Assessing Library Web Accessibility for Visually or Hearing Impaired People

Abstract

In information society, much information resides in digitalized form on the World Wide Web. Being an information repository and lifelong education roles, libraries shall ensure their website and information system accessibility for all people. In order to understand the websites of libraries meet the norms of barrier-free standard after the new version released. This paper attempts to find common problems of web accessibility design in national and public libraries by using an automatic assessment tool. The observational method and interview of visually or hearing impaired people will be conducted to collect the uses’ experience and opinions by using assistive technologies of library webpages. The results indicate that the typical barriers in library webpages are in pictures, forms and website headers without additional text and alternative information. The function of assistive technologies was not included in the library website design. According to the study, libraries can improve the accessibility of their web presence by reducing valueless animation design and by inviting the disabled community participating in usability testing of library website. Applying the solution will help to improve library web accessibility for the people with disabilities. (Article content in Chinese with English extended abstract)

Keywords

• web accessibility
• accessibility testing
• public libraries