Re: links on white and black background

At 9:41 PM +0100 2001/7/05, Pat Byrne wrote:
>I asked my original question so that I could find the best and most
>accessible way of doing this. Using a navigation bar with a different
>background to the rest of the page is a popular technique with Web designers
>- rather that say to them 'no you can't do that' I'd rather be able to say
>'here the most accessible way of doing it'.

Going off on a tangent, here's a thought:

CSS2 provides color keywords tied to the user's system preferences:
http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/ui.html#system-colors

One of the difficulties in creating navigation bars is that you want to
be able to do exactly what Pat describes here -- using different colors
to offset the navigation options.  But usually it's difficult to figure
out how exactly to do that and still allow the user to set colors.

I submit that by using the system defaults, you may actually be able
to solve that problem, by assuming (*) that the user will have set
reasonable color preferences on her operating system to allow the use
of the system -- and therefore you can use system colors in web
designs relatively safely.

(*) This is a semi-safe assumption, because otherwise the user may have
problems using the entire system if the colors are not "safe" for her
use.

This would be a good technique for the CSS Techniques document for
the following checkpoint:

2.2 Ensure that foreground and background color combinations provide 
sufficient contrast when viewed by someone having color deficits or 
when viewed on a black and white screen. [Priority 2 for images, 
Priority 3 for text].

What's the catch?  The catch is, as with any CSS, trying to figure out
if it's supported by the web browsers.  Eric Meyer's CSS charts at
http://www.webreview.com/style/ (bookmark those if you haven't!) don't
seem to touch on this.

--Kynn

PS:  The answer to Pat's question -- what is the accessible way to do
      this? -- is to use CSS.  That was easy. ;)

-- 
Kynn Bartlett <kynn@reef.com>
Technical Developer Liaison
Reef North America
Accessibility - W3C - Integrator Network
Tel +1 949-567-7006
________________________________________
BUSINESS IS DYNAMIC. TAKE CONTROL.
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http://www.reef.com

Received on Thursday, 5 July 2001 20:22:44 UTC