Coding Procedure

Accessible

We follow W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. Our sites:

Use correct DOCTYPE.
Use CSS-driven relative font size for general content - which allows users to control the size of the page content.
Have alternative text for all images and decorative/positioning graphics include null "ALT" attributes - which is important for text-based or screen-reading browsers.
Provide additional navigation aids.
Have meaningful page titles.
Identify the content language.
Have detailed and descriptive metadata.
Provide hidden links in the top of each page to allow users with text-based or screen-reading browsers to jump to the preferred content on the page.
Where possible, present main content first within the source (regardless of how the page is displayed) - again for text-based and screen-reading browsers.

Stable
We do extensive testing when building sites, to make sure all pages maintain consistent layout and style across a wide range of browsers and platforms. Our sites are designed to be completely accessible for older browsers such as Internet Explorer 4+ and Netscape 4+.

Valid and compliant
Our sites currently use valid HTML (4.01 Transitional) or XHTML (1.0 Transitional) and CSS 2.0. All pages and CSS files within our sites are checked and validated using W3C's online HTML and CSS Validators.

Coding for the future
The future of web development is based on W3C standards, which are moving towards CSS and XHTML. The aim is to separate style (look, appearance, colors, fonts, layout) from content.

The preferred option when a larger percentage of the target audience is known to be on version 5+ (standards-compliant) browsers is to use (current and forward compatible) XHTML 1.0 transitional code and CSS for both visual style and content positioning.

Users who come to a site using a non-standards- compliant browser receive all the content in either a slightly simpler layout style or plain format. This strategy allows us to provide specific print versions of each CSS file - which means there is no need for print-friendly versions of each page.