Accessibility

  • I know that WordPress generates valid XHTML 1.1 and CSS, which is very good compared to most blogging software. However, I’m wondering how accessible the code is; specifically, is it compliant with Section 508, and what level does it achieve with the WAI WCAG?

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  • Accessibility is always kind of a moving target. Most of the time I don’t think just because Bobby gives you the thumbs up its necessarily accessible.
    But that said..
    The default index.php page for WP 1.2 will pass Section 508, with one small modification…
    Down where the ‘search form’ is (looks around line 75) the <label> needs to be inside the form.

    74. <li id="search">
    75. <label for="s"><?php _e('Search:'); ?></label>
    76. <form id="searchform" method="get" action="<?php echo $PHP_SELF; ?>">

    to

    74.<li id="search">
    75. <form id="searchform" method="get" action="<?php echo $PHP_SELF; ?>">
    76. <label for="s"><?php _e('Search:'); ?></label>

    It doesn’t achieve any of the WAI Accessibility levels out of the box, but by some very minor modifications it should be able perform as you need it.
    After a few tweaks, I validated to WAI Level 3 according to Bobby.
    As far as the ‘admin’ pages – I can’t vouch either way for them.

    Just a word of caution here — you should view Bobby as if it were a spellcheck or grammar checker. It highlights possible issues, but cannot give definistive answers.
    Compliance with web standards is 80% of the task of accessibility. Ensuring that content is available, usable, and understandable in multiple modalities (images, text, sound) is the other 20% and no tool can verify that.
    The concept of “Bobby Approved” was one of the things I would have done differently if we* did it over.
    *I was on the oriiginal design/dev team for Bobby

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