Re: [WebAIM] Accessibility or usability recommendations for differentiating menus visually

Our current contrast requirements right now only cover text elements and specific graphics. We need to cover structural content like this as well. This type of thing doesn’t always covey information per se and it may be possible to read a page without this content but reading and comprehending becomes much more difficult when structural elements are inaccessible. I encounter a lot of pages with flat designs where they use very subtle color differences between elements making it difficult or impossible to distinguish between these colors making the separations invisible.

This may cover us https://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/low-vision-a11y-tf/wiki/Contrast_(Minimum)#SC_Text but we need to tweak it so it covers structural elements.

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Scott McCormack
Principal Technical Consultant  -- IT Manager
SSB BART Group
scott.mccormack@ssbbartgroup.com<mailto:scott.mccormack@ssbbartgroup.com>
(415)624-2712 (o)
www.ssbbartgroup.com


From: Jim Allan <jimallan@tsbvi.edu>
Date: Thursday, February 9, 2017 at 8:02 AM
To: public-low-vision-a11y-tf <public-low-vision-a11y-tf@w3.org>
Subject: Fwd: [WebAIM] Accessibility or usability recommendations for differentiating menus visually
Resent-From: <public-low-vision-a11y-tf@w3.org>
Resent-Date: Thursday, February 9, 2017 at 8:03 AM

Do we have anything to cover this? Interactive contrast? Graphic contrast?
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Preast, Vanessa <vanessa.preast@dmu.edu<mailto:vanessa.preast@dmu.edu>>
Date: Thu, Feb 9, 2017 at 8:45 AM
Subject: [WebAIM] Accessibility or usability recommendations for differentiating menus visually
To: WebAIM Discussion List <webaim-forum@list.webaim.org<mailto:webaim-forum@list.webaim.org>>


Hello,

I'm looking at a site design which is generally a "flat", minimalist, monochrome design of Black on very light grey. I, personally, am having trouble easily differentiating the menu from the content areas below. There is a thin line separating the menu from the body of the page. The body of the page contains two columns of "widgets", each with a title bar with a gradient background.  The menu text is about the same size or smaller than the widget title bar text. The menu has no background shading different from the rest of the page.

Is there any accessibility or usability advice about menus clearly distinguished from body text?  (Please share the links/resources)

I'm wanting to advise increasing the weight of the separator line, bolding the menu font and/or increasing the menu font to help differentiate the menu area from the rest of the page.  I thinking that it would really help a user's ability to scan the page and quickly find what they need. All I could find for references were articles such as "Flat Design" https://www.w3.org/WAI/PF/cognitive-a11y-tf/wiki/Flat_Design, but these refer to buttons having a more 3-d appearance, not menus clearly differentiated from document body.

Best,
Vanessa
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--
Jim Allan, Accessibility Coordinator
Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired
1100 W. 45th St., Austin, Texas 78756
voice 512.206.9315    fax: 512.206.9264  http://www.tsbvi.edu/

"We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us." McLuhan, 1964