashing of teeth as various people weigh in with their opinions on either the W3C or the WHATWG-depending on which camp they're in-being irreversibly broken …exactly the kind of ludicrous over-reaction at which the internet excels..." 
http://adactio.com/journal/1638/

Keep Calm and Carry On (with HTML 5)
By Andy Clarke.
"...W3C Working Groups are battlegrounds where "Pay To Play' combatants fight war without end for their own or their employer's (those big business entities that fund the W3C) agendas to succeed. These mercenaries care little for the needs of web designers or developers. We are civilian populations caught up in the fighting..." 
http://tinyurl.com/y8qockb

HTML5 Means Whatever You Want it to Mean
By Peter-Paul Koch.
"Last Friday I found evidence for increasing confusion about what the HTML5 spec actually is. I don't have any doubts on that score: HTML5 is anything you want it to be as long as it's new and cool..." 
http://tinyurl.com/y9plg5p

Error Messages for Corrupt HTML
By Roger Johansson.
"...Many people who do not like the idea of browsers displaying error messages for corrupt/invalid HTML tend to equate error messages with the 'Yellow screen of death' that Firefox and other Gecko-based browsers display when they encounter a non well-formed XHTML document served as application/xhtml+xml..." 
http://tinyurl.com/y9kexec

The HTML5 Show (AKA, A Mess)
By Kyle Weems.
"...if people don't even know if HTML5 exists anymore, or the status of the organizations working on it seem to be out of whack, why would they bother using the <video> tag or exploring <canvas>? We need to give people something to work with. Which means we need to not have insane grandstanding by a single individual..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yjswoxu

Accessible HTML5 Video with JavaScripted Captions
By Bruce Lawson.
"...The elephant in the corner regarding all video - whether it be HTML5 or proprietary - is accessibility. What are conscientious developers to do to provide textual alternatives for those who can't access the contents of the video? In HTML5 there isn't an alt attribute on the video element as there is on img, but you can add "fallback content" between the tags like this..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yb32sm3

W3C HTML Accessibility Task Force
By Roger Johansson.
"As a number of people have stated, there are some accessibility issues in HTML 5. Hopefully the HTML Accessibility Task Force will help straighten those out..." 
http://tinyurl.com/yeftg74


+09: TYPOGRAPHY.

To Serif or Sans-Serif, That is The Question
By Amit Goyal.
"...The following tutorial guides you through the various font-choices available, anti-aliasing, and some general type-related tips that, I can assure, you'll consider in your next web project. If you're a complete virgin to typography, I suggest you flick through this one before continuing on..." 
http://designora.com/tutorials/sans-serif-font/


+10: USABILITY.

The First Rule of UX
By Joshua Porter.
"'You cannot not communicate. Every behavior is a kind of communication. Because behavior does not have a counterpart (there is no anti-behavior), it is not possible not to communicate.' Paul Watzlawick's First Axiom of Communication. This is the first rule of UX. Everything a designer does affects the user experience." 
http://52weeksofux.com/


+11: XML.

Accessible SVG is Closer Than You Think
By David Bolter.
"Sometime in early December, Aaron pinged me to discuss the topic of SVG accessibility..." 
http://tinyurl.com/ya5plrd


[Section one ends.]


++ SECTION TWO:

+12: What Can You Find at the Web Design Reference Site?

Accessibility Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/accessibility

Association Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/associations

Book Listings.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/books

Cascading Style Sheets Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/css

Color Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/color

Dreamweaver Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/dreamweaver

Evaluation & Testing Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/testing

Event Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/events

Flash Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/flash

Information Architecture Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/architecture

JavaScript Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/javascript

Miscellaneous Web Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/misc

Navigation Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/navigation

PHP Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/php

Sites & Blogs Listing.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/sites

Standards, Guidelines & Pattern Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/standards

Tool Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/tools

Typography Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/type

Usability Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/usability

XML Information.
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/xml

[Section two ends.]


++END NOTES.


+ SUBSCRIPTION INFO.

WEB DESIGN UPDATE is available by subscription. For information on how
to subscribe and unsubscribe please visit:
http://www.d.umn.edu/goto/webdevlist
The Web Design Reference Site also has a RSS 2.0 feed for site updates.


+ TEXT EMAIL NEWSLETTER (TEN).

As a navigation aid for screen readers we do our best to conform to the
accessible Text Email Newsletter (TEN) guidelines.  Please let me know
if there is anything else we can do to make navigation easier. For TEN
guideline information please visit:
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+ SIGN OFF.

Until next time,

Laura L. Carlson
Information Technology Systems and Services
University of Minnesota Duluth
Duluth, MN U.S.A. 55812-3009
mailto:lcarlson@xxxxxxxxx

[Issue ends.]

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