Accessible Web Applications
Gardner Information Design, Inc. offers services for standards-compliant and accessible web development projects.
Case Study: Accessible Web Application
During 2008, GIDI Principal P.J. Gardner participated on a project to redesign the Massachusetts Accessible Housing Registry as an accessible web application. The new application was launched December 2008.
MassAccess Housing Registry
The MassAccess Housing Registry is a web application that enables people with disabilities and others to search for accessible and affordable housing online, so it was extremely important that the web site be as accessible as possible to the widest number of users.
The purpose of this project was to redesign the formerly text-based MassAccess Housing Registry for the Massachusetts Citizens' Housing and Planning Association (CHAPA) and to make it more interactive, more modern, and easier to use for people with disabilities.
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Compare the new version with the original:
- MassAccess Housing Registry (AFTER)
(live site) - MassAccess Housing Registry (BEFORE)
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On this project, Gardner Information Design, Inc. worked as a sub-contractor to Isovera, Inc., a web development firm in Cambridge Massachusetts, the winner of the contract. The new application was built using PHP and an SQL database.
P.J. Gardner served as accessibility lead, front-end web developer, and user interface consultant for the project.
Disclaimer: Live web sites are always subject to change. The examples on this page may not match the current version.
Required Skills
Skills employed on the MassAccess accessible Web application project included:
- Ensuring the accessibility of the MassAccess Housing Registry web application.
- Developing fluid web page templates to correspond with visual design comprehensives.
- Building close to 50 accessible forms using XHTML and CSS, for integration with the back end.
- Participating in user interface design for interactive elements of the web application.
- Performing browser compatibility and heuristic quality assurance testing.
- Testing the completed web application for compliance with U.S. Government Section 508 and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Enterprise Web Accessibility Standard.
- Contributing to information architecture and content management for the Help & Resources section using the QuikCMS content management system.