Re: [WSG] Certified Usable
Craig Errey wrote: Certified Usable is backed by our Professional Indemnity insurance and as such is a specifically name service on our policy. For an industry that is generally risk averse, they have audited what and how we're doing it and are comfortable to include it, with no effect on our premium. So is it a way for the corporate bean counters to feel secure with the product, in that light ? Regarding the statement that essentially goes: '90% success, within x minutes +/- 10%', we must use ranges like this because we cannot guarantee 100% usability. Because we use strong statistical methods in the process, we must use confidence intervals and make our statements framed with such statistical rigour and various caveats. This is what gives our insurer confidence that we are not doing things that cannot be done, and that would expose them to risk. The process is being run by Psychologists (Registered in NSW) who have an extensive understanding of testing design, rigour and statistical analysis to ensure the process is run correctly and defensibly. In fact, the ethics that psychologists must abide by regarding testing procedures means that we are fully accountable for what we do by the NSW State Government (specifically Department of Health). There is no pseudo-science here, and no illusion of competency. These staff have at least a Masters degree in Psychology and 5 - 10 years experience in usability. Usability ? As in human cognitive development or HCI or both ? Which ? Regarding what we're defining as usable, it is entirely task driven. It is strictly not designed for simple sites or marketing sites, but can be used for them. Rather it is geared at complex transaction sites and rich applications like internet banking, online travel booking, ERP and CRM systems. In these sites, success rates and time taken (the two primary measures) are easily measured. So if the task is quick and achieves a success, even if the work flow doesn't make intuitive sense, it's Certified Usable ? (This is related to the perils of some CMS solutions I've had the pleasure of working with. What may be usable to a software engineer may not be usable elsewhere. Go read Jeffrey Veen at length on this..) Regarding setting the standard and testing for it, because the process is task driven, and relies on user testing, the evidence for task success or failure, or time taken is observable and can be independently verified. It's a bit like Standards Australia providing consulting on ISO 9000 and then auditing you for compliance. Although they did not necessarily set the original standard, there is independent proof of whether a company complies or not and it is not their opinion, even though they may have set up the ISO process in the organisation. Pass or fail is independently verifiable and another testing group would come to the same conclusion. Task driven solutions sometimes do not make intuitive sense, no matter how fast they are. Which gets into the whole field of self-fulfilling prophecy in that the product works efficiently because it does. In the case of Certified Usable, we set a tough benchmark, usually at a minimum 90% success. We do not use an easy target, such as 50% success rate. There would be no point as real world performance would not match the claim of Certified Usable. Yet from what it looks like at first glance, CU is simply a way for the corporate bean counters to feel secure about a product so that they/you have a potential inside run against the multitude of CMS solutions out there. There is no conflict of interest because the measurement of achieving the set standard is transparent. It is not our opinion because it is based on observable behaviour - someone's success is usually binary, and the time take is finite. As psychologists, we are good at observing and documenting behaviour and doing it in a way that is accurate and repeatable. So where's the associated peer reviewed psychological studies of such things ? Transparency should mean that others who likewise have studied human cognitive behaviour within the workplace can test whether your tools actually do the job. (And yes, I'd be one of them : that is my only caveat within this discussion, acknowledging the potential for conflict of interest) What may be usable to a deaf user may not be usable to a blind user or vice versa, to paraphrase of the team leaders I've been working with in terms of accessible CMS solutions in the last few years. lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
[WSG] WSG Resources broken
Russ, I was getting continued CFML errors when trying to access the Resources subpages of the WSG today (main Resources page fine, any subpage spat errors). Any gremlins in the system you haven't exorcised yet ? Thanks Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Converting the heathen: never again
