• (cs) in reply to cyclops
    cyclops:
    Am I the only one who thought the phrase "As long as we, the majority, can access content, that’s all that really matters." was sarcasm in the context it was used?

    I just recently became disabled, although not in a way that prevents me to use computer technology, and I can say that I was not the least bit offended by the OBVIOUS sarcasm of this article.

    As a developer of software and websites, I know first-hand how little thought accessibility is given by software developers and management. It's not usually until a nice big lucrative government contract is looming that companies scramble to make their software accessible in the most minimal way.

    The article was pure sarcasm, and anyone claiming to be offended is trolling, stupid, or both.

  • Noah Slater (unregistered) in reply to cklam

    the mindset behind that one caused the death of more than six millions jews and countless other persons back in world war 2.

    Well, well... I have enjoyed watching you all fall over your self to prove just how wrong I am. I hasten to point out that I actually retracted my main argument. Guess it pays to read before you comment.

    Either way... I'm calling Godwin's Law on this one.

    So long, and thanks for all the fish.

  • s (unregistered) in reply to Martijn van Zal
    Martijn van Zal:
    I once saw a site where they did all their hyper links in Bar style :)

    I once saw a site where every single link was a separate Java applet. With function of "rollover" (change background image under the text).

  • s (unregistered) in reply to Noah
    Noah Slater:
    The term "differently abled" is offensive to me as a disabled person, as is your assumption that all of your readers are able bodied.

    I am a disabled person and I read your site - please don't refer to me as if:

    a) I am "different" is some way b) I should not be reading your site due to my disablement

    You're a touchy jerk giving a bad name to all disabled people. captcha: stinky.

  • Thany (unregistered) in reply to Noah
    Noah Slater:
    a) I am "different" is some way b) I should not be reading your site due to my disablement

    Sorry, but I just need to reply here. I don't mean any disrespect, but, uhm, different doesn't mean anything negative. It's actually a more respectful way of saying you've got something going than saying you're disabled (obviously you're not, because then you wouldn't be able to do anything, right?). And how can you be not different from when you are disabled and I am not? In my country, the literal translation of a disabled person is "invalid" or "less valid"...

    Don't know about you, but I'd be offended by that for sure ;)

  • (cs) in reply to codeman38
    codeman38:
    Even more oddly, on the Russian site, "сс" is converted into "B". There are several "nedelya klaBiki" posts. Not sure what sort of weird round-trip transliteration is going on here!
    Russian "c" translates to Western "s" and we already know "ss" is being converted to "B". So "сс" --> "ss" --> "B"
  • Pilum (unregistered) in reply to W
    W:
    Monkios:
    Eulbobo:
    One of the "first" recommendations for accessibility is the possibility for a website to work without javascript enabled.

    Good try, but it's hard to beat the habits

    The target attribute isn't included in the anchor element in strict XHTML.

    You can do what this guy did or you can change the DTD for your website to allow the target attribute. Most web developper don't know this.

    Or you can fuck off with the popups and use a regular link.

    Ok, to all you web n00bs, here's how it's done:

    <a href="Accessibility

    Popup and regular link rolled into one. Accessibility and the proper way to do it - "javascript:" is a relic from before the days of event handlers.

  • Pilum (unregistered) in reply to Pilum

    (And I managed to mess that one up, of course :P)

  • The real wtf fool (unregistered) in reply to Noah Slater
    Noah Slater:
    Well, well... I have enjoyed watching you all fall over your self to prove just how wrong I am. I hasten to point out that I actually retracted my main argument.

    Please engage brain before commencing typing in future.

  • (cs) in reply to Rich
    Rich:
    Gsquared:
    For example, in a discussion of sunburn, the statement, "pale skin, like that possessed by caucasians, is more succeptible to sunburn than more heavily melinized skin, such as that possed by people of color, and thus requires a higher SPF sunscreen to be safe".

    What I find offensive is the implication that I am a person without color.

    Rich

    I think a street comic said it best before...

    "People call us colored? When I get up in the morning I'm brown. When I get mad, I'm brown. When I get sick, I'm brown. When I die I'll still be brown. You others though, when you get up in the morning you are pink. When you get mad your are red. When you get sick you are green. When you die you will be gray. You are the colored people!"

