Hippo

Accessibility

WCAG, ATAG and UAAG together form the pillars for the Web Accessibility Initiative of the W3C and the international foundation of the web guidelines of the Dutch Government and drempelsvrij.

Briefly summarized the Web Accessibility Initiative contains three core points:

  • An accessible Web is essential for equal opportunities for disabled people;
  • Web accessibility is an advantage for people, like the elderly, who's possibilities change by diseases caused by old age.
  • Web software plays an important role in the accessibility of the Web.

It is a excellent development that the Dutch Government obligated the web guidelines for her own websites.

The ATAG guideline makes it possible for the user of a CMS to create or increase accessibility of the webpages. If a CMS does not meet the ATAG standard, it will not be possible for that CMS to satisfy the web guidelines of the government and the W3C. Hippo CMS does satisfy the ATAG guideline.

All the content in Hippo CMS is saved in XML format. The content of a page is therefore separated from the layout. This is essential to meet the demands of the web guidelines. In the authors environment only semantic markup is given to the content (for example: this is important) and the layout is determined by the XSL and CSS. Certain information which is necessary for an accessible website (like alt text) can easily be enforced. This setup and technology makes it impossible for authors to make mistakes.

In short: with Hippo CMS you make it easy for editors and authors to stick to the web guidelines.