WEBVTT

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In Unit 1 of this course

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you will learn a variety of strategies
for answering the question

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"What makes a quality website?"

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After all, before we can plunge into
creating our own sites

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it's important to do a bit of planning first.

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And in this unit, we'll be developing a set of
criteria to help guide our creation.

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Now, we've all experienced websites that we feel
are well designed...

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And those that aren't...

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But what makes some websites better than others?

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First off, good quality websites use color
effectively.

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Effective use of color can entail everything from
the selection of an appropriate color scheme

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to making sure that those with color-related visual
impairments can still use your site effectively.

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Good quality websites follow web standards so
that they work equally well across browsers...

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platforms...

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and monitor resolutions.

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In this unit, you'll learn about the different
standards put forth by the World Wide Web Consortium

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that we'll be following for the rest of this course.

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Good quality websites are accessible to
individuals with disabilities.

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[Screen Reader] For example, is the web site optimized
so that a blind person can easily read, navigate, and
operate the website

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using a text-to-speech screen reader
application?

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[Narrator] If a site contains audio or video, does it also offer
transcripts or captioning to help make that

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content accessible to individuals
who are deaf or hard of hearing?

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In this unit, you'll have the chance to view
some videos of people with disabilities and the

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everyday challenges they face in accessing
information on the web.

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And finally, good quality websites are well-
structured and well-planned.

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This unit is designed to get you thinking about
your site's organizational framework.

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When planning the site's structure, you'll need to
think about the needs of your particular audience.

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After all, the design of an entertainment site will
differ drastically from that of an e-commerce site
or an educational site like this one.

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After establishing the target audience,
it's time to sketch out the actual structure,

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such as the hierarchy of pages
that branch out from the home page.

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One way to approach this task is to
invite members of your target audience

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to do a card sorting activity

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where each card includes a topic
covered on your website.

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Your users may have very different perspectives than you

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about how they expect
your site's content to be organized.

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One key takeaway from this unit
is that every audience is diverse,

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and it's important when designing a website
to plan ahead

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so your site will be usable and
effective for anyone who visits it.