Facebook have talked for a while about a whole new layout and it’s finally available to the masses. Currently it’s still not the default layout for facebook.com but if you go to the direct URL for the new one you can give it a go.

Apart from the new 1024 pixel wide design which of course is the new standard online it really tries to separate those pesky applications! At last!

I’ll be giving it a good going over tonight - what are your thoughts on this new layout?

That “text only” link you see on some websites winds me up. It really makes me see red. To me it shows lack of understanding and laziness when it comes to accessibility. It goes against the accessibility initiative.

This type of ”alternative” site is providing a second class service for those who would benefit from accessibility enhancements. Some sites I’ve seen actually run these as completely separate sites generally of lower priority which leads to out of date or inaccurate content in comparison to the main website!

As I’ve been banging on about for ages there are easy ways to makes sure the main website is available to everybody without the need for a text only version - if web best practices are used you’d be surprised how many ticks you’ll already have in your accessibility boxes.

However an article that has made me think a little more about this subject is one about accessibility being in a post-guideline age. The basic premise being that following the guidelines is not enough to ensure good website accessibility and user testing is key. This of course is correct although I feel not always realistic in every case - I’ll come back to this later.

The thing that jumped out in this article is the mention that maybe “alternative” versions of a website are now acceptable. Not in the same scheme of things as the text only cop-outs I mentioned earlier but in the respect that everyone is receiving tailored content for the individual so why not use this to enhance the site for everyone? Perhaps this tailored content could actually mean that, for example, people using screen readers could have a particularly optimised experience to fit them?

My personal opinion is this should only be an extension of existing accessibility functions on the site but certainly has potential. Different users have different needs and therefore some techniques can boost their experience - possibly even making other user’s experience not as good.

User testing would be imperative to ensure every personalisation made the best for a particular group but this is where I come back to my earlier point about not being realistic in every case.

User testing isn’t cheap and there is an iterative process involved which too can increase development costs for a website. I’m not saying it shouldn’t be done but not all companies can afford to spend the extra doing this. The situation currently still has accessibility proponents having to convince some companies to look at accessibility at all.

Accessibility standards I believe are becoming mature and with the British Standard in the future I can only see more and more companies seeing this as essential. I don’t believe the web development community is yet in a position to support this across the board although knowledge is spreading and maybe the nay sayers are beginning to have their heads turned by the convincing arguments of the accessibility community.

It’s still a process that is going to take time - larger companies (or those very reliant on being inclusive to all) will set the standard and user testing for accessibility will become the norm. In the meantime the guidelines are of exceptional importance and the accessibility community must be supportive to companies that make unintentional mistakes.

The British Standards Institute developed the PAS78 - “Guide to good practice in commissioning accessible websites” and although not a British Standard it does raise the profile of web accessibility.

However the BSi are developing PAS78 into a full BSi standard or rather a “family of standards” including coverage of Web 2.0. The intention of the BSi is to publish in the first quarter of 2009 which to some standards bodies is pretty quick.

So what will this mean in the UK? I would hope that the extra prestige of being able to display that you reach a British Standard will encourage more companies to take it on board. At the same time it hopefully lays some of the accessibility development myths that still knock around the web. After all the BSi have the authority to carry this through I believe.

HTML 5 is estimated to arrive in 2012. Allowing time for browsers to support the new standard and for these new browsers to become the majority is going to take at least 3 years. Therefore the next version of HTML is still 7 years away - a lifetime for the web.

The last standard to come out of the W3C was XHTML 1.1 in 2001. So 11 years between new standards is that acceptable?

It of course has to be understood the difficultly of producing standards for the web community but the time this seems to be taking for a technology as fast moving as the web is so far off the pace it’s incredible.

No wonder that proprietary systems are gaining more and more ground over time. They are simply filling the vacuum of new technology left by the standards bodies. Adobe Flash and Microsoft SilverLight provide the medium to extend web pages far and beyond what can be done with HTML. Certainly AJAX is being used heavily now as an extra layer on HTML and I never cease in being surprised at some people’s ability to use this lightweight scripting language for more and more impressive web applications but can this keep pace with the “designed for purpose” contenders like SilverLight?

Flash already has a deep penetration into the web market and various actions like Google crawling Flash better could extend its market further. SilverLight is the new boy on the block but already is picking up speed with some predictions of hugely increased market share (you’d never bet against Microsoft).

Is this good for the web? At the moment I believe yes it’s always good to have rival technologies. Competition spawns innovation. However in the long term it may not be.

If it takes, as estimated, 8 years to produce a new web standard how can this new standard bear as much relevance to the web 8 years later? If a possible Flash / SilverLight features war kicked off then the standards process would very soon be left behind - HTML would simply be the base to display the web application (or if the desktop / web blurs even more maybe HTML wouldn’t be needed at all).

In the long term if we effectively see the use of proprietary web technologies in the majority of cases, this could kill the standards process as it stands now altogether. Not good news as this standards process is inclusive allowing the general web community to be involved. Proprietary technology of course will be fashioned to the companies vision which doesn’t necessarily gel with the wider community.

So what to do? Tough one. Maybe the process needs streamlining, maybe there are just too many people involved (although decreasing this could erode the current inclusiveness), maybe the new standards are too ambitious and perhaps rather than whole new versions we should be looking at smaller incremental updates that can see new features pushed out the web quicker.