Daily Pioneer News

PLATTEVILLE - The best-looking website in the world is a waste if it can't be accessed by the end-user.

That's the message of University of Wisconsin-Platteville Web Coordinator Daniel M. Frommelt. By streamlining design and adhering to certain standards, web designers can ensure their websites are accessible by more people and functional when opened by new browsing technologies.

Over the past 14 months, Frommelt has spoke 10 times at conferences and seminars nationwide on his approach to web standards and accessibility. In the past, web pages were only accessible via personal computers.

"Today, technology is so fast, that's not true anymore," Frommelt said.

Devices such as cell phones, personal digital assistants and interactive television are fast becoming options for Internet browsing. By streamlining web design, developers can make their sites accessible through these technologies, and in addition, ensure their web pages are readable by people with disabilities.

Blind Internet users, for example, utilize Braille devices to read web pages, a process that can be anywhere from frustrating to impossible with web pages that aren't developed with this end-user in mind.

"The overall concept is how to build a webpage so it'll work in anything," Frommelt said.

The use of cascading style sheets can produce more printer-friendly pages, and by adhering to web standards, designers can produce the same pages with less code and smaller file sizes.

"It's actually easier to do it this way," he said.

Since his presentation at a UW System webmaster's conference in March 2003, Frommelt has been invited to speak on web standards and accessibility at a number of technology conferences nationwide. Most recently, he delivered a presentation at the CUMREC Higher Education Administrative Technology Conference May 16 in Austin, Texas.

When Frommelt presented at the WebDevShare conference in Bloomington, Ind., last October, he and UWP student Sean Sieg won an award for best presentation. Frommelt caught the eye of keynote speaker Jeffrey Zeldman, a renowned web designer and how-to author, who asked Frommelt to write an online journal article on the topic.

"This whole thing mushroomed and got big pretty quick," said Frommelt, who has been asked to speak at the University of Iowa and at a regional Council for the Advancement and Support of Education conference.

Though web standards have been around for years and the alternative browser technologies are becoming more and more popular every day, Frommelt has found that few web developers are aware of this approach to design.

"The knowledge is surprisingly rare," he said. "For someone that's never heard of web standards, it's a real eye opener."

Frommelt is pleased these industry leaders have sought him out for this knowledge, but he realizes it's been more difficult to "blaze the trail" than to follow it.

"It feels good knowing you have something you can help somebody with," Frommelt said. "What took me three months to learn, they can pick up in a week."

Frommelt learned about web standards piece by piece as he attempted to solve problems with the university's website. Nearly all of the university's web pages are now web standards compliant since the web development team converted the design and integrated templates in 2003.

"For the most part, users didn't even know that we did it," Frommelt said. "We've been working toward this since 2000."

In addition to reading online journal articles and keeping on top of the latest tech news, Frommelt's development team uses 18 different web browsers and alternative technology simulations to check university web pages for usability.

"We do a lot of testing. We do a lot of reading and a lot of research every day down here," he said.

With international communication continuing to grow, Frommelt believes accessibility is more important than ever. He cites widespread cell phone use in Japan, and the gaining popularity of interactive television in Europe.

"If they can't see our webpage, we've failed," he said. "We've got a long ways to go, but I think we've made some pretty big strides."