Ben Buchanan wrote: Hi, I hereby publicly declare that my days of complaining to website authors that I cannot view their site at 800x600, and then opening my big mouth about other dubious issues I notice on their site, are now over. [snip] I'm astonished at the tone - although not especially surprised by the content - of their reply. Even if they thought you were being the biggest pain in history, they should remain polite when replying. I've seen and hear similar tones within the CMS meatspace (and usually been on the end of very offensive messages from the relevant powers that be when I raise standards and accessibility). It seems pervasive of corporate culture in this respect. Why is it the suits and marketroids think they understand how the web works when they're in marketing and business management ? ISPs remain no different than any other web enabled bells-and-whistles deployments. Quality matters, doesn't it? ;) Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Converting the heathen: never again
Lachlan Hunt wrote: What kind of person would rather insult the customer instead of admitting they have a problem? A bank ? I managed to get the standard filler text for a bank's customer service department in pointing out some issues on Firefox 1.5. The problem still isn't fixed either.. Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Target sued over non-accessible site
matt andrews wrote: On 10/02/06, Lachlan Hunt [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Angus at InfoForce Services wrote: Most people have JAVAScript turned off, According to what statistics? I think you'll find most people actually have it turned on. Indeed. I can report from some recent testing on the sites I work on (which have hundreds of thousands of members, and thousands of simultaneous users), that less than 0.1% of users had Javascript turned off. They're dating sites, so they're probably skewed more towards the home/casual user than the office user, but still... I was surprised it was so stark. Amount of Javascript disabled based on various client profiles I've got: My site: Less than 0.1% Commercial music site: Less than 0.5% Commercial / education health care site: Less than 0.7% References available on request. Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] what cms system
Alexorbit wrote: hey buddy, joomla its the first CMS to apply a valid xhtml+css plus Ajax admin functions... try do get it. http://joomla.org here you can find a lot of cms www.opensourcecms.com http://www.opensourcecms.com This is a pretty old thread. Can the admins please shift it to the WSG-CMS list as it seems to have resurrected itself ? The WSG-CMS list is a much better place to discuss web standards CMS architecture than using the main WSG list. Thanks Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Screen-Print-Wireless
Miika Mäkinen wrote: I remember seeing one test on the @media handheld support and found it: http://htmldog.com/ptg/archives/55.php and a conclusion at http://www.htmldog.com/ptg/archives/56.php I guess the main issue still is that sizable chunk of mobile browser share (Pocket IE) also apply styles that are supposed to be specific to the screen media type.. I need to do some stuff for mobile later this year as well, and so far I'm planning to send mobiles different pages than desktop browsers. Also it's not that easy to make content that works on sooo different resolutions AND you should remember that the connection speed of a mobile is usually slow e.g. sending lot of content that is hidden using stylesheets seems like a waste. I think that it depends on the type of content you have... articles and blogs etc. could probably be sent the same to all browsers, while more of an application still will need different versions. Would resolution dependent CSS switching also work within this model ? http://www.themaninblue.com/writing/perspective/2006/01/19/ The concept I'm working on using this tech is as follows: 1) For Pocket IE and other PDAs, run a basic 200 pixel wide design under screen media type, then step up to 640 by 480, 800 by 600 and so on for normal (IE/Fox/Opera/Safari) browser rendering 2) run a cut down version of the 200 pixel screen model for the handheld media type. 3) Run a boilerplate print version aimed at correctly printing everything in order at A4 or Letter. Would this method also work ? Sure, it looks like a lot of work and possible duplication, but then you could also extend to the tv and tty media types inside this model.. Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Dean Edwards IE7... just PNG support?