  • (cs) in reply to SteveBosman
    SteveBosman:
    Russian "c" translates to Western "s" and we already know "ss" is being converted to "B". So "сс" --> "ss" --> "B"
    Yeah, I realized that... it just seemed strange that the conversion is happening in what seems to be two passes. I guess why I was thinking 'round-trip' was that, since the Cyrillic was already being transliterated, it doesn't seem like it should be going through a second layer of processing once it's been Romanized.
  • Hunter Thomas (unregistered) in reply to Noah Slater

    You sir, do not understand the joke. The portion you quote was obviously a tongue in cheek reference to how most people treat website design.

    Yes, this is a sadly common and prevalent view. That doesn't mean the author is unaware or supportive of it. You are to up tight. My wife (who has a neuro-muscular motor impairment) and one of my best friends (who is blind, and the best sysadmin I know) laugh at people who get this up tight about accessibility.

    This site is for poking fun of how badly the intent of the architects can get mangled when people with interest in perverting the tech (usually for money, one way or another) get their hands on it.

    This site is not your pulpit for fixing how people view accessible design.

    Your comments are the equivalent of walking into a church, and yelling at people that they need to read the bible and follow god harder.

  • Hunter Thomas (unregistered) in reply to Hunter Thomas
    Noah Slater:
    No, you are right - it wasn't his major point, the objectionable language was used seriously.

    I quote:

    "As long as we, the majority, can access content, that’s all that really matters."

    How would this make you feel as a disabled reader? Alienated? Maybe you will reply "no" but the fact of the matter is that this language distances this site from disabled readers.

    It's subtle, but it's important.

    Hunter Thomas:
    You sir, do not understand the joke. The portion you quote was obviously a tongue in cheek reference to how most people treat website design.

    Yes, this is a sadly common and prevalent view. That doesn't mean the author is unaware or supportive of it. You are to up tight. My wife (who has a neuro-muscular motor impairment) and one of my best friends (who is blind, and the best sysadmin I know) laugh at people who get this up tight about accessibility.

    This site is for poking fun of how badly the intent of the architects can get mangled when people with interest in perverting the tech (usually for money, one way or another) get their hands on it.

    This site is not your pulpit for fixing how people view accessible design.

    Your comments are the equivalent of walking into a church, and yelling at people that they need to read the bible and follow god harder.

    Crap, the post I was quoting originally didn't make it. Bastards. Fixed.

  • Marc (unregistered) in reply to Martijn van Zal

    I once saw a site where they did all their hyper links in Bar style :)

    I once worked at a place where the head of our IT department had a site full of links like that. When I criticized it and asked why he didn't use plain HTML links that simply 'always work', his answer was "because at the time the site was built it was a better solution". The real reason, of course, was that he copy-pasted the links from somewhere else because he couldn't write code worth sh*t himself. His management skills were also nonexistent. Except for how he manged to compensated for his lack of competence by ass licking.

  • No one (unregistered)

    YOU ARE ALL DISABLED. There is also no title attribute on the link, so screen readers are out. The Javascript is secondary.

  • (cs) in reply to W

    Agreed. If one really wants popups with specific window sizes/properties, then I think this:

    Blah

    is the best solution. The downside is that it uses a name, so other links will open in the same window. I'm sure the JS syntax is incorrect, I never use JS. :-)

  • pgaule (unregistered) in reply to Noah Slater
    Noah Slater:
    Anyway, what attitude are you speaking of? Should I be afraid to voice my opinion in case YOU don't like it?

    You should be afraid of voicing your opinion because it makes you look like an idiot.

  • Jon (unregistered) in reply to Pilum
    Pilum:
    (And I managed to mess that one up, of course :P)
    I'll say. It still has an onclick event. Can't we all agree that auto-spawning popups is the real WTF?
  • Andrew (unregistered)

    Over 100 comments and no one seems to understand standards.

    Foo

    You can then use JS to make that link popup. But you need the damn title, and the href, otherwise a link it is not.

    Every time I have seen accessibility discussed on mainstream sites this is the kind of bullshit I have seen.

    If you are disabled, the internet can be a very useful tool, why unnecessarily make it more difficult for all of us to use? Accessibility is for everyone.

