Accessibility

Recently I visited the Apple store in Basingstoke and had a play with the iPad. Whilst there I heard various comments about the iPad and iPhone from staff and customers. The primary one was the lack of support for flash. I tend to ignore comments like this, then over the last few weeks I have heard or had comments made to me about the majority of photographers websites, portfolio websites (web designers / developers) using flash for a gallery and how few people use anything else.

This does concern me for several reasons. Almost all of the professional photographers websites that I visit do not use flash at all, so not too sure why people think this is the case. What I do find is that non-professionals (photographers or web developers) tend to use flash though for a few reasons. The main one being that they publish images to the Internet using software like Lightroom to create a flash gallery, it is simple and easy to do, little if any coding is required and it looks pretty. In fact I hear that a lot, “we like it because it is pretty.”

So what is my problem then? Well simple, accessibility.

What? Accessibility! This is a standard which says all content should be accessible by anyone, visually impaired, hard of hearing, etc. So a simple screen reader should be able t interpret the page and give an audible (voice) description of the page.

Flash content can be made accessible, but, what I tend to find is that it is largely ignored. At a stroke this renders flash content inaccessible to some visitors. This may only be a small minority, but is still something that should be taken into account.

On the same note there is also the problem of mobile devices, many of which simply cannot display flash content. Either because like the iPad it is not supported or because they are simple and non-powerful devices. This is then another group of visitors that are being excluded.

As I said above, I have no problem with flash, it is powerful and does a fantastic job, but needs to be used correctly. However, this is a problem with HTML as well as I see a lot of people forgetting the basics or simply do not understand it in the first place. With flash I try explaining this to people but most of them do not understand web design properly, do not understand accessibility or simply do not care.

So what do I use? Simple, HTML and jQuery. Anyone who asks me, that is what I say and most think it is ridiculous, many also do not know what jQuery is.

Why do I use it? A few reasons.

• HTML is supported by every browser and is accessible, easily.
• jQuery can accomplish the same sort of effects, that I use, as flash.
• jQuery is lighter and requires less processing power than flash.
• jQuery can be coded using a text editor, no expensive software is required.
• Can easily have a fallback.

Let’s just take a look at the last one, what do I mean by fallback? Say you ahve set your site up using nothing but flash. What happens when I visit and do not have flash installed? I either install flash or leave. Even if only parts of the site need flash, I still may not want to install it, or may not be able to install it. So you should have an alternative way of dealing with visitors that do not have or want flash installed. This is a fallback. Again some sites do this. With jQuery it is relatively simple to have a fallback. If the visitor does not have JavaScript installed, then a basic page is shown and none of the effects work, but there will be no boxes saying install plug-in.

To further muddy the waters, we have HTML 5 and CSS 3 coming out, which bring even more functionality to the standard browser. If this will compete with the true power of flash or not remains to be seen.

Summary

First off, I am not getting at anyone here and I am not saying do not use flash. I know not everyone is a pro and everyone has to start somewhere.

So what am I getting at then? Simple, irrespective of what you use, flash, HTML, jQuery, etc., make sure you know what you are doing and that it is done correctly. If you are not a professional or are unsure, take feedback, learn from it and ask questions and never assume you know the best.. Just remember that keyword, accessibility; you do not want to exclude anyone from accessing your site.