Joshua Street wrote: Hi all, Just wondering if anyone's had any luck with using JUST the PNG component of Dean Edwards' IE7 JavaScript? The full thing seems like overkill, because that's the only feature I really need. Alternatively, how does one go about getting alpha support for CSS background images? Not having a great deal of luck with this... Regards, Josh Josh, According to the specs for DE-IE7, you can specify a specific module: !-- compliance patch for microsoft browsers -- !--[if lt IE 7] script src=/ie7/ie7-core.js type=text/javascript/script script src=/ie7/ie7-graphics.js type=text/javascript/script ![endif]-- http://dean.edwards.name/IE7/usage/configure.html Pick and mix as you want. The graphics JS file should just be the PNG fix. Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] CSS Driven?
russ - maxdesign wrote: What is the definition of a CSS driven design ? You could say that a css-driven site is one that has all or the majority of presentation removed from the markup and placed in CSS files. So where's the dividing line between table based design and CSS driven ? My searching thus far has turned up Meyer, comments about the Zen Garden, and a few other proponents across the Net implying or stating that CSS driven means pretty much all CSS based, not just some.. and I'd like to know why they are right. Anyone? Having said this, I googled the word driven for a definition and found that it also meant mobs goaded by blind hatred I don't know about anyone else but I often use angry mobs to control my web pages - though it is hard to get them to exhibit blind hate. Love the definition, Russ ;) :) Russ Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
[WSG] CSS Driven?
I've seen a lot of diverse opinion on this thus far in my Googlebombing, so I may as well ask it here.. What is the definition of a CSS driven design ? Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] standards or confusion?
Christian Montoya wrote: Tables + tag soup = hacking. Your friend really needs to get with it. Validation is not the main issue, it's accessibility. Speed is important too. If you can convince him to use CSS (if you can't, you have a lot to learn too, or he is dumb) then he will want to get browsers out of quirks mode, since that is where the real differences show. Then he will have to have a doctype, to make sure that browsers (mostly) follow the rules. I've had the unfortunately task of educating vendors (usually some form of CMS/DMS) in this area, and some are definitely more resistant to this than others. Mentioning the speed gains and legal backing now behind accessibility law only seems to get some vendors ingrained into a defence of their own workflow models, though. Apart from that, I second everything Christian said ;) Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Mambo Accessibility
I've never used it myself, but you might want to take a look at Joomla. It's compatible with Mambo at this point http://www.joomla.org/index.php?Itemid=44option=com_faqcatid=7 and the developers are at least are trying to be compliant and accessible http://help.joomla.org/content/view/805/125/ Cheers, Steve Ferguson - http://illumit.com/ Areas that Joomla is dealing with: 1) Frontend and backend accessibility considerations 2) Well formed, semantic code. Minimal cruft. 3) Appropriate use of markup 4) Design standards (e.g. looking at W3C Core Styles, what classes we really need, correct use of classes) I say this as part of the Usability and Accessibility Group within Joomla. Whilst I'm not the actual core dev team, I have been helping out with ideas and code architecture. Joomla is going in the right direction. It's just not there yet..;) Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media http:///www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Noise (was) Mambo Accessibility
Quoting Nick Gleitzman [EMAIL PROTECTED]: Is it my imagination, or has this list acquired an unreasonable amount of noise lately? Aren't there separate lists for CMS and/or software issues? Call me a grouch, but all I've seen in the last little while has been FF1.5 and Mambo... C'mon, guys - can we get back OT, please? N I'm quite happy for the M Accessibility thread to be shifted to the WSG CMS list.. (along with anything else mentioning any form of CMS) Anyone else ? Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
[WSG] Validate a PNG?
I'm involved in a template competition at the moment and the requirements state XHTML and CSS compliance as a specific requirement for submission to the contest. The twist is that the designs must be submitted as PNG or JPG, and as far as I know, there isn't a mechanical validation system that validates a Photoshopped layout to web standards compliance. Could this be a misunderstanding on the part of the competition hosters as to the difference between layercake designing and rapid CSS prototyping ? Thought, comments, flames all welcome ;) Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Validate a PNG?
