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NAVIGATION
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Scsi's "Perfect 10" Web Standard -- Best Practice #4: Every Web page's navigation always remains under user control, thereby allowing use of any combination of keyboard, mouse, or other pointing devices as hyperlink selection tools.
For your convenience, the four major headings provided on this Web page are listed immediately below:
NOTE: Relevant hyperlinks are included within the associated paragraphs to make your browsing session productive and all the more enjoyable.
What factors are all-important considerations for assuring user control?
Why is keeping navigation always under user control such an important issue? First of all, Web site designers should strive to allow for the greatest degree of accessibility to content behind the set of hyperlinks (text- and graphics-based) associated with each and every Web page on their Web sites. In addition, the range of navigation tools (such as a keyboard and various pointing devices) used to perform hyperlink selections should not be restricted. In fact, the underlying hyperlink access design should be independent of any specific navigation devices entirely.
What is Scsi's approach toward handling Web page navigation?
Keeping navigation within any Web page simple was a primary objective. Part of how this was implemented was to make sure that every hyperlink is event handler-independent. Now this may sound highly technical, but it really is quite basic and simple to understand. The term event handler-independent -- in lay terms -- implies that you are never exclusively obligated or restricted to use a mouse or a keyboard to gain access to a given hyperlink. In effect, you will always be able to navigate throughout any page using either mouse- or keyboard-based operations alone or in any combination with one another, thereby assuring 100% accessibility to both tool tips (if browser supported) for text hyperlinks and assurance (by design, of course) of nothing other than one-level-only graphics-based hyperlinks (hence, no complicated expanding menus, ugh.) at any time, period.
What benefits come from making navigation simple?
But there's even more significance as to what else this deliberate design choice implies -- if you think about it some more. For one thing, you will likely soon come to appreciate that you will never (ever) have to bother with working your way through complex (and often inaccessible by keyboard-based actions alone) pull-down or fold-out sub-menus while navigating the hyperlinks provided throughout any of the Scsi P&KT Web site's pages. For another, you are generally only one -- and probably never more than three -- hyperlink selections away from getting to any other point within the entire Scsi P&KT Web site.
Now this particular feature is becoming most impressive in and of itself, isn't it? Being able to navigate so easily and so quickly -- with minimal chance for confusion -- makes this a very important feature that benefits everyone who makes use of the Scsi P&KT Web site. Now that's a r-e-a-l win-win relationship that all Webmasters could employ to help everyone save time, minimize navigation-related frustrations, and aid visitors in getting to the particular information they are looking for.
Besides Best Practice #4, which of Scsi's "Perfect 10" Best Practices would you like to read about next?
- Best Practice #1: Every Web page is fast loading.
- Best Practice #2: Every Web page is viewable with any type of browser.
- Best Practice #3: Every Web page incorporates meaningful, descriptive 'balloon help' text for every hyperlink (both text- and graphics-based).
- Best Practice #4: Every Web page's navigation always remains under user control, thereby allowing use of any combination of keyboard, mouse, or other pointing devices as hyperlink selection tools.
- Best Practice #5: Every Web page incorporates an integral and effective dual-domain search window.
- Best Practice #6: Every Web page's text viewing size selections remain under user control at all times -- according to the particular browser tool's available selections.
- Best Practice #7: Every Web page's contents will always automatically resize widthwise to fill the entire browser window -- no matter what screen resolution settings or window sizes are in effect at any time.
- Best Practice #8: Every 'Print this page' operation automatically results in an intelligently word wrapped, truncation-free, black-on-white printout of that Web page's main body contents -- regardless of the page orientation and user-specified text size selection in effect at that time.
- Best Practice #9: Every Web page incorporates readily accessible contact information.
- Best Practice #10: Every Web page validates against the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) specifications for Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), and Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) Content Guidelines (WCAG).
Web Page Validation and Contact Information
This Scsi's "Perfect 10" Web Standard -- Best Practice #4: Every Web page's navigation always remains under user control ... Page was last updated, validated -- to assure full conformance to W3C's XHTML 1.0 Strict, screen medium cascading style sheet (CSS), and WCAG Accessibility (Priorities 1, 2, and 3, inclusive) recommendations -- and uploaded on Saturday, June 7, 2008 at 1:00 p.m. EDT by Raymond Sonoff, President of Sonoff Consulting Services, Inc., 271 Saxony Drive, Crestview Hills, KY 41017 USA: Telephone: (859) 261-5908.
Remember: If you have some questions to ask, wish to request additional information about specific topics, or want to send a request for proposal, Scsi will always welcome your inquiries and respond promptly -- often the very same day -- to your e-mail communications. -- 
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