Philosophizing about the use of JavaScript on a website

[Philip M]

Originally Posted by felgall

Wikipedia gives the settlement figure as six million with another 3.7 million in fees - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationa...et_Corporation

That page does not mention JavaScript but a lot of the discussion at the time was about how the site required JavaScript to work properly. There is lots of mention of accessibility and working without JavaScript is required for accessibility.

I read it that the issue was specifically its use of the alt attribute for clickable images featured on the website. Also the site was said to block keyboard access and required that transactions be performed solely with a mouse. No mention of Javascript. The case seems to turn on the specific wording of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, which was passed before the internet came into general use.

Odd that the case did not unleash a torrent of similar outlandish claims. Why are a myriad of US lawyers not swarming round this honeypot? Anyone with a website is now exposed to this greenmail. Surely it is the subject of an appeal to the USA Supreme Court or whatever?

Luckly I live in the UK and am not subject to lunatic American jurisdictions. Although our own judges are often crazy enough as well where "human rights" (meaning the rights of criminals, terrorists, scoundrels, illegal immigrants, asylum seekers and so on) are involved. Somehow the human rights of ordinary, decent, law-abiding people to be protected against criminals etc. are never taken into account.

[Philip M]

I think that we have said it all. I for one have had (more than) enough of the topic, which somehow has got pasted into a long-finished thread.

[VIPStephan]

That was me because we took the original thread way off-topic. But because I’m a nice guy (and I was involved in taking it off-topic, too) instead of issuing infractions I moved it to this old thread which I split from another thread for exactly this discussion. Feel free to go wild here.

[rnd me]

Originally Posted by felgall

There is lots of mention of accessibility and working without JavaScript is required for accessibility.

i hope you are saying this was a flawed assumption of the page, JavaScript is actually needed for top-notch accessibility these days. There is never a need to disable properly-written javascript for accessibility's sake, and doing so usually hampers A.T. rather than helping it.

in general, my response to debate presented in the thread:

if you want to deliver an informational brochure, js should not be required.

If you want to deliver something that does stuff instead of just saying stuff, it's probably gonna suck unless it requires javascript.

yes, you can use google maps, email, directories, slideshows, and embeded video without JS, but given the UX advantages to JS, why on earth would you want to?

[felgall]

Originally Posted by Philip M

And WTF would anyone want to disable Javascript in his browser anyway nowadays? What benefits does he imagine will arise? It is as silly as saying that you could still use a website if you were viewing it on a monochrome monitor.

A lot of disabled people find that many web sites are completely unusable BECAUSE they use JavaScript and so they have no way of telling where they are in the page or what is happening. The need to have JavaScript off for those web pages in order that the pages will hopefully be usable without the JavaScript that is breaking the site for them.

If the site also fails to work without JavaScript and if there is no alternate site for them to use then they end up without a site that they can use for that particular purpose at all since the site is equally broken for them whether they have JavaScript enabled or not. No bank would take the risk of being taken to court over having not provided an accessible way for their disabled customers to use their site.

As an example of how allowing a page to be functional without JavaScript requires no more effort than one that can only use JavaScript, consider a form where ajax is to be attached to call the server and update the page based on what is entered into the form. With properly written JavaScript all of the JavaScript would be in an external file linked into the page. The server side code that the ajax calls would also be in a separate file. To get the page to work without the JavaScript you'd need to add an action parameter to the form, you'd need to link the server side script into the page and modify it very slightly so that it returns the result instead of echoing it when the script is included instead of being run directly. That's a whole four extra lines of code with most of it being exactly the same code for each form where you do this extra work. If the form were being used to make a purchase then the cost of the modifications would be recouped out of the profit the first time someone without JavaScript used the form to make a purchase.