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tim_c

Help with accessibility.

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This is proving one of the most difficult to use and unfriendly web forum packages I have come across. I seem to recall coming across invision before and walking away.

 

One thing that would help is blocking images but that seems to be impractical because there is no way of uniquely identifying the main problems, the mugshots and many of the icons without losing vitual ones. It is so bad that it wrecks any attempt to resize text, misrenders.. The editor is broken so goodness knows how this post will come out.

 

Turning off CSS makes a total mess but the editor then works, falls back to straight display of an edit box.

 

Am I correct that there is no forum threading or can that be turned on?

 

There seems to be missing navigation. Where is it?

 

Sorry be moan but I am struggling.

 

There again I have no idea what the site is supposed to look like. A check shows a lot of markup errors.

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Are you sure that this isn't the settings on your browser/machine?

 

I've been happily using the site for several years now on various versions of IE, Firefox and Safari from various locations and various machines (Windows, OS X and Linux) and never had any problems or had to configure anything.

 

Which browser/OS are you using? Do you have all OS patches installed?

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Hi Tim, and welcome to the forum.

 

If you go into My Controls and then select Board Settings from the list on the left, you then have the option to change the settings and block signatures, images in posts such as smilies and avatars.

 

I'm not sure what problems you are having with the editor. Could you explain exactly what you are trying to do? Hopefully then we can understand the problems better and find a solution.

 

What site navigation are you having difficulty finding?

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> Are you sure that this isn't the settings on your browser/machine?

 

Yes.

 

> Do you have all OS patches installed?

 

Yes and rather more than that.

 

> Which browser/OS are you using?

 

At this moment Opera 9.51 (eye candy disabled) and XP SP3 (eye candy disabled)

 

> I've been happily using the site for several years now on various versions of IE, Firefox and Safari from various locations and various machines (Windows, OS X and Linux) and never had any problems or had to configure anything.

 

So you do not notice the problems. I am trying to find workarounds for problems you do not notice.

 

I've had another fiddle and provided the place works it looks as though a part solution is disable ECMA script. I'll have a further think about how to disable the images.

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> If you go into My Controls and then select Board Settings from the list on the left, you then have the option to change the settings and block signatures, images in posts such as smilies and avatars.

 

Looks like fatal problems with the ECMA script (java-script) the site uses. With that turned on the effect is it _hides_ things like the routes to change anything. Just tried it and it is a now you see, now you don't. This includes breaking configure and hiding the means to change anything. In fact when I first tried it took me ages to find a way to post. I go right back, was no web, and that can be a problem as youngsters do things in ways that to me are illogical and very NT.

 

The easy answer to getting rid of the mugshots is block them one by one since there will not be many regular posters. Low key is fine, faces are not.

 

> I'm not sure what problems you are having with the editor.

 

Invision are trying to implement a fancy editor on top of a simple browser web form. Instead of using a known working one they do their own and it is not very good. For example it gets confused about white space and might decide to display text with the spaces removed. With script disabled it works fine, but no control bar etc.

The HTML markup is broken (probably works with American web browsers and a workaround for the very broken IE, all versions) so that changing the text display size pushes the edit box off the right side of the screen. The font size is uncomfortably small. The easy solution here is directly accessible page zoom, works fine with script disabled. My guess is that the markup and script are inconsistent on units of measure. Historically almost all browsers are broken on at least one unit of measure em, pixel, % etc. with a result that page authors firefight the browser bugs, fix one thing, break another.

Don't worry about it.

 

On the plus side Invision have got it right that it works without script. (so far anyway)

 

> Hopefully then we can understand the problems better and find a solution.

 

I'll find workarounds, there won't be anything you can do other than mention known solutions others have found.

 

> What site navigation are you having difficulty finding?

 

Go to forum home doesn't, it points outside but that is inconsistent. The root is visual confusion, part of what I am trying to get rid of. The panels and shades and colours and bold and not bold and small font and large font and so on.

 

I've now worked out part of it and is a mistake.

 

There are three navigation items displaying and they go to two different site addresses, using three different URL.

From the top of the page you are viewing now: -

 

"Asperger and ASD UK Online Forum"

"Asperger and ASD UK Online Forum"

"Asperger and ASD UK Online Forum"

 

Here are the three different routes

http://www.asd-forum.org.uk/forum/index.php?

http://www.asd-forum.org.uk/forum/%5C%5Cwww.asd-forum.org.uk

http://www.asd-forum.org.uk/forum/index.php?act=idx

 

I am AS and I am amused... I only saw the least violent and that link leads to the web site home page, not the forum. Put a huge great button and we won't see it, wherein lie some tales.

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Tim,

 

Have you tried viewing the site using Internet Explorer? How does it look to you then?

 

Im not aware of any other user having these sorts of problems I'm afraid so I doubt its some sort of general issue with the site. When I get home I'll give Opera a try and see how it looks to me.

 

regards,

 

Kris

Admin

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You are using highly technical language, which most of us do not understand.

 

If we can understand exactly what it is you are trying to do, we can try to suggest solutions for you.

