Hi all,
Some time ago, in response to a post by Hugh, I created a mock-up of a Librivox catalog page which incorporated some layout changes the Librivox admins were interested in making. While I was doing that I put some thought into making the page more accessible. The resulting mockup scored quite well with the web page accessibility checkers I tried, but I didn't have a screen reader like Jaws to try to see if it actually is easier to use for visually impaired Librivoxers.
The mockup is available at
http://padraig-o.users.sourceforge.net/librivox/mockups/my-fathers-dragon9.htm. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who uses a screen reader if the accessibility features added do help usability with a screen reader.
The mockup adds support for access keys. Rather than have to navigate the entire document (which I imagine can be slow with a screen reader) you can use an access key to trigger the key functionality on the page, e.g. the one click download options.
For example if you use Firefox you trigger access keys by holding down Shift and Alt and pressing the letter or number corresponding to the option you want.
So if you want to download the ZIP of the book just hold down both Alt and Shift and type Z (don't let go of either Alt or Shift until you have typed the Z).
You can subscribe to the podcast in the same way, get help, search the catalog etc.
To see the list of access keys available use
Alt Shift 0
That's a zero above, and it's part of an accessibility standard called e-GIF which is quite widely used. The page that pops up will list all the access keys available and what they do.
The page returns no issues in both accessibility checkers I've tried.
I also improved the link titles etc. used. These are really there for screen readers to use, but if you hover over e.g. the Wikipedia links in Firefox then Firefox will display them to you in a tooltip.
The above effort to rework the catalog pages has been overtaken by the general site redesign which I believe is being worked on, but hopefully if these techniques do make life easier for visually impaired Librivoxers they could presumably be applied as appropriate to the new site design as it is implemented.
Thanks,
Padraig