Is your course accessible? Test it before launching. Tools and references.

Does your course or site look good? Check out how it will be perceived and used...

You're satisfied with the content of your work posted on the Internet. Here are some ways to check how it might be perceived...

First, it needs to be loaded and decoded

Are you patient? After 8 seconds, more than 50% of Internet users become seriously impatient if a page doesn't load.

Here's a site performance analyzer: GT Metrix, which details the priorities for improving your site's performance. The very fact that you're looking to improve speed will automatically lead you to increase accessibility and respect the standards on which assistive tools for different disabilities are based.

More generally, the Wave Accessibility Evaluation Tool, like the AChecker or Floeproject , will mercilessly dissect your site in terms of accessibility. Wave even offers an accessibility test toolbar for integration into Firefox.

Then it has to be readable

The basic test simply concerns the display. If the page is complex, some browsers can throw up a few surprises, not to mention the display on cell phones or tablets. A few tests are worthwhile.

For browsers, on BrowserStack, you can see how your page displays on dozens of different browsers.
For mobiles, here are two sets of compatibility testers, so you can choose the ones that best suit your clientele.
- On Webdesigner
- On Six revisions

You can also run such tests across real devices with mobile testing tools like testRigor, which help verify responsiveness, UI stability, and functionality across platforms.

Contrast

Black on white is high-contrast, but if the lines are too fine, or a gray or colored background is added, the contrast decreases. Worse still, if you use colors outside the 256 "web safe" colors, systems treat them differently. Check on iOs and Windows, just in case...

There are "objective" contrast analyzers, but more often than not, your own perceptions will be your best guide.

Contrast analyzers

Contrast analysis software

Contrast as a reading aid

Slow readers and many "dys" readers often return to the beginning of a line of text they've already read. This quickly plunges them into meaning confusion.

The Beeliner extension for Chrome and Firefox ensures that the color
at the start of a line to be the same as that at the end of theprevious line,
but different from the next. Simple, effective, but you still need
sufficientcontrast with the background.

Intellectually accessible

Is your content intellectually accessible?

Obviously, you'll write differently if you're addressing children or adults, the general public or a specialized audience; beginners or professionals. But if your course is aimed at a wide audience, around 50% of whom don't have a very good grasp of the language's codes, this element is a major point of accessibility.

Sentence structure, length of words used, length of sentences, length of paragraphs, variety of words, expressions, idiotisms (literally incomprehensible expressions), abbreviations, etc., all these elements and others contribute to making a text more or less accessible.

Here are two text analyzers that will tell you how accessible your texts are:

Readability Analyzer
Scolarius

For example, the content of this article doesn't appear to be very accessible. We don't address the general public. On the other hand, our descriptions of introductory courses and serious games are much more accessible.

And the technologies!

Sound, video, images, obsolete flash applications, tabbed browsing, sensitive areas, pop-up windows, chat rooms, etc. All these elements can make a site more or less accessible, depending on the effort that is put into enabling its use by those who can't see or hear it, or who can't perform two operations at the same time with their mouse, or click a tiny object with precision between two shakes.

The principles are well known: a site must remain: perceptible, navigable (functional), comprehensible and robust (technologically flexible), no matter who uses it.

As this is a constantly evolving technological sector, we suggest these sites, which keep a close eye on all developments: