[Accessibility_sig] Student/Staff Web Portals and Accessibility Issues (Luminis or PipeLine in particular, portals in general)

[Jan Heck]

Greetings, folks (please pardon cross-postings),
 
Our district (Coast) has decided to go with the Luminis (formerly Campus
PipeLine) portal district-wide, with phased go-live dates throughout 2007. I
just attended a two-day introductory training to the system yesterday, and
am filled with "accessibility angst" over what I saw and heard.
 
(1) Is any other campus or district out there already using Luminis (or
PipeLine), and if so, what have you done re: the accessibility issues with
the portal? Also, have you had any complaints, formal or informal? Is there
any way I could visit your campus's portal as a guest?

For those who are interested, here are just a few of the problems I've noted
so far:

*	No way to skip over redundant navigation links 

*	No automatic notification capability of any changes made whatsoever,
so I won't be able to check for accessibility issues because I won't even
know that something somewhere has changed 

*	Many areas where content developers can upload images with
absolutely no way to include alt text, i.e., it's not just optional, it's
impossible! 

*	No structure to pages (content within tabs) whatsoever -- not a
single heading used anywhere that I could find 

*	Many areas where content developers can enter free-form HTML, with
absolutely no provision for automatic notification of changes so that I can
check what's been entered for accessibility or know that something's changed


*	Every page (tab) has the same <title> element by default, with no
apparent provision for giving pages unique names 

*	Many areas where developers can dump in JAVA apps or JavaScript
code, again, with no notification or accessibility checks 

*	Layout uses tables nested within tables within tables within tables
within tables... ad nauseum 

*	And the list goes on...

(2) What other portals are being used by campuses, and what accessibility
problems have you discovered in them?
 
Thanks very much for any input you can supply.
 
~ Jan
 
--
Jan Heck (jheck at coastline.edu)
Instructor, Accessible Learning Technology
Coastline Community College
 
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