Re: Some questions from CHI-WEB people

but if we've gotten past all the learning, how much extra effort is
required if all the players are on the same team in that the goal is
accessible and attractive?

----- Original Message -----
From: "Vadim Plessky" <lucy-ples@mtu-net.ru>
To: "Scott Luebking" <phoenixl@sonic.net>; <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
Sent: Monday, December 24, 2001 1:24 PM
Subject: Re: Some questions from CHI-WEB people


On Monday 24 December 2001 05:04, Scott Luebking wrote:
|
|   I believe the purpose of the question was not quite understood.  The
|   question was asking how much additional work does a web page creater
who
|   starts with no backgroup in accessibility guidelines will need to
put in
|   to making a a new web page which is also accessible as compared to
if
|   the new web page need not be accessible.
|
|   Scott

Hello Scott!

Separating "content" from "presentation" (which is necessary for web
accessibility) requires *web page creater who starts with no background
in
accessibility guidelines* to learn (at least):
* XHTML
* CSS
both of these tasks are rather complicated, and require *re-thinking* of
traditionally used methods (for example, re-design of "copy-and-paste"
process, and other important points raised by David Woolley in answer to
your
mail)
Making content in XHTML (or XML) is more close to programming, while
(broken)
HTML4 can be coded with no knowledge of programming.
Knowledge of CSS requires understanding of design principles, and basic
knowledge of DTP (Desktop Publishing)
If you combine both requirements (programming+DTP) in one, you will
understand that it's quite difficult to find a person who can do both.
And such person will definitly cost you a lot of money.

One more point is with making site accessible without SCRIPTs.
As many designs (Macromedia Dreamweaver, for example) rely on scripts
from
the beginning (findOBJ, rollover images, etc.), redesigning site for
accessibility will require ... just making completely new site, no
less!..
Of course, costs associated with this are enermous, and I hardly imagine
any
company which would like to do this at their own good will.

I still think that it worth to make site accessible. Let's say that it
will
take your designer/programmer (with good skills *in general*) one month
to
learn XHTML/XML and 2 months for CSS. Than I guess one extra month for
accessibility looks like reasonable for me.
But you can'tr expect *all this done* in one month, for sure.

Hope that I have answered your question.

|
|   > > 1.  Has any experimentation been done to get a sense about how
much
|   > > longer it takes a developer to learn accessibility issues and
create
|   > > a web page which can be considered accessible?  For example, one
|   > > experiment
|   >
|   > Accessibility needs to be introduced above the developer level.
If the
|   > person commissioning the page imposes a particular visual
presentation,
|   > the designer has to find a solution that simultaneously meets the
|   > accessibility requirements and the apperance requirements, even
though
|   > the appearance may not improve usability for any class of user.

--

Vadim Plessky
http://kde2.newmail.ru  (English)
33 Window Decorations and 6 Widget Styles for KDE
http://kde2.newmail.ru/kde_themes.html
KDE mini-Themes
http://kde2.newmail.ru/themes/

Received on Monday, 24 December 2001 11:33:29 UTC