BS 8878. The web accessibility code of practice via BSI (Building accessible experiences for disabled people) is coming soon and it should be interesting reading for all those who want to build their websites so the majority of people can access them:

BS 8878 Web accessibility. Building accessible experiences for disabled people. Code of Practice is applicable to all public and private organizations wishing to offer accessible, usable websites to their customers. BS 8878 has been designed to introduce accessibility, usability and user experience for disabled people to non-technical professionals, some of whom may be completely new to this subject.

It gives guidance on process, rather than on technical and design issues, including recommendations for:

  • involving disabled people in the development process
  • using automated web accessibility tools to assist with accessibility testing
  • the management of the guidance and process for upholding existing accessibility guidelines and specifications.

The new British Standard BS8878 for accessible websites is based on PAS 78 and is due out late 2009. Any time soon hopefully!

Other Reading

If you want to procure, or design and build sites with accessibility in mind in the UK, you’ll find the following documents useful:

…and of course, accessible website design begins with validation – you can validate your html and validate your css using W3C tools and we have a selection of links to the best website accessibility tools.

With any web accessibility guidelines, I like to cut through the soup and see what the folks at Accessify Forum think of each implementation – there’s a lot of passionate accessibility folk who hang out there who are only to ready to help with useful accessibility tips. Check it out.

I do wish the folks responsible for making these documents are available would stop shunting this stuff about. Over the years they don’t even bother redirecting users to where the new files are kept or even leaving a link to the new location – sometimes you need to be a SEO to find the flaming documents. Hows that for accessibility? Whatever happened to cool URI don’t change?

For web developers and those resposible for procuring an accessible website, it’s considered by some on the know that WCAG 2.0 level Double-A (AA) is a solid technical foundation to base a website on, but you are also going to have to test your website with USERS before you can say your site is accessible.

It’s worth noting that it’s still, in late 2009, practically impossible to design a site that will comply with the UK DDA as the UK DDA does not refer to WCAG and it does not lay down a specific level of accessibility for all websites. The purpose of the UK DDA is to legislate against unreasonable discrimination, and to require reasonable adjustments in cases where discrimination occurs for those accessing websites – but that discrimination would obviously have to be determined by a court, and that hasn’t happened in the UK to my knowledge. Of course, building your website to standards like WCAG shows at least you are attempting to make your websites accessible on some some level.

Actionable Tips

  • Build your website to W3C WCAG 2.0 level Double-A (AA)
  • Validate Your HTML & CSS
  • Make it simple for visitors to your website to contact you
  • Make reasonable changes to your website if asked to by someone who has difficulty accessing the information on it
  • Have a culture of inclusiveness in your whole organisation!
  • Learn more about web accessibility because this article is opinion and clearly NOT LEGAL ADVICE.

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