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I am not really sure what the point you are trying to make is.

 

I can access the forum without any problems using Opera. Are there specific problems that you would like help with or are you just using highly technical language to tell us you don't like Invision software?

 

Simon

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> I am not really sure what the point you are trying to make is.

 

The answer seems to be forget it, I'll do whatever to protect myself. I did not intend to annoy people.

 

Sorry I trouble folks.

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> I am not really sure what the point you are trying to make is.

 

The answer seems to be forget it, I'll do whatever to protect myself. I did not intend to annoy people.

 

Sorry I trouble folks.

 

 

I am sorry you have been uoset by our posts. I can assure you were were not offended or annoyed by your posts, we just had problems understanding them! There is no reason for you to leave the forum.

 

Ther moderators and admins have been discussing how best we can help you with this, the problem we ahave is that we are still not sure from your posts what the problem is. I couldn't work out wheher you were telling us you didn't like the Invision software, or found viewing the forum difficult, or couldn't work out how to do something specific. There are a number of criticisms in your posts of the way Invision does things but they are put in very technical terms so nobody really knew what you are talking about.

 

If you could tell us what it it that you are trying to do that you can't do, or what it is about the site that makes it difficult to use them we will be happy to help where we can.

 

Best wishes

 

Simon

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I am sorry you have been uoset by our posts. I can assure you were were not offended or annoyed by your posts, we just had problems understanding them! There is no reason for you to leave the forum.

 

Ther moderators and admins have been discussing how best we can help you with this, the problem we ahave is that we are still not sure from your posts what the problem is. I couldn't work out wheher you were telling us you didn't like the Invision software, or found viewing the forum difficult, or couldn't work out how to do something specific. There are a number of criticisms in your posts of the way Invision does things but they are put in very technical terms so nobody really knew what you are talking about.

 

If you could tell us what it it that you are trying to do that you can't do, or what it is about the site that makes it difficult to use them we will be happy to help where we can.

 

Best wishes

 

Simon

 

I think that explaining is beyond me.

 

Put it down as an example of communication failure and why we don't approach people for help. Almost always goes wrong. Even dropping the matter does not work, people come after you.

 

I think it is the central coherence problem biting me. I write information, that is all.

 

About all I can add is what happened.

 

I have for quite some time been occassionally viewing a few things in this place.

 

I decided I could add input on something and tried to join.

 

Joining wasn't particularly difficult but when I logged in successfully and tried to post I was informed I had no rights. No further explanation.

 

The following day there is a second email saying I have been accepted. Posting is then possible.

 

I then try and use the place, where is quickly became apparent that for me it is difficult to use and very uncomfortable visually.

 

I then find that fixing some of the visual problems has been made difficult by the design of the software.

 

I then find strange things going on as though there is a configuration problem, still don't know what was happening, showing partly as missing navigation.

 

If I try and make the text larger that messes up other things. Today this mattered, I had what once upon a time would have been a severe migraine, no bad headache these days but my eyesight is blurred and has holes. A place like this would be impossible to use.

 

As it stands I can use the place. I did try and edit my profile but it rejected the changes. Doesn't matter.

 

Now please drop the matter or delete the thread.

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Joining wasn't particularly difficult but when I logged in successfully and tried to post I was informed I had no rights. No further explanation.

 

The following day there is a second email saying I have been accepted. Posting is then possible.

 

There's always a gap between applying to join and becoming a member who can post. If you look at the names at the bottom of the page of who is online, you will often fine a name in black rather than blue text, because these people are still being approved my the boss people :ph34r: If you don't pass initiation, they don't let you in .... :whistle:

 

I then try and use the place, where is quickly became apparent that for me it is difficult to use and very uncomfortable visually.

 

I think people were asking what you find difficult so that they could help you. For me, personally, I find this forum much better than most - the blue background works with my bizarre vision :wacko: and the fact that posts aren't generally in bright colours/bold/various fonts/added images etc. which to me makes other forums difficult as there's so much to filter out to find the actual post.

 

I then find strange things going on as though there is a configuration problem, still don't know what was happening, showing partly as missing navigation.

 

Not an expert here, but possibly something to do with Java - I messed up my 'puter and sometimes now on this forum I get little red crosses or sometimes nothing at all where the 'reply' box etc should be - however, I've used the forum long enough to know where they are so just know where to click on the screen. If it annoys me I can usually fix it by coming off the forum and logging back on.

 

If I try and make the text larger that messes up other things. Today this mattered, I had what once upon a time would have been a severe migraine, no bad headache these days but my eyesight is blurred and has holes. A place like this would be impossible to use.

 

What do you use to enlarge the text? I have some thing built into my laptop to do this up to 400% - I never use it unless I want to look at pictures of something similar in more detail (not what it was designed for) and also a separate magnifier (although going away from the computer and doing something non-computer based for a while is better, for me, than trying to work with a headache). Both push the text off the screen as you would expect - as the screen size is fixed you will only have a proportion of the text showing if it is enlarged - this is logical.

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