Web Accessibility

www.colombia.travel Web Accessibility

The Colombia.travel web team is intent to work every single day to improve universal access to the contents of Colombia’s official tourism portal. We have been working along the directives WCAG 1.0, complying with all the Priority 1 verification points Thus, we are able to declare that we meet Level of Conformity A. We performed an automatic revision with tools like HERA, TAW and eXaminator. Let us take a look:

• Equivalent texts for non-textual contents. We worked on all images and Flash objects to provide them with an alternate text. At present, we are working on the transcription and subtitling of the video soundtracks.
• Transmission of information through color. We avoided the transmission of information exclusively through color (typical example: “Click the blue button.”).
  
• Identification of language switch. Every time there is a language switch, we pointed out the language of the fragment in the source code, thus facilitating correct pronunciation by screen readers.
• Logical reading without a style sheet. Even when the style sheet of any webpage in www.colombia.travel is deactivated, reading can be done logically and naturally.
• Screen flashes. We did our best to avoid the use of screen flashes that could annoy our visitors; for instance, moving marquees, blinking GIF buttons, or Flash banners moving indiscriminately.
• Clear Language. Our journalists work daily to provide a clear content, free of spelling, syntactic, grammatical, and ortho-typographical errors.
• Image maps. We do not use image maps.
• Identification of headings in data tables. There are not many data tables in www.colombia.travel. However, headings are clearly identified in the few existing ones.
• Frames. We avoid the use of frames. In the few cases where we have had to embed an iframe we identified it clearly.
• Scripts. We use JavaScript on some occasions, for example in the central photo of the startup page (for the transition between images) and in the photo galleries to launch them with a lightbox effect (for the purpose of providing better usability levels of the site). However, if a user has JavaScript deactivated, access to the content will be possible through the menu, the sitemap, or the search feature.
• Audio descriptions and subtitles. Our drafting team is hard at work to offer shortly all the audio descriptions of all the soundtracks on our website.

We also comply with several Priority 2 points

Additionally, we have made progress in other Priority 2, verification points, for example:

• Color combinations. We use the W3C W3C Consortium algorithm for texts to meet the required threshold in brightness and color contrast.
• Validation of formal grammars. We declare a transitional XHTML document that has been validated in 95% of the internal pages. The CSS style sheet used (Version 2.1) is 100% validated for all pages. Our commitment is to work every day to fulfill our goal of “Zero validation errors”.
• CSS style sheets. The site was designed with CSS style sheets that control the totality of styles. We do not use tables for design layout. Additionally, we include print style sheets to make printing easy for all our users.
  
• Relative units. We use em units in most of our style sheet; they allow scaling of fonts and in some cases, the scaling of the composition boxes.
• Heading elements. All our pages use headings to structure the document in a logical and sensible way.
• Lists. In our contents, we use ordered lists in no specific order. Also, correction lists, which have been marked.
• Quotations. In cases where it was necessary to mark a quotation because it was part of a text not produced by our journalists, it was tagged with blockquotes; for instance, in the case of testimonials.
• Opening of new windows. All links (internal and external) in the www.colombia.travel site open in the same window.
• W3C technologies. We use Transitional XHTML and CSS standards.
• Divisions. We use division tags to divide long blocks of information.
• Links. We treated every link carefully to clearly identify where the user will go after clicking.
• Metadata. We use subject-specific metadata in each of our web pages.
• Site map. We provide our users with a very complete site map with everything that is necessary to know about our information architecture.
• Coherent navigation. The whole site was designed for coherent navigation.
• We do not use tables for design layout. We stand behind our statement: Zero tolerance regarding the use of tables for design layout. In fact, we modified the original Joomla code that employs certain tables solely for design purposes.

Also, several Priority 3 points

We did not leave for “tomorrow” the Priority 3 points that we are able to comply with at present. We are using them today because we know they improve our site’s accessibility. For example:

• Acronym expansions. When we use an acronym for the first time, the expanded form is explained.
• Main language. We identify the main language of each document.
• Coherent presentation style. We created a template-based style that is consistent in each page.
• Skip to content. We provide a shortcut in every page to enable users (especially those who use screen readers) to skip over repetitive elements on each page, such as navigation menus, and arrive to the content quickly.

We hope that the navigation of our site is as accessible as possible. However, should you encounter any difficulties in accessing content, we would be grateful if you would let us know at info @ colombia.travel

Thank you,

 

WEB TEAM
www.colombia.travel