The 'azimuth' property and accessibility

I recently came across the azimuth property in CSS. I've personally never used this before nor have I seen anyone else use it and upon further investigation I learned that this controls direction of sound from speakers.

So in a way this could very much be useful for screen readers and accessibility for the hearing impaired, but since so few people use it (again, I've never seen it used) I question its necessity for truly accessible web sites.

Not even the governments' Section 508 web site uses this property in its stylesheets. So I wonder if this property is even worth worrying about at all? If anyone has used it before and can offer anything, I'd be very interested to learn more about it.

Respond to this post   Permalink

Userbility and Designerability

Jakob Nielsen said “To design an easy-to-use interface, pay attention to what users do, not only what they say. Self-reported claims are unreliable, as are user speculations about future behavior.”

I think though, that this is only half of the challenge. The other half is a similar statement directed towards the designer. Since we are the ones designing the interface, of course we understand it. We have to step back and look at it objectively, taking all potential users into account.

It's hard trying to think of scenarios other than what we'd find ourselves in, especially if that means "dumbing something down". The truth of the matter is though, that since the demographics of web site users are unpredictable in most cases, in order to make something truly usable, you have to think and build for the lowest common denominator.

Going back to what Jakob said though, it's important to note the close relationship that must be maintained between the client, the users, and the designer. A successful web site cannot be built by one-sided views. It will either be usable for the client or usable for the designer, but not both. We must consider all possible users.

Respond to this post   Permalink

Right is Wrong

Right-aligning text hinders readability and therefore usability and should be avoided. Function over form. Jakob Nielsen discusses this in more detail in his recent AlertBox article and gives several good examples of faulty navigational menus as well as reasons why right-aligning text should be avoided.

Basically, we read from left to right, the left being where we go to reacquaint ourselves with the structure. Left-aligning text helps our eyes stay on track which makes reading easier.

Three main points Jakob uses are:

• Left-justify the menu, so that the user's eyes can move in a straight line and don't have to re-acquire the beginning of each new line.
• Start each menu item with the one or two most information-carrying words.
• Avoid using the same few words to start list items, because doing so makes them harder to scan.

Again this hearkens back to earlier posts stating that design should not have priority over functionality. A good designer will be able to balance the two - to produce a well-designed system that is also highly functional and usable.

Respond to this post   Permalink