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d a v e
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RE: Government Department Websites . . . - 5/31/2007 9:12:50
maybe they didn't know ...
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caz
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RE: Government Department Websites . . . - 5/31/2007 11:04:10
I think that you are probably right Dave. They probably think that accessibility refers only to the physical world such as lifts, ramps and buildings.
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d a v e
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RE: Government Department Websites . . . - 5/31/2007 12:22:35
though of course that's not to say that they shouldn't know ;)
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Nicole
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RE: Government Department Websites . . . - 5/31/2007 15:58:36
Here's what I've decided to do.
Did I tell you guys this? I forget. I few days ago I also found what I believe to be the site the Project Brief was based on. It's the site of another branch of their department (in another area of the State) a fairly brilliant site in appearance only, but that's all the untrained eye will see. Having been told who I'm competing against, not by name but I was told 2 designers from Sydney, one from Melbourne etc. I'm therefore of the belief that the designer who designed that site will be tendering.
But that other designer used tabled to lay that site out, the site isn't accessible, and when a screen reader is asked to read it, it sounds atrocious.
I don't have a laptop to take to my client to show the pitfalls of this other site - but I also don't want to be finding fault with another site and another designer, especially as I'm only assuming that they're a competitor. If they are though, this guy will have that extensive site in their portfolio, and I don't really have one to show them of the same scale.
So, as Caz mentioned, I'm going to go in hard on the accessibility angle, not by itself though, but by backing up my statements with parts of all the State Government Guidelines to support me, I'm going to mention the Standards that they are supposed to comply with, for no other reason than the State Government has directives to their agencies - I might imply that it's also the right thing to do but I want them to know that I've done my research into State Government procedure and know more about them than they do.
For the record, the NSW State Government's Guidelines regarding Accessibility are among the most extensive I've seen, so are the Guidelines they have written about planning, commissioning and maintaining a website. They are so brilliant and mention Accessibility in almost every point in the 200 - 300 pages I've printed out that I was going to post them here somewhere as they are also provide a good (basic) checklist for people new to accessibility. They're mostly up to date, February 2007 and mention very current thinking and links to further information.
Back to the directives I've found - as mentioned they may not even know about them, but I'm wondering why on the phone the other day I was told that the site would need to be started by June 30? I'm guessing that that was because they did know about this deadline and want to be able to report that a new site is at least underway.
It also makes me wonder though, whether this other designer, if tendering, was informed about these guidelines and the rest of us are just quoting to make up the numbers. I'm aware that a Government Department has to get tenders from at least 3 sources before choosing a contractor.
Edit: I planned to also back up what i was saying by including a sentence to the effect that "no other regional branch's website currently follows these guidelines. But unfortunately 1 of the 12 uses CSS layout and another one does use accessible forms - that was what I was going to say to get around finger pointing, but it's going to be harder to write now that two separate sites possess some accessibility standards, separate sites mind you, and neither of them are this brilliant looking site that they've based the Project Brief on.
< Message edited by Nicole -- 5/31/2007 16:07:44 >
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Nicole
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RE: Government Department Websites . . . - 5/31/2007 16:29:03
Thanks Womble,
I'll write it up and see how it sounds and then mellow it down before sending it to them - I have until June 12 anyway.
I'm doing it this way though because I believe I'm not in the box seat anymore with this project. Very little of what i wrote in my first 12 page submission back in January has been included in the new Project Brief.
The other thing is that the Commissioner herself is not part of the decision making process (apparently)
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Nicole
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RE: Government Department Websites . . . - 6/1/2007 2:55:11
Jaybee,
Half of me was saying "I'm not sure I can do all this" and the other half was saying "go for it - learn it on the fly".
So this afternoon I've written to them and withdrawn from the tender process.
I'd only just made some time to start learning other things when this Project Brief came through and I dropped everything and have done nothing else since. At least now I should be able to get on with some of this other stuff. But then there was a call at 4pm from another new client . . .
By the way, I type things here to you guys as designers that I wouldn't dare write in a submission or say to a client. I knew in this case that my only real hope was to push the accessibility issue and the governments directives to them, but I'd have done it tactfully y'now.
Government sites are the type of sites I want to end up doing, but perhaps just not now - plus their tender process is a pain!
Y'now what? I also discovered today that the good looking site that I believe their project brief was written having seen, was only uploaded very recently. I know I'm assuming a lot, but I wouldn't be surprised if that designer had already been picked, but couldn't do it before the other one was completed - hence the very long wait for the project brief to be sent to everybody.
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