Outside Goodness

LGMA National invites members of the local government sector to suggest possible female presenters and/or speakers for the 2012 LGMA National Congress and Business Expo in Perth.

This week's issue is now available. Top stories include the LGSA's 2012 Tourism Conference, NDS Industry Development Fund Regional Meetings, International Women's Day - Local Government Grants and Successful grants announced for Roadside Vegetation Implementation Project.

Question: Are there any standards associated with skip links?

Answer: Yes! In order to comply with Success Criterion 2.4.1 Bypass Blocks – you must provide a mechanism to “bypass blocks of content that are repeated on multiple Web pages. (Level A)”

One of the “sufficient techniques” recommended by the W3C for bypassing blocks is the use of skip links. You can read more about them here:

“The objective of this technique is to provide a mechanism to bypass blocks of material that are repeated on multiple Web pages by skipping directly to the main content of the Web page. The first interactive item in the Web page is a link to the beginning of the main content. Activating the link sets focus beyond the other content to the main content. This technique is most useful when a Web page has one main content area, rather than a set of content areas that are equally important.”

Adding a link at the top of each page that goes directly to the main content area

For a website to pass this success criteria, the following tests must be passed:

• Check that a link is the first focusable control on the Web page.
• Check that the description of the link communicates that it links to the main content.
• Check that the link is either always visible or visible when it has keyboard focus.
• Check that activating the link moves the focus to the main content.
• Check that after activating the link, the keyboard focus has moved to the main content.

Debate 1: NAME vs ID

Example 1 – using an NAME attribute as the target

<a href="#content">Skip to content (Press enter)</a> <div> <a name="content">Content</a> </div>

Example 1 – using an ID attribute as the target

<a href="#content">Skip to content (Press enter)</a> <div id="content"> Content </div>

Many years ago, browsers like IE5 used to have trouble with linking to ID’s. For this reason, many Accessibiltiy Experts recommended using the NAME attribute. however, this practice is not recommended any more. In fact, if you are using HTML5, then using the NAME attribute will throw a warning.

Debate 2: Visible skip links

Ideally, skip links should be visible to all users. This allows not only screen reader users, but those who navigate with the keyboard to see these links immediately.

However, many clients do not like visible skip links on their sites. An acceptable alternative is to use skip links that become visible when it receives keyboard focus – ie when a user tabs through the page.

Examples

Here are three example pages – all using hidden skip links that become available once the user has given them focus.

• Skip example 01 – using “id” as a target – HTML5
• Skip example 02 – using “name” as a target – HTML4.01 strict
• Skip example 03 – using “name” as a target – HTML5

The CSS code used in these example:

.skipLink a { position: absolute; left: -1000px; z-index: 2; margin: 0; padding: .5em; background: #fff; font-size: 200%; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; } .skipLink a:active, .skipLink a:focus, .skipLink a:hover { display: inline; top: 0; left: 0; color: #fff; background: #000; }

• CSS Text Level 3 – W3C Working Draft 19 January 2012
• Syntax Highlight
• Responsive Images: How they Almost Worked and What We Need
• Responsive Web Design
• A better photoshop grid for responsive web design
• New CSS3 Properties to Handle Text and Word Wrapping
• Naming convention in CSS
• CSS3 Images End-Game: Summary of Changes and Request for Comments
• The best of [time]s
• Did we lose track of the big picture?
• The Hidden Nuggets of WCAG2: The Wonderful World of ALT Attributes, Part I
• JAWS 11 and IE 9
• Inclusive Design

Nearly 3,000 people from 101 countries will celebrate Australia Day by taking their citizenship pledges at one of the 95 ceremonies hosted by NSW councils tomorrow.

More than 49 councils across 12 categories were recognised for their environment and sustainability achievements at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney today.

The Local Government and Shires Associations of NSW (LGSA) welcomed the review of the Waste and Environment Levy announced by Minister for the Environment, the Hon Robyn Parker MP yesterday

The Local Government and Shires Associations of NSW (LGSA), has publicly conveyed their disbelief that the Rural Fire Service (RFS) have once again made an error in their NSW Rural Fire Fighting Fund allocations notification to councils.

The Local Government and Shires Associations of NSW (LGSA) have welcomed the commencement of the NSW Local Infrastructure Renewal Scheme (the Scheme).

The Local Government and Shires Associations of NSW (LGSA), has expressed their extreme dissatisfaction with last night's amendments to the Protection of the Environment Operations (POEO) Act 1997...

An update from Planning NSW

Circular, Ref : 11-43

The national office of Local Government Managers Australia (LGMA) is pleased to announced Civica as the Principal Sponsor of the 2012 LGMA Management Challenge.

An update from Planning NSW

In 2012 the LGMA Management Challenge will become an optional (accredited) subject in a Graduate Certificate in Local Government Leadership.

• HTML5 and CSS3 Advent 2011
• Designing for the Web: Templates and Grid Systems
• An Introduction To Object Oriented CSS (OOCSS)
• CSS Image Values and Replaced Content Module Level 3
• On HTML and CSS best practices
• Some Lesser Known Features of LESS
• Introducing ECMAScript 5.1
• Discover the Color Palette of Any Website
• Poll Results: Ideal Page Size
• Shapecatcher.com: Unicode Character Recognition
• What I Learned About the Web in 2011
• Give Your Users A Hollywood Experience
• The Hidden Nuggets of WCAG2: When Not to Use ALT Attributes
• Alexa 100 Accessibility Errors

The Local Government and Shires Associations of NSW (LGSA) have expressed concern about what exactly the new environmental watering scheme means in the Murray-Darling Basin Plan (MDBP).

The Local Government and Shires Associations of NSW (LGSA), has voiced their extreme disappointment in Premier O'Farrell and his failure to adequately handle the return of the ability to conduct Local Government elections to councils.

In 2012 LGMA will be running a LGMA Pacific Local Government Climate Change Fellowship Program aimed at exchanging knowledge & building capacity on the common & imminent challenge of climate change.