Re: csun not accessible

[Kelly Ford <kford@teleport.com>]

This is emblematic of the supposed leaders in the disability field.  Far 
too often it is do as we say, not do as we do.  I'm sure CSUN 2000 will be 
full of people praising Harry Murphy for his contributions to the 
disability field.  Is this the best we can expect from someone who's 
supposed to care about access?  Well after checking out the conference 
material for the 2000 presentations, I do indeed see that all the papers 
are linked with Javascript addresses.  If those who occupy the supposed 
leadership positions in the disability arena aren't going to take the time 
to address accessibility for all, how can we expect the rest of the world 
to do so.

The web page in question here can be found at:

http://www.csun.edu/cod/conf2000/proceedings.html

I'm sure eventually the staff at CSUN will correct this situation with the 
obligatory song, dance and apology.  It will remind me of the old days when 
they handed out braille conference materials that were not formatted in the 
least.  Will they ever acknowledge that doing this was wrong from the 
start, I doubt it.  Instead they'll sit from their positions on high and 
tell the rest of the world to care about accessibility but we see how much 
they take the time to ensure that what they do is accessible.


This problem impacts more than just people who use Lynx.  Last time I 
checked, Home Page Reader and Webspeak could not follow Javascript 
links.  Hopefully someone can confirm or correct my information on these 
two programs but I believe I have the latest of each and had trouble on the 
page.  The problem is large enough that it is a priority 1 barrier to 
accessibility in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

I'm sure some will view my comments as harsh, critical and negative.  It 
doesn't take a rocket scientist to follow the web  Content Accessibility 
Guidelines.  So why did CSUN fail to do so when constructing their 
page?  Guideline 6.3 states:

    6.3 Ensure that pages are usable when scripts, applets, or other
           programmatic objects are turned off or not supported. If this
           is not possible, provide equivalent information on an
           alternative accessible page. [Priority 1]
           For example, ensure that links that trigger scripts work when
           scripts are turned off or not supported (e.g., do not use
           "javascript:" as the link target). If it is not possible to
           make the page usable without scripts, provide a text equivalent
           with the NOSCRIPT element, or use a server-side script instead
           of a client-side script, or provide an alternative accessible
           page as per checkpoint 11.4. Refer also to guideline 1.