One of our busiest site’s interfaces is getting a serious accessibility and standards-compliance overhaul, something I’ve been looking forward to doing for a while. I’m in the midst of development and rapidly approaching the launch deadline, but working on the search interface got me thinking about the recent Accessible Google Search that came out of Google Labs with the promise of a better browsing experience for an often neglected group of online users:
Google Accessible Search is designed to help the visually challenged find the most relevant, useful and comprehensive information, as quickly as possible.
One of the most promising aspects of the new technology was the prospect of being rewarded by Google’s ranking engine for developing accessible websites, something we try to do wherever possible (the Government Education Portal is a good example). However, considering the relative simplicity of the search interface there was wide spread puzzlement about the decision of the developers to not make it XHTML 1.0 compliant. Undoubtedly the complexity of the system (both software and business processes) was no small hurdle, but at least the standardistas made their feelings known.
A little over two months later and the author of one of the articles was approached by Google and asked for input on the interface for the Google Search Appliance. The result is a great step in the right direction and the number of big players who recognise both the importance and benefits of web standards is growing rapidly. It also demonstrates the power of the blogosphere!
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This is a great initiative by Google. It may also pay off for them in developing a voice search interface and voice results for mobile devices.
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