Making Your Pages More Accessible

Some of your disabled visitors may use a touchscreen monitor and a pointing
stick held in their mouth (or affixed to a headband) to touch the
screen to navigate websites. Some may use a pointer device to press keys
on a special keyboard (which waits for the next key after pressing
the ALT or CTRL or SHIFT key). You can code your pages to facilitate
this type of accessibility.

Here is an example of a navigation menu across the top of a
web page.

Text Interpretation of Image



In this example:



The ALT key when used in conjunction with the accesskey will
move cursor to the link associated with the accesskey.



“hreflang” tells the browser the language used on the linked page
is in.



The “title” is a popup similar to an “alt” tag.



The tabindex establishes the order that the tab key can be used to allow the visitor to move
between links on a page.



Best Resources for Further Study

The American Library Association hosts an online version of Adaptive Technology for the Internet: Making Electronic Resources Accessible to All by Barbara T. Mates. This online book is chock full of great information on how to make your site accessible to individuals with a wide range of disabilities.