Accessites.org
5 Steps To Reworking A Legacy Site

Many articles and tutorials on developing an accessible site do tend to assume that you have the luxury of starting with a blank sheet. However, in practice, many developers are faced with large legacy sites that are in dire need of an accessibility makeover. They may not even be able to develop a replacement site behind the scenes but, instead, have to deal with improving accessibility levels on the existing site that is being actively used.

So how do you deal with this situation? Where do you start? Here are five steps that might help you on your way:

1. Don’t try to do everything at once
2. Develop a step-by-step plan
3. Carry out user testing
4. Let your visitors know that you are doing
5. Display your progress

Step 1. Don’t try to do everything at once

In many cases, the sheer size of the job in hand can be almost overwhelming. Tinkering with a few alt attributes here and the odd form label there isn’t likely to have a major effect unless you can plan and coordinate the changes so that you get maximum impact initially and then tie up all of the loose ends later on.

So before you start, stop and think!

Define the major issues within the site as a whole. Likely showstoppers may include:

1. images that lack vital alt attributes;
2. page content that cannot be resized via the user’s web browser;
3. form controls without explicitly associated labels
4. repetitive link phrases.

The article on Practical, Entry-Level Web Accessibility might give you some help in deciding which issues to focus on and precisely what steps you are going to take to rectify the problems. If you can, highlight ten common site-wide issues and then document exactly what steps are to be taken to remedy each issue as it is encountered.
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Step 2: Develop a step-by-step plan

Once you’ve decided what you are going to do, your next task is to decide where you will be doing it and when. This is where the best of intentions can start to falter — especially if you’re faced with a 2,000 page site. Which bits do you target first?

Try tackling specific areas/pages in the following order:

1. Site navigation

   A site can hold the most informative content but it is likely that much of it will never be accessed unless visitors can navigate the site relatively easily and effectively. Does your site navigation use graphics? Can the site be navigated with images disabled? Can the menus be resized by anyone with poor vision?

2. Entry pages

   The Home page is an obvious candidate but are there any other pages on the site that act as entry points? Given that any of these pages are likely to be the very first pages that users encounter upon entering your site, correct any obvious accessibility problems they have and consider adding links to site maps, searches or other help facilities.

3. High traffic/popular pages

   Now you need to look at your site logs. Identify the pages that are most popular or heavily used and work on them. Our aim here is to try and maximise the effect that your changes will have on the largest possible audience, so it makes sense to target high traffic pages.

4. Pages specifically for the disabled

   This should be fairly obvious but, sadly, the very pages that are supposed to assist or provide information for the disabled may be amongst the last pages to receive attention during normal ongoing development. Yet, if there is one place where you can be sure that your accessibility improvements will have the greatest effect, it is here.

5. General interest pages

   We’re getting towards the end now. Having focused on the high priority areas, we can now turn our attention to the general pages. How you break this work down is entirely up to you. Work through specific sections in alphabetical order, if you like. It really doesn’t matter as long as you document which areas have been completed and which still need attention. This is likely to be a long term process, so the documentation is important.

6. Specialised pages

   Almost complete! Now all we have left to do is take care of all of those rarely visited pages that are tucked away in the dusty corners. Do they all still need to be available? Perhaps now might be a good time for a spring clean? If you are starting to stumble across Portable Document File, PDF, documents, check that each page that lists PDF links also includes a link to the freely downloadable Adobe Acrobat Reader. Microsoft also offer free readers for Excel, Powerpoint Reader and Word, so offer links to these too, if appropriate.

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Step 3: Carry out user testing

Once you have completed, or part-completed, your reworking of the site, carry out proper user testing. Whilst accessibility tools and validators do have a role to play, the effectiveness of automated tools is limited. Many accessibility guidelines need to be reviewed in context to their use which requires a trained human eye. Even then, a site has to be used before it’s full accessibility level can be properly assessed. Whilst user testing may be comparatively expensive, it can offer invaluable feedback and insight into issues that you may not have even been aware of.
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Step 4: Let your visitors know what you are doing.

If your site does have accessibility issues, you cannot hide them — no matter how much you may want to. Visitor impatience and frustration with the site’s shortcomings may be lessened if you let them know that you are actively working to improve the site. You can also ask visitors for suggestions, comments and feedback on any changes you have already made. In effect, every person who visits your site will be testing it. So if users do have feedback, give them a way to pass those comments onto you quickly and easily. You may be surprised at some of the issues they highlight and heartened by the positive comments they make in response to your changes.

However, be aware that publishing your development aims is not an excuse for delaying the work. Visitors are very quick to spot when they are being fobbed off by lip service in lieu of real action and complaints are likely to rise sharply as a result. This should not be about evading responsibilities but about involving visitors in ongoing changes.
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Step 5: Display your progress

When you have completed the work — either wholly or in part, tell your visitors what you have done and why. Consider developing and publishing an ongoing improvement policy that outlines future work or improvements and, again, allow visitors to become involved in the feedback process wherever possible

Once you have completed all 5 steps, take a break, admire your achievement and then start at Step 1 all over again. Who knows?, You may get to the point where you can submit your site for one of our awards.

We look forward to hearing from you.

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