Macromedia Dreamweaver was developed by Macromedia. Macromedia has made a great effort to incorporate accessibility features into there latest Dreamweaver programs Dreamweaver MX and Dreamweaver MX 2004. A brief description of the features available is given below.
Dreamweaver MX and Dreamweaver MX 2004 can automatically prompt user to include certain basic asscessibliity features such as alt text for images or field label for data entry fields on forms. However in order to be effective the web developer must enable the Web Accessibility features available in both MX and MX 2004. They can do this by selecting edit, preferences and then accessibliity. They will then need to check the empty check boxes for form objects, frames, images and media before clicking ok.
Once the accessibility features are emabled Dreamweaver will automatically prompt for accessibility features such as alt text for images when an image is inserted onto the page. However web developers should that the automatic accessibility prompts will only appear in the design view of the page. If a web developer is in code view or the code window then the accessibliity prompts will not appear, even if they are enabled.
Dreamweaver is able to test the accessibility of a web page against the WCAG 1.0 or Section 508 guidelines. This is done using Lift wihich is a testing tool that accompanies the Dreamweaver MX and MX 2004 packages. These reports produced as a result of the tests against the WCAG 1.0 and Section 508 guidelines can be found in site and then reports. The creaters of Lift UsableNet have also included a reference about Web Accessibility for all disabliities in the Dreeamwever MX and MX 2004 packages. This can be found in the help files, it gives advice about what a web developer to do to ensure that there web pages meet the WCAG 1.0 and Section 508 guidelines. However this it is considered to be quite technical and therefore is only really beneficial to web developers who alreadly have some existing knowledge of Web Accessibility.
Dreamweaver is able to automatically produce some code that is cmplient with the W3C’s HTML and XHTML specifications. However much of the code that it produces remains non-complient with these standards.
If the accessibility features in Dreamwever MX or Dreamweaver MX 2004 are enalbed then Dreamwever will automatically prompt a web developer for an alt text for an image as it is inserted into the web page. Once the prompt appears the users has the opportunity to enter a meaningful alt text for the image and a long description, if one is required. If the long description is left blank then the image will not contain a long description. Long descriptions are only really required in cases where the alt text does not fully describe the image. If the image is not part of the centent of the page e.g. a spacer image then a web developer should select the empty option. The image will then be given a blank alt text alt=””.
A web developer can edit the alt text for an image at anytime in the properties panel. If the web developer wishes to edit the contents of the long description then they will either need to re-insert the image onto the page or edit the long description manually in the HTML code. Unlike the alt attribute the long description cannot be edited in the propertiers box. Dreamweaver MX and MX 2004 also enable a web developer to add alt text to image map hot spots. The images and image maps page contains more information about how to make images and image maps accessible.
If the accessibility features in Dreamwever MX or Dreamweaver MX 2004 are enalbed then Dreamwever will automatically prompt a web developer for a label for all data entry fields on a form. Once the prompt appears the web developer can enter an apporpiate label name in the label dialog box. They can select the label style, there are three label styles wrap with label tag, attach label tag using the for attribute or no label tag selected. The attach label tag using the for attribute option is reccomended as this will automatically assign a particular label to a particular data entry field, regardless of where that label is on the form.
The web developer then needs to select whether or not they wish to position the label before or after the data entry field. It is reccomended that the field label be placed before the data entry field. Ideally they should be positioned just to the left of the data entry field. Finally the web developer is given the opportunity to assign an access key or tab index to the data entry field. Access keys are very rarely used on forms, in certain cases one may be given to the field label of the first data entry field. Meanwhile tab indexes are quite a common feature on forms and are reccomended. Adding a tab index to data entry firlds will control the order in which the fields on the form are accessed via the tab key on the keyboard.
There are a number of ways that a web developer can add a label to a form elements that is already on a web page. They could delete the exisiting form element and the re-insert it and then use the automatic accessibliity prompt to add the accessibility features. Alternativly they could manually edit the HTML ocde of the form element in the code window. Finally they could select both the label and form elements via insert, form, label. Howeber the label and data entry field must be directly next to each other for this to be accessible and therefore is not reccomended.
Web developers should beware that Dreamwever MX and MX 2004 both prompt for a label when a button or image is inserted onto a web page however neither a button or an image require a label attribute. Alt text should be added to images and a value attributte should be added to buttons. The forms page contains more information about how to make forms accessible.
Dreamweaver MX and Dreamweaver MX 2004 provides limited support for making data tables accessible. If accessibility features are enabled then the web developer will automatically be prompted to add accessibility features to a data table as it is inserted onto the web page. The web developer can then choose whether the table has row headers only, column headers only, row and column headers or no headers. Dreamweaver will then use this information to assign the table headers and where necessary insert the appropriate scope attribute (this is only needed if a data table has both row and column headings ).
A web developer can also identify the table headers by selecting the table cell, row or coloumn that is going to represent the table headers. Once the cells have been selected the web developer will need to check the header option in the properties window, so that Dreamweaver knows that these cells are the table headers web developers can also identify table headers.
However if a web developer states that the table has both row and column headers then Dreamweaver will automatically make the top-left column a column header. If this cell is not a column header then the web developer will need to change this manually in the HTML code. If a web developer want to add the scope attribute to cells in an exisiting table then they will have to do this manually. For complex tables, the id attribute will be required. This is not support in Dreamweaver MX or MX 2004, therefore if a web developer wishes to insert a table that uses the id attribute they will need to code the table manually. A web developer can also use Dreamweaver MX and MX 2004 to add sumnmary and caption attrubtes to there data tables. The tables page contains more information about how to make data tables accessible.
If accessibility features are enabled then the web developer will automatically be prompted to insert a
frame time each time a new frames pages is created. It will not be displayed if the web developer edits an
exisitng frames page. Once the prompt appears the web developer has the opportunity to enter an appropriate
title for the frame. Dreamweaver MX and Dreamweaver MX 2004 both support the
More information about the accessibility features of Dreamweaver MX and MX 2004. More information about the accessibility features of Dreamweaver 3 and 4.