Nick Gleitzman wrote: On 9 Nov 2005, at 7:02 PM, Absalom Media wrote: ...and the requirements state XHTML and CSS compliance as a specific requirement for submission to the contest. The twist is that the designs must be submitted as PNG or JPG... Huh? Sounds to me like the organisers just don't know what they're talking about. That's why I asked them to clarify. It took a while to get any meaningful answer. Unless their intention is to vet designs as images, and only look at the code of shortlisted entries - ? No, unfortunately it's not this. It looks like the organisers are still thinking of design in terms of the layercake workflow, which seems to go against current trends for rapid CSS prototyping of design work. I can submit an image. The workflow for the design mustn't be rapid CSS prototyping as the workflow I use is somehow considered a rules violation, even though it ends up with a design prototype as requested. Weird. It only gets weirder the more I look at it. ;) Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] flash and accessabilty
Please, scott, I'm being spammed to death with your post in this thread endlessly repeating in the WSG list. Can you hold off the barbarian hordes for a while ? Thanks Lawrence Meckan -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] flash and accessabilty
Ryan wrote: I don't think it's him, because I only sent one copy of my previous message and I just received two copies with the rest of the stuff from the list, it may be a technical diffidulty with the list. I'm still only recieving one copy of everyone else's post on the list apart from scott. Thanks Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] flash and accessabilty
Please, scott, I'm being spammed to death with your post in this thread endlessly repeating in the WSG list. Can you hold off the barbarian hordes for a while ? Thanks Lawrence Meckan -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] flash and accessabilty
Please, scott, I'm being spammed to death with your post in this thread endlessly repeating in the WSG list. Can you hold off the barbarian hordes for a while ? Thanks Lawrence Meckan -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] flash and accessabilty
Ryan wrote: I don't think it's him, because I only sent one copy of my previous message and I just received two copies with the rest of the stuff from the list, it may be a technical diffidulty with the list. I'm still only recieving one copy of everyone else's post on the list apart from scott. Thanks Lawrence -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help ** ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
[WSG] ActiveMatter
I know this might be slightly off toic, but the CMS listserv on WSG won't allow me to subscribe: Sorry, the mailing list cms@webstandardsgroup.org does not allow subscriptions. I'm currently part of a major project to roll out the ActiveMatter CMS. Now I'm wondering if anyone has any confirmed sightings of this product conforming to the following: 1) W3C HTML/XHTML and CSS 2) WCAG Level 1 Thanks Lawrence Meckan -- Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] Proper way to embed fonts?
Alan Trick wrote: Hi, I'm working on redesigning a company website to make it more accessable and I've done a pretty decent job with makeing everything scale with the font sizes, but I have one big problem. Our company is developing a particular font that we want to use for our company name, a font that will be used on all our products. So, either I put the text in an image (which is making me cringe already), or I find some way to enable our visitors to download the fonts automatically. I did a little searching around and I found that there is a way to do that for certain versions of IE, but I was wondering if there was a way that works that I could do this that would work on all browsers, or at least NN4, IE=5, FF, Moz, Safari, Opera. Has the W3C created and standards to allow this to work? Alan, Here are my suggestions for cross-browser font embedding: sIFR http://www.mikeindustries.com/blog/archive/2004/12/sifr-2.0-release-candidate-3 or: sIIR http://axisfive.net/aboutsiir/ I experimented with the MS WEFT tool on some design layouts before finding I can deliver standards compliant font embedding with sIFR. sIIR may be better suited for your company font as sIFR depreciates back to CSS font calls when either Javascript or Flash isn't enabled. Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
Re: [WSG] XHTML complient in-browser Rich Text Editor.
Matt wrote: Hi Everyone, I am looking for a lean browser based text editor which creates valid XHTML output. Basically I would use a normal text area, but the site I am developing requires the ability to add hyper links, paragraphs, and change the text style. I want something that will automatically run (i.e. I want to avoid having the user manually install something)... I have looked at xstandard (http://www.xstandard.com) and I'm pretty impressed, but I found it to be really slow to load as it might be a bit too rich on functionality for my needs... TinyMCE is what I use and recommend: http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/ It usually outputs valid code. Lawrence Meckan Absalom Media Mob: (04) 1047 9633 ABN: 49 286 495 792 http://www.absalom.biz ** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list getting help **
