WiderWeb Accessibility
What is the problem?
The legal obligation
The legal requirement to provide services that do not discriminate against disabled has been enshrined in law in many countries. In the UK this act is the Disability Discrimination Act of 1995 which states that it is unlawful for "a provider of services" to discriminate against a disabled person in failing to comply with its provisions. Any ambiguity was removed by the Disability Rights Commission's publication in 2002 of a Code of Practice, which clarified that businesses should make their web sites accessible to those with disabilities such as hearing or visual impairments.
Accessibility is an issue for all web site owners, whether on the public Internet or across a private Intranet. The requirements are that web sites be made easily available for people with a large range of disabilities, specific recommendations being provided by the Internet’s W3C governing body in the form of the Web Accessibility Initiative guidelines;
http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/
Making sure a web site is accessible may be difficult for any number of reasons:
- A non-accessible site already exists that had no plans to be redesigned
- Updating of my web site is not scheduled for a long time
- Content management tools may not yet support accessibility options
- The cost is prohibitive
- Web enabled applications may have been bought as a complete tool
- The complexity of a site and the guidelines mean I cannot provide all functionality needed
How does WiderWeb Accessibility help?
WiderWeb Accessibility provides an alternative version of an existing web site, that complies with accessibility requirements. As an independent intermediary solution it can be integrated to your web site(s) with almost no programming and tailored to your exact needs by our trained accessibility consultants (Corporate edition only).
WiderWeb Accessibility Features:
User Sessions:
- SSL session handling
- JavaScript execution
- User session timeouts - set time to live
- Session creation & tear down
Page Handling:
- Simplifying Pages
- Analysis of script execution results
- Flattening Frames
- Removing unnecessary code
- Allowing Style Configuration
- Applet launch control
- ALT tag heuristics
Customisation:
- 'End of Page' marker changing
- Browser over-rides
- User Preferences