"The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect."
Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, recognized that universal access is a critical element of good design.
The Web's landscape has altered dramatically since its inception, when many websites completely ignored users with disabilities.
"Most project managers assumed that blind people could not use the Web anyway, so therefore they also could not use the specific website that was being developed," said Web usability guru Jakob Nielsen.
"We have now eradicated this misunderstanding, and most Internet managers do know that they have to care about users with disabilities."
Despite progress, websites today are still three times harder for users with disabilities to use than for other users.
"In most projects, accessibility has fairly low priority because project managers underestimate the number of people who are impacted by design problems," Nielsen said. "They think that they are just losing a handful of customers, whereas in fact they may be turning away millions of customers, especially among senior citizens, who constitute a big and rich group that's getting more and more active online."
Now, a new software product allows developers to check pages for compliance with usability guidelines as they code.
The software, "LIFT-Nielsen Norman Group Edition," or LIFT NN/g, works with Macromedia Dreamweaver (4.0 or MX) on both Windows and Macintosh.
LIFT NN/g checks to ensure that websites are compliant with the World Wide Web Consortium's accessibility guidelines and Section 508 guidelines.
"The new software basically makes it easier to be a Web designer and to remember the guidelines for users with disabilities," Nielsen said. "Instead of relying on having the designer remember every single guideline at every single step of developing the website, we are offloading the memory burden onto the computer, which is very good at staying alert and checking for a lot of details all the time without getting tired."
The Nielsen Norman Group created guidelines by conducting user tests and observing a range of users (including those who were blind or had poor vision or motor-skill challenges) interacting with a variety of websites.
The software alerts developers of any possible violations of these guidelines. A fix wizard automatically repairs broken tables, images, scripts, cascading menus and other glitches. A JavaScript Analyzer avoids common errors. A monitor checks work as it's completed, so mistakes are fixed before they are perpetuated on multiple Web pages.
Hundreds of pages can be processed in just a few minutes, saving hours that would otherwise be spent coding by hand.
"The main benefit is that the computer doesn't get tired; thus, it will check every design detail for every single guideline all the time," Nielsen said. "Also, the software has a simple link from any occurrence of a potential usability problem to the relevant research material that explains why it's an issue and what questions to consider when deciding whether to keep or fix the questionable design element.
"This is much faster than having to look up the answer in a book, and in fact it's a great example of the original promise of hypertext."
The software goes beyond merely focusing on accessibility to promote usability and improve the Web user experience for everyone.
"Technical accessibility is not enough to make a website easy to use," Nielsen said. "The real question is whether users can get what they want from a website in a reasonable amount of time and whether the visit is pleasant for them. Users with disabilities are humans and need easy and simple user interfaces just like anybody else."
"Making websites more accessible can go beyond the benefits to people with disabilities," agreed Doug Bowman, network design manager for Terra Lycos (Terra Lycos is Wired News' parent company). "Accessibility measures also make good business sense.
"The Web is just as much a public space as our downtown office buildings and suburban shopping malls. By not being aware of, or taking the time to implement, common Web accessibility measures and guidelines, we are -- as website producers -- essentially hiding the elevators, ramps, handrails and wide doors which welcome anyone into our virtual buildings and help them find their way or move from place to place."
But while the software automates many core usability and accessibility solutions, humans must ultimately decide whether a design has a usability problem.
"As with all usability, it is based on the need to create good human interaction, so it is important not to take the human out of the design process," said Jason Taylor, senior product manager for UsableNet.
The LIFT NN/g software works like Microsoft Word's grammar check, allowing designers to check fundamentals that are sometimes missed due to busy schedules and tight deadlines. But like grammar, usability doesn't always follow strict conventions.
"While it's helpful to know when you've gone outside those normal, recommended practices, automated software could misguide someone with less experience in Web accessibility if they follow every suggestion," Bowman said.
The cost of the software, available at UsableNet for $549, could be prohibitive for some small websites.
"I don't see smaller companies happily forking over another $550 for accessibility software when they really haven't yet been educated on the benefits of making their websites accessible," Bowman said.
What's more, some larger companies use other HTML editors besides Dreamweaver for designing and managing websites.
The LIFT NN/g software is just one of the evaluation, repair and transform tools that can be used in conjunction with more complex websites serving environments used by large websites.
Developers can also check the accessibility of their website free of charge using a tool commonly known as "bobby", which checks for compliance with the basic W3C standards.
"Large, dynamic database-driven sites often use complex scripts and serving environments to pull together content from multiple sources, then compile it into HTML," Bowman said. "Website design may begin in an editor like Dreamweaver. But the final HTML churned out by a content management system may leave out some of the accessibility-checked code from Dreamweaver."
Despite these drawbacks, software producers and designers agree that any improvement in accessibility for people with disabilities will also make it easier for other Internet users to navigate the Web.
"Over time, these tools become educational in nature," Bowman said. "Repeated reminders of what could be done can eventually become ingrained and lead to common practice."
