>I wake up and am caught in a mire. That's your own fault for not being a die-hard 2-hour a day man. I dunno, the youth of today , no stamina ... ;o)
>From a search engine standpoint any form of hidden text is considered >spamming. That includes, but not limited to, negative positioning, placing >text behind images or even setting visibility or display to one of the many >methods of hiding. I would qualify that with the phrase 'intention to spam'. You won't be penalised for using sensible options specifically intended for accessibility like off-screen jump links. The engines aren't stupid. However, collapsed, display: none, <noscript> WOW (white-on-white) text specifically designed to deliver content to non-sighted users ... er ... like spiders will likely get you blitzed. Check out 'website development' under Google UK; 60% spam results on the first 2 pages. But that's OT (over the top & off-topic). >From a usability, accessibility and SEO point of view never put your site >name in your page title. You have other places you can use that. For >instance, you can use your first ALT attribute, typically your logo, to >identify your site or company name. That uses the screen reader to it's >advantage and identifies to the non-visual or low vision visitor what site >they are on. The visual users never need it because they can obviously see >your logo. >So, using an H1 in that location would be incorrect. Yup, there's too much clever? (pointless) stuff going on when it's entirely unnecessary -- and semantically wrong. >The first H1 should mimic or mirror the page title ... maybe not entirely. >That reinforces the page title for the search engines. And, best of all it >gives the screen reader user an understanding of the overall page topic. >There have been times where I changed the H1 from the page title to a more >descriptive heading. Agreed entirely >Yes, some screen readers have the capability of grouping all links together >regardless of position on the page. And, yes, some do allow navigation >based upon headings. Unfortunately, they don't all do that. Therefore, >taking the position that you should design your page based upon those >capabilities is errant. This is as much a user issue as it is developer ignorance of the capability of contemporary AT. Education is required both ends. >Skip navigation can be hidden from view or can be placed in view near at the >top of the page. Unfortunately, that would then be the first thing the >search engines see. Nothing really wrong with that at all. The H1 >essentially identifies the beginning of the content. So, some and I won't >say which ones, search engines ignore everything prior to that. Ouch! This >does not lead to your pages being ignored if you do not include heading >tags. But, the proper use of heading tags will help your site perform much >better. >And, for the screen readers that do use headings to navigate that can get >visitors to the main content much faster. Yup. ... Good to get this out in the open. And I feel it unnecessary to comment on the remainder of your text, save to say sensible reading. >I hope this helps. My apologies for being so long. I always use the book analogy to describe a Web page and it's great to have my personal views endorsed by somebody who's obviously given great consideration to the topic. Mike Pepper Accessible Web Developer www.seowebsitepromotion.com Administrator www.gawds.org ***************************************************** The discussion list for http://webstandardsgroup.org/ See http://webstandardsgroup.org/mail/guidelines.cfm for some hints on posting to the list & getting help *****************************************************
