Understanding Accessibility

WCAG General Guidelines

There are 14 guidelines in WCAG 1.0. Guidelines indicate the emphasis of each of the checkpoints in their section. Each guideline has at least one checkpoint which should be complied with, and many have more. Just reading through the guidelines should give you an idea of what's involved in making a site accessible. To get more info about a guideline or the get instructions on how you would go about making an accessible site, just click on the link.

  1. Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory and visual content
  2. Don't rely on colour alone
  3. Use markup and style sheets and do so properly
  4. Clarify natural language usage
  5. Create tables that transform gracefully
  6. Ensure that pages featuring new technologies transform gracefully
  7. Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes
  8. Ensure direct accessibility of embedded user interfaces
  9. Design for device-independence
  10. Use interim solutions
  11. Use W3C technologies and guidelines
  12. Provide context and orientation information
  13. Provide clear navigation mechanisms
  14. Ensure that documents are clear and simple