Minutes of the Web Advisory Group Meeting,
May 3, 2005
Marston Science Library Rm. L107, 2:00pm – 3:30pm.
Present:
Tom Minton, Web Manager (Chair, ex officio)
Ying Tang , Programmer
Vernon Kisling, Collection Management
Ann Lindell, Public Services
Merrie Davidson, Member at Large
Julia Allen, Technology Services
Rewriting the Library Web Guide
The committee discussed rewriting or updating the library web guide to reflect new policies instituted over the past year and other related issues. The committee agreed that the following specific areas should be added, updated, clarified, or explained.
Use of the Library Templates on Web Pages.
There is no section referring to this new policy and the committee thought it should be added.
Use of CSS Style Sheets Versus HTML for Web Page Formatting.
The new templates rely on the use of CSS to format the header and footer of pages based on the templates. The committee felt that the use of style sheets for formatting the content areas of web pages should be addressed. Ann thought this was a new technology, unfamiliar to many of our web content providers and as such, CSS should be allowed but not be formally required. The committee agreed to address CSS but make the use of this technology optional and still allow HTML formatting.
The Exclusion of Sensitive Security Materials From Web Pages Viewable.
In October 2004, the Florida Board of Governors asked that each institution review its web sites and remove sensitive materials that are exempt from public records law under Section 119.071, Florida Statutes.
At that time, every web coordinator had to review their area’s pages and remove any affected materials. Tom thought to avoid any of this information from creeping back onto the web site in the future, this exclusionary requirement should be formalized in the Web Guidelines with the note that any questions about whether any materials should be excluded be forwarded to Tom. The committee agreed.
The Formalized Policy of Using Contribute or Dreamweaver
In an attempt to rationalize the support of web editing software, the library has developed a policy of using either Macromedia Contribute or Macromedia Dreamweaver. The idea is that most web content providers would use Contribute while the Web Coordinator in each area would use Dreamweaver. In this way, a Coordinator could administer their area’s web directories in a consistent way. Since this policy of who uses which software has confused some staff, Tom thought the policy should be included in the Web Guidelines. The committee agreed.
Overall Design Policies – Use of a Formal Style Manual
The committee thought that a formal style manual would be too inflexible; that a requirement that web pages be “consistent” with the look of the library templates should be our goal. The committee suggested that any “style manual” be written more as a best practices guide. The “style manual” might reemphasize that web pages should have a consistent and familiar look based on the library templates and could assist web authors in this effort by informing the web authors what actual colors, fonts, etc, are used on the top level pages. Web authors that strayed from the “look” could be handled on an individual basis.
Julia noted that Acquisitions and Licensing and Cataloging and Metadata had developed fairly rigid style manuals. Other areas may have developed similar documents. In addition other areas may have developed department templates based on the library template that might not exactly conform to a future library style manual. Ann thought that the libraries’ web authors have just finished one redesign and they should be given some time before asking them to again change all their pages to match a style manual. Other members felt that a rule-bound style manual could be put off until a future redesign.
Usability Evaluation.
Tom brought forward the idea of heuristic and usability studies. Formal usability studies are difficult because of sample selection problems and require the permission of the University’s non-medical Institutional Review Board. Tom stated that he intended to do some usability testing this summer once these problems were resolved. He asked for any interested volunteers from the committee to help observe the test subjects.
In addition, Tom proposed the idea of including heuristic usability principles in the guidelines. Heuristic principles are a list of “ideals” that web authors should strive to meet when authoring a web page. Each web design is graded against each principle by a small group of individuals. Each page must receive a mean passing grade from the testers. A perfect score is not required. Tom felt that having every page “scored” by an oversight group before being posted was highly impractical. But principles could be developed and included in the guidelines as a tool to help our web authors remember some basic usability practices. Tom asked the committee to think about possible principles to be included in the guidelines. Tom handed out a list of general heuristics developed by Jakob Nielsen, a noted usability specialist, and a list of library-specific heuristics developed by the University of Virginia Library and the California Digital Library as examples.
Accessibility Requirements
Tom thought the section of the guidelines on accessibility needed revision to provide a stronger emphasis on the university requirements and provide guidance and links to newer relevant sites that would help web authors.
Finally the committee agreed that a closer reading of the current guidelines might uncover other areas that need revision. Tom then asked that each member to read the document again to look for these areas. Ann suggested that the guidelines could be written in a less academic fashion and more like a how-to manual or checklists.
Other Issues
Redirect Pages
Tom mentioned that the library web site had many older redirect pages that were not dated or initialed. This made it difficult for him to tell if the redirects were still needed. He asked the committee members to pass the word that redirect pages be dated and the author be identified by initials. The idea of adding this requirement to the Web Guidelines was briefly discussed. No one objected but no formal decision was made.
Application of W3C Web Standards and Web Page Validation.
Tom explained the process of validating web pages and style sheets against the W3C standards. He stated validation was a new process in web development. He demonstrated an online validator that tested pages against the current standards and returned a list of errors or violations. He explained that perhaps validation would not be strictly required because many of our legacy pages were no longer to current standards and still displayed and worked perfectly in both IE and Firefox (the library’s ghost standard). He also noted that many of the web pages provided by our vendors also failed validation. But if every new page were run through the validator some serious mistakes such as missing required <alt> tags would be revealed.
Writing for the Web
Tom felt there should be some training on how to write for the web, either classes or a web page with tips. One member informed us that the Center for Instructional Technology and Training gave classes in writing for the web and perhaps we could point people there to avoid the burden of in-house instruction. Tom asked if the committee thought developing a web site for the library web content providers with tutorials and tip sheets would be useful. Time for the meeting ran out and the committee decided to address this topic at a later time.
