This post has been through several revisions whilst I temper my anger!

A common e-mail from myself to some of the people that I have helped build web sites starts something like this....

"Very disappointed!!! I spent ages making your web site accessible to all. I spent ages showing you why it was important to make your web site accessible. I showed you web sites that didn't have any alt tags for images and how unusable that made your site. I showed you how easy it was to at the very minimum give an image an alt tag. And what do you do as soon as my back is turned...."

If this web site was promoting a commenting extension for Joomla and I wasn't using it myself what kind of message does that give to you.

If this web site advocates that accessibility=usability but didn't follow some of the basic rules of accessibility such as valid css, valid html and meaningful alt tags what message does that send.

Thanks to Arno Zijlstra who repeatedly extolled the virtues and benefits of building an accessible web site and Beat of Community Builder fame who sent me the most amazing book I have ever read, Don't make me think, by Steve Krug I've become a strong advocate of building accessible sites as they are more usable.

Today I came across a web site that sells usability testing.

The idea is that you ask them to test your site and produce a video of their experience on your site and "hopefully" point out a few areas that you could improve.

Whilst reading some of the "observations" of client's sites something struck me, the site itself reproduced many of the same "observations".

Perhaps the most obvious was the code used to produce the "buy now" image and link.

<a href="/ordernow.html">
<img src="/buynow.gif" border="0" />
</a>

As you can see the absence of an alt tag for the image means that anyone using any form of assistive technology to view the site will never find the most important link on the entire site.

(And that's without saying anything about using the deprecated border tag)

What am I trying to say with this post?

Never purchase anything from someone who doesn't practice what they preach.

Buy Steve Krug's book and "Don't make me think".

Obviously on this site it's on the top right corner of the page. But why is it there and can you still search the site if there isn't a search button?

According to a recent survey of the Top 100 blogs at Technorati by Smashing Magazine 62% of sites have the search box in the top right corner of the site, just like here, with the majority of the rest placing it at the top of the right hand sidebar.

Why is it there? Is there some amazing reason why you should place your search box there?

No not really, it's there because everyone else puts it there so thats where your user expects to look. Break the trend if you want to, but do so at your peril. If your users can't find the search very quickly they will give up searching - lol.

I've noticed a new trend in Joomla sites not to include a search at all. I have no idea what the logic is behind this decision but it frustrates the hell out of me. I know the content is there, as I saw it the other day, but now I just can't find it.

Now of course I could use google to search the site but it's just not logical to leave a site in order to search it.

Luckily most Joomla developers don't know some of the hidden features of Joomla so it's still easy to search those sites even if they don't have a search box.

http://www.domain.com/index.php?option=com_search

Later this week I'll share some other "hidden" features of Joomla and why it's essential to understand them.