(rev. Nov, 2009)
Justification: Current standard; HTML is being phased out in favor of XHTML.
Supporting literature: http://validator.w3.org/docs/why.html, http://www.htmlhelp.com/design/standards.html, http://www.maxdesign.com.au/presentation/checklist.htm
Exceptions: Use of the <embed>; tag JavaScript code or CSS IE hacks that might not validate.
Helpful links: W3C’s validator: http://validator.w3.org/ Firefox Web Developer tool: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/60/
Explanation and justification: While a good portion of our viewers (around 20% as of this writing) continue to use Internet Explorer 6, providing full support for this browser significantly infringes upon our ability to use the more advanced interactive features Internet users are expecting. Since there is no longer an institutional requirement to use IE 6, we request that users upgrade to IE 7 or later or switch to another supported browser such as Firefox or Safari.
Exceptions: Mobile devices; Other exceptions can be made for intranet applications so long as they are clearly spelled out in the “technical requirements” section.
Justification: As of this writing, according to our latest usage statistics on the SOM web server, over 98% of our viewers use a screen resolution of 1024x768 or higher.
Exceptions: Mobile devices, for which we define a separate style sheet, if needed.
Helpful tools: Firefox Web Developer tool: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/60/ has an auto-resizing tool
Justification: Better consistency with very old browsers - will ignore the style sheet, altogether, rather than attempt to render styles.
Supporting literature: http://www.yourhtmlsource.com/stylesheets/advancedcss.html, http://css-discuss.incutio.com/?page=ImportHack, http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/media.html
Exceptions: None.
Justification: Accessibility; cross-browser compatibility; allowing the user to specify font size via his/her browser preferences.
Supporting literature: http://webdesign.about.com/cs/typemeasurements/a/aa042803a.htm, http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/fonts/, http://www.clagnut.com/blog/348/
Exceptions: None.
Justification: Accessibility
Supporting literature: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10-HTML-TECHS/
Exceptions: Sites where the audience is pre-selected to not include those with visual disabilities - e.g., the Admissions Status page or small-scale intranet applications whose user base is known and unlikely to change.
Helpful Links: http://www.stopdesign.com/articles/replace_text/
Justification: Aids in search engine indexing
Supporting literature: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10-HTML-TECHS/
Exceptions: None.
Justification: Accessibility; printability; Flash content may be hidden to some users and to search engines; the inappropriate use of Flash (e.g., Flash intro pages) may delay the users' ability to get to the content they are looking for; browser features such as "Find in Page" and text translators will not work on Flash content; text is often not resizable in Flash.
Supporting literature: http://www.sibagraphics.com/wp/category/web-design/resources/flash/
Exceptions: Flash, Ajax, etc. may be appropriate for certain limited applications.
Justification: Accessibility; makes printing, bookmarking, and searching difficult.
Supporting literature: http://www.yourhtmlsource.com/frames/goodorbad.html
Exceptions: When there is no viable alternative to using an iframe.
Helpful links: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10-HTML-TECHS/#alt-frames
Justification: Users may have slower connection speeds or lack the plugin needed.
Exceptions: If an entire list of items is of the same document type, a warning at the top of the list is sufficient.
Justification: The <u> tag has been deprecated; underlining items which are not links is confusing to the user since the convention on the web is that only links are underlined.
Supporting literature:http://webdesign.about.com/od/htmltags/p/bltags_u.htm
Exceptions: None.
Justification: Accessibility; separation of content and format; additional functionality available with CSS-P; XHTML code is less complicated than using tables; allows for more design control in Contribute.
Supporting literature: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10-HTML-TECHS, http://phrogz.net/CSS/WhyTablesAreBadForLayout.html, http://www.westciv.com/style_master, http://brainstormsandraves.com
Exceptions: Laying out forms may prove easier to do using a table.
Justification: Content used within these technologies is not editable in Contribute, presenting a potential maintenance issue for SOMIS.
Exceptions: Interactive content that requires this technology; small-scale intranet applications whose user base is known and unlikely to change; sites which already have an experienced Web Designer on staff or which plan to contract out for ongoing maintenance.
Justification: Use of custom styles requires that we explicitly allow access to those styles in Contribute (which we don’t normally do since this can be used improperly and requires more setup and user training).
Exceptions: Sites not maintained via Contribute; styles applied outside of editable fields in the Dreamweaver template; custom styles that do not map to an existing HTML tag - in this case, these styles can be placed in a separate style sheet that the editor can access via Contribute.