  • Anonymous (unregistered) in reply to dolo54
    dolo54:
    Plus, exactly term would you prefer? "Handy-capable"??? Plenty of black people I know have said that the term "people of color" is fairly offensive in that it sounds pretty much like "colored" where as "black" is totally fine with them.
    I find "people of colour" not offensive, but ridiculous instead.

    Are there colourless people? I've never seen one or heard of any, except in sci-fi's featuring "invisible man".

    All real people have skin colour. White is itself a proper colour, too!

  • Anonymous (unregistered) in reply to Michael Buschbeck
    Michael Buschbeck:
    There is no trivial mapping of "ss" to "ß" in German. We do use double-s in our language; "ß" is a distinct character, even though it's occasionally transcribed as "ss" where the "ß" letter isn't available (in plain ASCII, for example).
    "Occasionally"? Which "we" are you talking about? The Swiss always use "ss" instead of "ß". Always. They have got rid of das scharfe S for decades since a spelling reform, and the world (or the country) hasn't collapsed because of it. Further, when capitalizing, "ß" always becomes "SS" (or "SZ" in some regions). Some people do keep using "ß" in all-caps signs, but that's non-standard.

    These make the 1996 German spelling reform ridiculous in keeping the "ß" in Germany and Austria. The Swiss can live without it. So, why can't "we"?

  • Anonymous (unregistered) in reply to Lucas Goodwin
    Lucas Goodwin:
    On topic:

    Popups are just bad design even with-out the added irony of putting a pop-up link on the term accessibility.

    I'll never understand why designers try to make webpages behave like client apps.

    Just because... they can! (Not that they should.)
  • Anonymous (unregistered) in reply to Gsquared
    Gsquared:
    And yet again, the language is crippled by someone who just plain doesn't understand the words. "Dis" = not, against, missing; "ability" = a capacity or skill to accomplish or do something. Thus, "disability" simply means "lacking a skill or capacity to accomplish something". Is a blind person "disabled"? Well, he/she does not have the capacity to see, ipso, he/she is "dis"-"able" to see, ipso, "disabled". Same for someone lacking legs = lacking the abilities for which legs are necessary = disabled.

    Is that a pejorative or insulting term? Not at all. It expresses a simple fact.

    I can't agree more!

    Indeed, I hate those who complain that these words are offensive. These complainers are usually sufferers of inferiority complex, IMHO. They want to attract attention, which they need and lack. They feel they're ignored. So, they invent something to complain about. "Disabled" is a normal word. They invent a new, pejorative interpretation to it, so that they can complain (at the expense of crippling our language). Then, they impose this interpretation on others to raise attention.

    The same thing goes for words like "man" (for mankind) and "he" (when being non-specific on gender and hence may refer a person of any sex). The feminists want to raise attention. So, they invented something to complain: "man" is to be interpreted as only referring to male homo sapiens. So, "Man is not born evil" now becomes a sexist statement, as it doesn't talk about women! And "Everyone should try his best" is considered sexist, too, because the new interpretation excludes female homo sapiens. You now have to say, clumsily, "Everyone should try his/her best". Some people are now using "they" singularly instead of "he/she" to make it less clumsy, but this cause confusion between singular and plural 3rd person pronouns. That's language pollution! The root cause boils down to the feminists who invented something to complain about.

    So, minorities, please stop inventing something to complain about. Most of the time, I've found that it's not the majority discriminating against you. Rather, it is you yourselves who are discriminating against yourselves. And you wrongly assume that the majority are discriminating against yourselves like you do. That's inferiority complex.

  • Anonymous (unregistered) in reply to cklam
    cklam:
    1.) There is obviously a great sensitivity as to the correct language vocabulary when addressing the issue of handicapped people - including the use of the term "handicapped". AFAIK (and I am not a native english speaker), the term "handicapped" translates directly into the corresponding german term "behindert" (yes - I am german) and as far as I can remember language lessons in school, "handicapped" was a correct translation for "behindert" and the correct term to describe people with disabilities. Pls correct me if am wrong.
    Yes, you're right. Originally, the word has no negative meaning.

