Joomla valitating/accessibility issue

[B. McLaughlin]

Hello,
Not sure where else to post this and it is non-profit related.

I am fairly new to Joomla (completed one site) but not to web design.
I am currently doing to work for a non-profit and need to develop a new site for them. They currently have a non-CMS site.

One of the members of this organization is all over the accessibility issue. I keep telling her that the results will be fine.
But – if I run the one site that I have already done using Joomla through the W3C validator, it returns with all kinds of errors. The errors that it is returning are mostly dropped end tagging brackets. If you use the W3C validator on joomla.org you will see what I mean.

Anything I should know about the validation/accessibility of Joomla?

Without going into all the details…this woman that is part of this non-profit knows enough about web design to get other people wound up, I will need to be ready to defend my choice of using Joomla.

Thanks

[Apollo]

Just curious, are you doing this as a volunteer?

Without going into all the details…this woman that is part of this non-profit knows enough about web design to get other people wound up, I will need to be ready to defend my choice of using Joomla.

Why don't you let her do the job?

[B. McLaughlin]

Well....not really the response I was hoping for...
For what it is worth...it is not her job.

But anyway, validation/accessibility of Joomla?

[rg]

But anyway, validation/accessibility of Joomla?

You can create a template that validates as xhtml transitional if you turn on SEF. But a valid site is not automatically accessible. If Accessibility has a high priority the current stable version of Joomla is not the best choice. There are some accessibility hacks for Joomla. But hacks of course do have serious drawbacks.

[MMMedia]

There is a group that creates Accessible Joomla.  This is basically a fork of Joomla that is accessible.  You could check it out and see if it suits your purposes.

http://developer.joomla.org/sf/projects ... ble_joomla

[B. McLaughlin]

Thanks for the replies folks-
Have either of you used the Accessible Joomla?

What was did/do you think of it?

rg- Is what you were refering to  as a hack that has serious drawbacks?

[rg]

rg- Is what you were refering to  as a hack that has serious drawbacks?

no haven't tested them. But a core hack may not work any more after upgrading to a new release. Imagine a security hole is discovered in your joomla version and the core team releases an upgrade that will overwrite a file that was patched by the hack...

[B. McLaughlin]

Ah.
Good point.

rg- In your previous post you mentioned write a tightly coded template to begin with. Is that the trick to having a Joomla site validate nicely?
If so, it is intersting that the http://www.joomla.org site gets the errors messages. I figure the folks that made it are some pretty smart folks, certainly smarter than me about this stuff.

[Slixter]

Joomla! Accessibility Statement
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Can be found here:

http://help.joomla.org/content/view/805/125/

--Slixter

[B. McLaughlin]

Well now...there is an answer!
v1.2 I don't supose there is a timeline with date about this anywhere is there?
Of course I knew more I would jump right in there and do some cleaning, but....you don't want me messing to much inside this thing.

Question:
When I run the validation and these errors regarding missing ending brackets for the tags, these are coming from the php generated parts, not the template correct?

Thanks

[rg]

When I run the validation and these errors regarding missing ending brackets for the tags, these are coming from the php generated parts, not the template correct?

The output from the Joomla core is valid xhtml (there may be some exceptions). If you use 3PD components or modules the output may or may not be valid. If you get errors because of missing brackets it's probably in your template or in a 3PD add on. One problem of the joomla core are the ampersands (&) in URLs if you don't use the SEF feature. The w3c validator will output errors because of unknown entities.

[B. McLaughlin]

rg-
I will move ahead with using Joomla for this project.
I will make sure that the template is clean and will use the SEF feature.

Thanks for the help/advice.

[unclochardceleste]

Sound choice M. McLaughlin.

I've been using J! for a couple canadian non-profits, and the advantages of a quality open-source cms completely outstanded the problems that a webdev may encounter if using joomla (incompatibility between bots, mods, comps and original core, imprevisibility of translation process if and when needed, and such).
Of course, these eventual problems are minor and get solved if you can code your own modules/components and translate your own files, but sadly, I've witnessed that time often lacks to embark in a full "do-it-yourself" odyssey when either volunteering or working "for the cause" with non-profits. This is where all the community's work and support comes in. Must say it's outstanding, and it is a true strenght of Joomla. Plus, you just can't help to contribute. [sorry for the propaganda - It's late and i'm an enthusiast and an idealist]

Indeed, you'll have to be aware and over-careful to minimize accessibility issues. There may be some. But foremost, what will  be is a kick-ass CMS backing the org's site, and a powerful and dynamic community to support - or to benefit from the work done on your side. From what i've seen from the other opensource cms, joomla feels like the best in its category, amen.

[just my two cents.]
H.