Mastering GOSS Themes: Accessibility and Responsiveness

Creating a successful, user-friendly website can be a complex task, with many factors to consider as part of the website development process. A key part of many Public Sector organisations' digital transformation strategies is to provide their citizens and customers with a user-friendly and accessible website, enabling them to find the information they require within a few clicks.  One way GOSS enable this to happen is through the use of the GOSS website themes, making website creation significantly simpler and more efficient.

In this latest blog series, we sit down with Sarah Youen, the Head of Creative at GOSS, to explore the advantages of thematic website design for organisations and share best practices for mastering GOSS Themes. In this second article, Sarah examines how using a GOSS website theme not only enhances the aesthetic appeal of your site but also significantly improves its accessibility and responsiveness. She delves into the importance of creating websites that are inclusive and easy to navigate for users of all abilities.

How do GOSS Themes ensure responsiveness across different devices?

GOSS Themes have been mobile responsive since the early 2010s, ensuring that websites function smoothly when accessed on any type of device. Since modern web design is no longer focused on creating websites designed with specific screen sizes in mind, so too are the GOSS website themes. With a GOSS Theme, our clients' websites fluidly adapt to any screen size the web visitor may be browsing the site on. This shift in focus is driven by the recognition that while internal developers and other stakeholders in our client organisations mostly interact with the desktop version of their GOSS-powered websites, the majority of their citizens access these sites via mobile devices.

Our themes are compatible with all standard browsers, keeping pace with the most recent releases. As browsers continually update, GOSS Themes stay current with modern standards, reducing the need to worry about compatibility with older versions. This forward-thinking approach means that users always have a smooth and up-to-date browsing experience.

How do GOSS Themes ensure accessibility for different user needs?

GOSS takes website accessibility very seriously and is a value at the very core of our overall service delivery. We understand its critical impact on our clients since many of our client organisations are public sector-based meaning the websites and services they provide must be completely accessible to all levels of user accessibility.

As a standard here at GOSS, we ensure that accessibility issues that may arise are always promptly addressed. For instance, when East Renfrewshire Council provided an accessibility report from the Cabinet Office in 2021, GOSS quickly addressed the minor issues identified, such as adding extra ARIA labels, and rolled out the improvements across all clients. This proactive approach means that by the time other councils were assessed, such as Gosport, the necessary accessibility updates were already in place, showcasing the advantage of using GOSS Themes. Furthermore, any recommendations for accessibility improvements clients may have for us are also adopted across all themes, ensuring a continuous enhancement of standards.

What resources or tools are available for testing the accessibility and usability of website themes?

At GOSS, we use a range of tools to test and ensure the accessibility and usability of our clients' website themes. These include:

1. Axe: Axe is a powerful accessibility testing tool widely used by various organisations, including Gov UK. It's designed to integrate seamlessly into development workflows, enabling developers to detect and address accessibility issues efficiently.
2. Silktide: Silktide is renowned for its comprehensive web performance analysis capabilities, which include accessibility testing. GOSS feature at the top of their 'highest-scoring CMS for accessibility' supplier list.
3. Wave: Wave (Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool) is an evaluation tool developed by WebAIM that helps identify and address web accessibility issues.
4. NVDA: NVDA (Non-Visual Desktop Access) is a free, open-source screen reader for Windows. It is an essential tool for testing voice recognition and ensuring websites are accessible to visually impaired users.

We always encourage our clients to conduct their own accessibility tests to ensure their websites meet the highest accessibility standards. External testing can catch nuances that automated systems might miss, as demonstrated by East Renfrewshire's collaboration with AbilityNet, which provided valuable insights beyond automation.

How can multimedia elements seamlessly integrate into website themes to enhance user engagement and accessibility?

With multimedia elements such as images and videos, GOSS Themes are built to ensure their accessible use across our clients' websites. With the powerful Content Management System (CMS) within the GOSS Digital Platform, there is the ability to support the use of various multimedia integrations. With images, there is the ability to upload various sizes of the same image so that the correct size is selected dependent on the accessibility criteria. Additionally, the Platform also allows users to give images alt text or captions based on their importance. This is particularly useful for graphs, enabling assisted technologies to convey the data effectively.

Videos are also well-supported, with options for captions and transcriptions. At GOSS, we recommend using platforms like YouTube for their advanced captioning tools. This ensures that video content is accessible to all users, including those with hearing impairments.

GOSS Themes are visually rich, offering options for background images, banners, and other graphical elements to create unique and engaging sites. This visual flexibility is increasingly important as we are seeing more clients migrate their microsites into their GOSS Digital Platform to ensure they aesthetically match their main public website. Additionally, by hosting multiple microsites on a single platform, as recently demonstrated by West Lothian Council hosting 90+ school sites in their GOSS Digital Platform, helps simplify training and management while reducing costs. GOSS Themes are designed to be both responsive and accessible, ensuring a seamless, inclusive experience for all users.