It’s no secret the web is becoming a very complex place. Anyone who has ever managed their company’s efforts to create a web presence knows the choices can be dizzying. You have standard marketing issues, like identifying target audience. You have functional issues: Will this site be a tool to gather information? Will it advertise a new product or service? Will it be an online service in and of itself? Will it sell a product? Will it be all of the above? And unless you have your own in-house development team you have to choose the right company to build and host your website; often listening to technical terms like HTML, XML, UML, .NET, ISP, ASP, ATS, CMS, RSS; server farm, co-location, W3C …It’s enough to leave your mind numb. And at the end of the day it’s all too easy to lose sight of the one thing that should never be forgotten – that potential visitor to your site.
More and more
companies are becoming aware of the need to accommodate a broadening range of potential visitors to their websites. In our multicultural world these can be people for whom English is not a native language. As computers become less expensive, easier to use, and generally more prevalent in day to day life, those visitors might be seniors. And, as technology evolves that can output media in multiple ways, such as reading text aloud, the potential clients may even be blind. Testing is the key to satisfying the broadest range of visitors. Here is a quick overview of some necessary steps.
Functional Testing
Functional testing is generally handled by the web development firm or department and is generally invisible to the client. It covers such things as verifying that links lead where they should and that forms and databases work together correctly. It asks the question, “Does it work right?”
HTML and CSS Validation Testing
The code that makes your website work should be written using formal grammar. It may function without following, so called, valid code standards but it will be treated by search engines and other automated systems as second class at best. It’s a bit like when you wrote essays at school – you had to use a formal structure and grammar. HTML and CSS validation asks the question, “Is it written and structured correctly?”
Automated accessibility testing
makes use of specialized software to examine your site’s code to see if certain elements to help handicapped people use the web are present. It is very efficient at finding errors and omissions at this level. It is somewhat analogous to a spell checker and even the grammar checker. Some packages are even sophisticated enough to offer advise on how to correct issues they discover. This level of testing asks, “Are the elements necessary for Accessibility Compliance present?”