Website redesign for accessibility

[purpledrosophila]

Hi all,

I put a post similar to this in the issues section for the ImageMagick website, but I thought it might be apt to put it in the community also, because I think it might merit some discussion. Also, I mentioned some specific bugs in the issues post, which it isn't really necessary to put here.

I'm a technical writer and web accessibility expert, and I've noticed a lot of potential accessibility problems with the ImageMagick website. I listed them in the post I put up in the issues section. I'm aware that accessibility isn't always a priority on the web, but it's reached a point where more than 95% of major web sites have significant accessibility issues, and it makes navigating the web especially difficult for users with disabilities. Interpreting complex concepts, like those in ImageMagick, can be just about impossible if a web page isn't structured well.

There seems to be a misconception that redoing a site for accessibility purposes isn't worth the effort because users with disabilities are supposedly only a small fraction of total web users. This actually isn't true, and there are disabled programmers out there who don't have access to software because the web sites aren't accessible to them. I am disabled myself and was a programmer for 8 years, so I know how much the right organization, look, and feel can make all the difference in the world.

Anyway, I'd like to help make the ImageMagick site more accessible, if this is something the community would approve. I would also be willing to act as a site proofreader and line editor when edits are made, if such services are necessary. If the community approves, I would like to create a new HTML5/CSS3/PHP7/ES6 (JavaScript) template to make the ImageMagick site really shine. Since parts of the site haven't been updated in 4 years, it seems like a good time for a fresh start.

Please let me know if something like this would be a good idea at the current time, and if you have any other thoughts or preferences on the matter.

Looking forward to the discussion!

[magick]

See https://github.com/ImageMagick/Website/issues/30.