5.2 Using ICT to support clients with special needs or specific language requirements

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
   1. Websites for those with special needs or specific language requirements
   2. Problems for clients with impaired vision
   3. Screen readers
   4. Colour blindness
   5. Clients with specific language requirements
2. Evaluating websites against best practice guidance
3. Assistive technologies
4. Changing software and keyboard settings
5. Voice synthesis and voice recognition

Problems for clients with impaired vision

The main problems are caused by screens which have no text. If it is not possible to read meaningfully only the text on the website page, then the screen reader will not be successful.

So the following are the problem areas:

• Web pages which overly rely on graphics
• Web pages which have graphics or photographs with no alternative text explanation
• Web pages with text which is presented within a graphic
• Web pages which use explanatory animations

The worst offenders can be sites that start in Flash with no text option, so that the user gets no information from the screen reader and doesn't know if the site is open or not.

Let's think about Screen readers ...