Solid Structure: Built to Standards
People feel confident using the design because it is stable, robust, and secure.
The way people access your web content varies. Some people need to change the appearance of content to make it easier to read. For example, someone with dyslexia might use Windows High Contrast Mode to make on-screen reading easier. Some people won’t see your content at all, and will be listening to a screen reader reading it aloud, or touch-reading it via a refreshable Braille display. Some people have color deficit and see colors differently, which may cause problems if your content relies on color perception and the ability to distinguish colors. This means that you need to make sure that the semantic meaning of your content is preserved, even if the visual display changes or the content isn’t visible.
The first step is to keep visual information separate from content—for example, marking a heading as a heading rather than enlarging the text and making it bold. That way the HTML of the document has structural information and the stylesheet (CSS) handles how the heading displays. The good news is that most authoring tools do this automatically for you.
When content creators focus on solid structure:
- The semantics of content are available to people who use screen reader software
- People can change how content displays without losing meaning