    But some people -- usually those suffering from inferiority complex -- invented a new interpretation of it, making it negative, thus forcing you to use other words. As a result, some people invented "differently-abled". "different" is neutral. "abled" is even positive. So, this term should be OK? No. Noah here has just demonstrated what I said: he invented a new, pejorative interpretation of this term (or even of "different") to complain about. He finds "being different" offensive, too, doesn't he? (I don't. I'm not handicapped, but I'm proud to say I'm different from you all. I'm unique in this world. [/b]I am who I am.[/b] My DNA is unique and hence different from you all. Why is being different such a bad thing? I can't understand.)

    The same thing happens in German, too. Originally, "die Mitarbeiter" is a plural form for "colleagues", which can include both male and female colleagues. There is another word "die Mitarbeiterinnen" which refers female colleagues only. (There is no specific form to refer to male colleagues only. So, indeed, the male sex is discriminated!) But at some point in history, the feminists invented a new interpretation, which has been unfortunately accepted by the main stream: "die Mitarbeiter" should not be gender-neutral; rather, it refers to male colleagues only. So, nowadays, in official letters, people are forced to write "die Mitarbeiter/Mitarbeiterinnen" instead of the more concise "die Mitarbeiter". Some people find that clumsy and shorten it to "die Mitarbeiter/innen". But the "/" doesn't look good within a word. So, some advocate writing "die MitarbeiterInnen" instead. But, this still doesn't solve one problem: how are you going to pronounce this? Doesn't it sound like "die Mitarbeiterinnen"?

    A series of problems arise from this new (mis-)interpretation of the originally gender-neutral word "die Mitarbeiter". And the root cause boils down to some feminists, having nothing better to do to kill time, invented something just to complain about. Sigh... an originally valid, concise and non-discriminating expression "die Mitarbeiter" is ruined and replaced by something clumsy. Sigh...

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    cklam:
    1.) There is obviously a great sensitivity as to the correct language vocabulary when addressing the issue of handicapped people - including the use of the term "handicapped". AFAIK (and I am not a native english speaker), the term "handicapped" translates directly into the corresponding german term "behindert" (yes - I am german) and as far as I can remember language lessons in school, "handicapped" was a correct translation for "behindert" and the correct term to describe people with disabilities. Pls correct me if am wrong.
    Yes, you're right. Originally, the word has no negative meaning.

    But some people -- usually those suffering from inferiority complex -- invented a new interpretation of it, making it negative, thus forcing you to use other words. As a result, some people invented "differently-abled". "different" is neutral. "abled" is even positive. So, this term should be OK? No. Noah here has just demonstrated what I said: he invented a new, pejorative interpretation of this term (or even of "different") to complain about. He finds "being different" offensive, too, doesn't he? (I don't. I'm not handicapped, but I'm proud to say I'm different from you all. I'm unique in this world. [/b]I am who I am.[/b] My DNA is unique and hence different from you all. Why is being different such a bad thing? I can't understand.)

    The same thing happens in German, too. Originally, "die Mitarbeiter" is a plural form for "colleagues", which can include both male and female colleagues. There is another word "die Mitarbeiterinnen" which refers female colleagues only. (There is no specific form to refer to male colleagues only. So, indeed, the male sex is discriminated!) But at some point in history, the feminists invented a new interpretation, which has been unfortunately accepted by the main stream: "die Mitarbeiter" should not be gender-neutral; rather, it refers to male colleagues only. So, nowadays, in official letters, people are forced to write "die Mitarbeiter/Mitarbeiterinnen" instead of the more concise "die Mitarbeiter". Some people find that clumsy and shorten it to "die Mitarbeiter/innen". But the "/" doesn't look good within a word. So, some advocate writing "die MitarbeiterInnen" instead. But, this still doesn't solve one problem: how are you going to pronounce this? Doesn't it sound like "die Mitarbeiterinnen"?

    A series of problems arise from this new (mis-)interpretation of the originally gender-neutral word "die Mitarbeiter". And the root cause boils down to some feminists, having nothing better to do to kill time, invented something just to complain about. Sigh... an originally valid, concise and non-discriminating expression "die Mitarbeiter" is ruined and replaced by something clumsy. Sigh...

    I remember way back from my university time (late80-ties/early 90-ties) a lot of people using the form "MitarbeiterInnen" as a shorthand for the above (in really official documents, too). And this is not mentioned in the "Duden" (at least the last time I looked) - more is the wonder (almost all universities/colleges in Germany are government-"owned" and run like government organizations).

