JavaScript

JavaScript is the behaviour layer of the Web. The articles found here generally focus on unobtrusive, accessible use of JavaScript rather than fancy effects for the sake of fancy effects.

Accessibility does not prevent you from using JavaScript or Flash

Many people mistakenly believe that in order to make a website accessible you have to completely abstain from using technologies like JavaScript or Flash.

Posted on May 31, 2010

Unobtrusive JavaScript is not necessarily accessible JavaScript

There is no guarantee that a JavaScript that is unobtrusively implemented is also keyboard and screen reader accessible.

Posted on January 26, 2010

Lightboxes and keyboard accessibility

All Lightbox clones that I have tested have issues with keyboard accessibility, making it unnecessarily difficult or confusing to use them without a mouse.

Posted on October 20, 2009

Java is not JavaScript

Java and JavaScript are not the same thing, and they are not related.

Posted on September 23, 2009

Building accessible forms with WCAG 2.0

Examples, with references to relevant WCAG 2.0 Success Criteria, of how screen reader users can successfully interact with forms that use JavaScript.

Posted on May 21, 2009

Hiding with CSS: Problems and solutions

Be aware that using display:none to hide elements will hide them from screen readers, and if you use JavaScript to show something, also use JavaScript to hide it.

Posted on May 4, 2009

JavaScript Tools bundle for Textmate

The JavaScript Tools TextMate Bundle gives you quick and easy access to JSLint and various JavaScript formatting and compression tools without leaving TextMate.

Posted on January 19, 2009

Find inline CSS and JavaScript with Inline Code Finder

Inline Code Finder is a neat quality assurance tool that will find and highlight any elements that have inline events, inline styles, or javascript: links.

Posted on December 16, 2008

Making Google Maps more accessible

You can make the Google Maps you put on your site more accessible by providing a static image fallback for users without JavaScript and hacking in keyboard accessibility.

Posted on December 1, 2008

Find nasty JavaScript with the Obtrusive JavaScript Checker

The Obtrusive JavaScript Checker is a Greasemonkey user script and Firefox extension that will examine the web page you are on and highlight obtrusively implemented JavaScript.

Posted on November 10, 2008

Reading up on WAI-ARIA

WAI-ARIA, the Accessible Rich Internet Applications Suite, helps developers make their web applications more accessible to people who rely on assistive technology. Start reading up on it.

Posted on November 3, 2008

How (a couple of) screen readers handle JavaScript events

Screen readers don’t always work as well with JavaScript as you might want or expect them to. But what exactly is it that doesn’t work?

Posted on October 29, 2008

NoScript for Firefox

Surfing the web with NoScript installed lets you decide which sites are allowed to run JavaScript, Flash and other active content in your Firefox.

Posted on October 17, 2008

DOMAssistant bundle for TextMate

To save keystrokes and speed up development I have created a DOMAssistant bundle for TextMate.

Posted on March 10, 2008

DOMAssistant 2.6 released

The lightweight JavaScript library DOMAssistant has been updated to version 2.6, with really fast CSS selectors, a plugin model, a development team, and more.

Posted on February 26, 2008

Beware of id and name attribute mixups when using getElementById in Internet Explorer

When using getElementById to get a reference to an element via the id attribute, IE may return an element whose name attribute contains the value you’re matching.

Posted on February 14, 2008