ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 1 6 /C&RL News W riting Web page standards By N ancy M cClements an d C h ery l B eck er Establish content, design, and technical guidelines T h e P rob lem . The University o f Wiscon- sin-Madison is a large and diverse univer­ sity campus, with more than 60 major libraries, special libraries, and reading rooms. Early in 1995 several campus libraries began develop­ ing Web pages which varied in design, style, and content. It soon became obvious that a level o f standardization was necessary, and few writ­ ten standards seemed to exist with our special needs— succinct instructions for staff o f vary­ ing levels of expertise on a large, distributed campus. The person responsible for mounting the General Library System’s homepage needed guidelines for the links he would make to other libraries. He turned to the User Documentation Working Group (UDWG) for assistance. Th e W orkin g G roup. The UDWG is one o f the several working groups that report to the Electronic Library Access Committee (ELAC), the public services arm of the campus libraries’ electronic infrastructure. The UDWG’s charge is to “define levels o f online help and printed documentation necessary for user access to all library electronic resources. Develop guidelines for format and level of detail. Develop or coor­ dinate the preparation o f such help. Address ongoing updates to ensure currency.” This five- m em ber group (Nancy McClements, Cheryl Becker, Patricia Herrling, Dennis Hill, and Don Johnson), which includes librarians and edito­ rial staff from several campus libraries, agreed to work on this major project o f developing campus standards for Web pages. The M ethod. Existing standards and style sheets from the Web itself were examined, as were books such as T each Y ou rself Web P u b ­ lishin g with HTML in a W eek (Sams Publishing, 1995). We sought input from those who had developed local library homepages. The first draft took com m on them es from all these sources and organized them into one document. Sections soon emerged, as did those items that would be required as opposed to merely rec­ ommended. After going through several inter­ nal revisions, a draft was submitted to a larger audience via meetings, a public forum, and several group e-mail lists. All o f these resulted in additional revisions. A final draft was ap­ proved in Jun e 1995 by the Electronic Library Committee (ELC), the administrative arm of the campus libraries’ electronic infrastructure. The C o nten t. The document was mounted on the W eb for easy access ( http://www. library.w isc.edu/help/tech/W eb_standards. html). Three sections make up the body: Con­ tent, Design, and Procedural/Technical. An appendix, made up o f examples to illustrate most o f the points, was distributed with the paper copy o f the standards. T h e A p p lica tio n . Authors o f new W eb pages must follow the required items in order to have their page linked to the main campus library hom epage ( http://www.library.wisc. edu). They are encouraged to employ the rec­ ommended items as well. To keep pages and links current, a standard reminder notice is sent to hom epage developers at the beginning of each semester. The standards were written as a starting point. We intend to modify them as our needs change and as developments occur in W eb technology. ■ Nancy McClements is a reference librarian at the University o f Wisconsin-Madison (UMW), e-mail: mcclemen@doit.wisc.edu; Cheryl Becker is coordinator o f the Weston Library, Center f o r Health Sciences, UMW, e-mail: checker@macc.wisc.edu. For Web p age samples send e-m ail to Nancy McClements. http://www http://www.library.wisc mailto:mcclemen@doit.wisc.edu mailto:cbecker@macc.wisc.edu Ja n u a ry 1 9 9 6 /1 7 W e b P a g e S ta n d a rd s a n d G u id e lin e s U n iversity o f W iscon sin -M ad ison C am pus L ib raries Content R e q u ire d : 4) Indication of restricted access where appro­ 1) On every homepage: name, address, and e- priate. mail address of responsible person or entity, for 5) Warning statement if link will lead to large example, webadmin@libraryname.wisc.edu. document or image. 2) Date of last update for pages with substan­ 6) No browser-specific terminology (for ex­ tive content. ample, “pull down the File menu and select Save”). 3) Full name of unit (in title heading, docu­ 7) Link text should make sense even if link ment text, address, and/or graphical link) and/or isn’t present, as with a paper copy. For example, URL in order that the source can be recoverable. “To ask a reference question: askmemorial@ doit.wisc.edu,” instead of “To ask a reference ques­ R eco m m en d ed : tion, click here.” 1) Copyright statement (if/when appropriate). 8) Use of a general style guideline (for example, 2) Statement of document status if in progress Strunk & White’s Elements o f Style). (for example, “prototype,” “under construction”). 9) Always think of your users— test with pri­ 3) “What’s New” section on homepage. mary user groups. Design R e q u ire d : 5) No “monster” graphics; avoid many little 1) A link to the UW-Madison Electronic Library, graphics. including the .gif icon, accessible by two or three 6) Navigational aids useful to your users ( “Re­ direct jumps (clicks) from each document. turn to Top,” Table of Contents, Next/Previous 2) A link to return to the parent homepage Page for documents in a series, etc.). ( “Return to xxx Home Page”) on all supporting 7) “Hot buttons” for short cuts to most impor­ local documents. tant links. 8) Minimum text in lists or menus. R eco m m en d ed : 9) Logical tags used as intended instead of forc­ 1) Style sheet (or template) to provide visual ing them to serve as a graphical device (for ex­ consistency across related documents. ample, use headings ‹ H 1› as true headings, not 2) Small graphic that identifies all of the docu­ just to achieve bold text). ments of a Web site. 10) Sparing use of bold, italics, blinking, etc. 3) Short and simple homepage. 11) Always think of your users— test with pri­ 4) Active links to mentioned documents. mary user groups. P ro ced u ral/te ch n ical R e q u ire d : 5) ALT attribute for images — for ben­ 1) A plan on how revisions will take place efit of browsers without graphics capabilities. (schedule for updating, who will do, etc.). GLS Automation Services will e-mail a standard re­ R eco m m en d ed : minder notice to library homepage developers (via 1) Markup language that is readable by future HTML-FOLKS) before each semester (fall, spring, (human) maintainers (e.g., liberal use of line breaks and summer) to review and revise pages and to and white space in the source documents). update links. 2) Check finished document with variety of 2) Test of links before mounting as well as a browsers, both text (Lynx) & graphical (Netscape, schedule for checking links and removing dead Mosaic, etc.). links. 3) High-level elements in every document 3) Spell-checking and proofreading of docu­ ( ). ments. 4) Low-resolution thumbnail images in text, 4) Conformance to HTML 2.0 or 3.0 DTDs pointing to full-resolution external images. (D ocum en t Type D efin itio n )— avoid use o f 5) Development in nonpublic directories only. browser-specific tags. 6) Test with primary user group. mailto:webadmin@libraryname.wisc.edu 1 8 / C&RL News To Buy or Not to Buy, That is Not Necessarily the Question. The Question is ... Whom to Buy From? P lacing an order should be simple and fast. With over fifty years of industry experience, when you place an order with Brodart, you are placing an order with a leader in the academic library market. Your order will be processed quickly and efficiently. You may place an order by mail or with our electronic ordering system. Orders are also accepted via fax or internet. If the title you have requested is not in our existing extensive inventory for immediate shipment, your titles will be ordered from the publisher immediately, regardless of quantity. It is definitely not “nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows” o f ordering from other vendors. 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