    So the feminist lobby at my university forced the adoption of unapproved languages changes into official documents. If you do not know Germany you can not imagine the significance of something like this actually happening.

    (Problably german readers only:) I leave it up to you to guess the name of the univeristy involved.

  • Amadan (unregistered) in reply to cklam

    [quote user=cklam]2.) You guys talk about labeling and segregrating groups of people through use of language. Obviously, it is correct to label certain groups of people like for example "men" and "women" - if we did not do that then there would not these handy places convienent places labelled "gents" and "ladies" in public places. Other labels are of course offensive - the most offensive example I can think of comes right from my people's history: "Juedische Untermenschen" and "Arier" - I think you all can understand that even without understanding german - the mindset behind that one caused the death of more than six millions jews and countless other persons back in world war 2. The point I am trying to make now is that labeling people is what we humans do - it is part of basic human nature. We do it all the time and the behaviour as such has not significantly throughout human history - in this point we are all still savage.[/quote]

    Hmm. In principle, I agree with everything you said. My inner nitpicker, though, has this to say:

    Labeling is what we humans do. It is otherwise customarily known as language. Labeling a certain type of animal with a sound "cat" (and its graphical equivalent) allows us to talk about our feline friends with other fans of that rather unique species. Talking about labeling itself would be difficult without the label "labeling" that we attach to the process I am now discussing. Etc, etc... So labeling itself is surely not bad - or particularly "savage".

    The important thing here is the difference between the intrinsically offensive labels ("Juedische Untermenschen"), which explicitly qualify something as having low quality, and extrinsic ones, that start out as innocuously descriptive and factual expressions and receive its "offensive meaning" by misinterpretation by overly sensitive people. Real offense vs. perceived offense.

    I am not American, and I was always quite shocked by the high linguistic tension over there. Once in a convention held in a venue that had a "Black Room" - and we were told by an American that it was simply unacceptable! But the room was indeed painted black (and contrasted with White Room and Grey Room), and we had no idea what else we would call it...

    The savage thing is, by my understanding, almost never the labels themselves - but the atrocious actions humans can, for some reason, be inspired to by them.

  • Jenda (unregistered) in reply to codeman38
    codeman38:
    Even more oddly, on the Russian site, "сс" is converted into "B". There are several "nedelya klaBiki" posts. Not sure what sort of weird round-trip transliteration is going on here!

    Well, any attempt to transliterate Russian so that the english speaking people would pronounce anything even remotely related to the original is bound to fail. You can't consistently transliterate to a language with no pronunciation rules. Or rather with several sets of coliding rulesets and thousands of exceptions from any of those.

    You can fairly easily transliterate Russian so that Czechs will read it almost exactly right (after you tell them to read "y" and "i" differently - no need to explain how and if you use one additional accentated character all czechs know from Slovak). With English all bets are off.

    OTOH, when it comes to grammar English is nice, simple and logical. Czech is ... erm ... complex. (I will sing, you will sing, he will sing, we will sing, you will sing, they will sing vs. ja budu zpivat, ty budes zpivat, on bude zpivat, my budeme zpivat, vy budete zpivat, oni budou zpivat or ja zazpivam, ty zazpivas, on zazpiva, my zazpivame, vy zazpivate, oni zazpivaji. And the meaning is a wee bit different and some verbs only use the first style, while others only the second and there are tens of different prefixes that sometimes signify future and sometimes don't and sometimes it even depends on context whether it's future or ability or ... It's a mess.)

    BTW, why do think there should be "cc"?

  • Jenda (unregistered) in reply to Monkios
    Monkios:
    The target attribute isn't included in the anchor element in strict XHTML.

    You can do what this guy did or you can change the DTD for your website to allow the target attribute. Most web developper don't know this.

    How come this doesn't surprise me. The HTML standars are full of WTFs. "If it works, ban it" seems to be the moto.

  • James Craig (unregistered) in reply to Monkios

    Or you can set the target via JavaScript and have the best of both. Or you can write a return value for custom popup function. You can do this any number of ways in strict XHTML.

    PS. The captcha on this comment isn't accessible, either. WTF?

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