Some institutions and organizations require that their websites meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines [WCAG] standards and we highly recommend everyone comply we these in order for your website to be accessible under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
Eastern Standard designs and creates websites to be ADA compliant following the principles laid out by W3C.
The WCAG documents explain how to make web content more accessible to people with disabilities. Web "content" generally refers to the information in a web page or web application, including:
- natural information such as text, images, and sounds
- code or markup that defines structure, presentation, etc.
WCAG is broken into four major categories/principles:
- Perceivable
- Operable
- Understandable
- Robust
Learn more about the current version (WCAG 2.1) on the official W3C site or on Wikipedia.
Although this video was made by an organization in Australia, it very briefly summarizes what "accessibility" refers to in terms of the web.
If your site needs to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, there are several considerations to be aware of with respect to:
- color palettes for website elements and text
- creating/saving your documents that users will download
- embedding audio and video clips
- embedding images and photos on webpages
While this section does not go into a comprehensive review of WCAG, it provides considerations/solutions to some of the more common issues that arise if "accessibility" is required but an after-thought in the website build process.
A couple useful tools to scan pages of your website for accessibility ratings:
Contrast checking tools:
http://gmazzocato.altervista.org/colorwheel/wheel.php
Chrome plugins:
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/siteimprove-accessibility/efcfolpjihicnikpmhnmphjhhpiclljc
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lighthouse/blipmdconlkpinefehnmjammfjpmpbjk
Firefox plugin:
https://addons.mozilla.org/EN-US/firefox/addon/wcag-contrast-checker/