Re: Accessibility of federal statistical tables

The table in the example you provided isn't marked up as a table. It's a simple ASCII "table" wrapped in PRE tags. In one sense, it is accessible, since it is possible to figure out the various columns and rows and understand the contents of the table. However, that's only because it is a rather small and simple table. It would be, with some tools, no less easy to understand, and with other tools far easier to understand, if it had been properly marked up. A larger or more complex table would almost certainly require proper mark-up to be understandable.

I would consider that table to be "accessible" if that word means simply that the information is available and its meaning can be understood. But as an example of accessible HTML, well, it isn't.

>>> "Steven McCaffrey" <SMCCAFFR@MAIL.NYSED.GOV> 01/23/01 08:16AM >>>
Hello:

     I decided to check the accessibility of federal statistical tables.
Does anyone have any thoughts on the format used in, as just one example,
Per capita income table (ESBR) 
http://www.bea.doc.gov/briefrm/tables/ebr5.htm? 
Any comments?
Note: As noted before, I am using JFW 3.31 and don't have the latest table handling commands so I can't comment on whether tables like this one can be traversed cell by cell.  
It seems to be fairly accessible assuming I am interpreting the table correctly.  Apparently the first column is per capita income for the year 1999, then there are columns from Jun to Nov 2000.  If I count columns, I can figure out what column a given dollar amount falls under.

Just curious,

-Steve



Steve McCaffrey
Senior Programmer/Analyst
Information Technology Services
New York State Department of Education
(518)-473-3453
smccaffr@mail.nysed.gov 
Member,
New York State Workgroup on Accessibility to Information Technology 
Web Design Subcommittee 
http://web.nysed.gov/cio/access/webdesignsubcommittee.html 

Steve McCaffrey
Senior Programmer/Analyst
Information Technology Services
New York State Department of Education
(518)-473-3453
smccaffr@mail.nysed.gov 
Member,
New York State Workgroup on Accessibility to Information Technology 
Web Design Subcommittee 
http://web.nysed.gov/cio/access/webdesignsubcommittee.html

Received on Tuesday, 23 January 2001 09:54:36 UTC