Monash Web Workshop Facilitator: Dey Alexander Establishing a quality assurance process for your website

2 Why you need a quality assurance process We publish too many pages with errors We don’t pay enough attention to the quality of our web pages How much more attention is paid to the quality of printed brochures and document? Why is the quality of the latter always treated more seriously?

3 Some of the errors on our pages Content errors Broken links Markup errors Cross-browser compatibility problems Accessibility problems Broken scripts/SSIs

4 Example – content errors A page with no title, and no content! (See

5 Example – broken links Summary of link problems on the Monash A-Z index (see

6 Example – markup errors Markup errors on CSSE home page (see

7 Example – cross-browser compatibility problems This page displays OK in Netscape 4.79 but not in Mozilla 1.5 (see

8 Example – accessibility problems This page is not accessible to screenreaders or text browsers (see

9 Example – script/SSI problems An error in the path to the footer SSI (see

10 Establishing QA processes What processes are needed? –Content review process –Design process –Maintenance process Communication issues –Communicate processes to ALL people publishing to your website –Provide training and support so that processes are understood and used –Establish expectation/culture of accountability for quality of individual pages

11 QA for content development What should be included in this process? –Self-review –Peer-review –Content approval –Determine a maintenance cycle See Web Content Quality Assurance ProcedureWeb Content Quality Assurance Procedure

12 QA for new design/development What should be included in the process? –Markup validation –Link integrity check –Metadata check (title, keywords, description) –Content check (text, images, etc.) –Accessibility check –Check page size (key pages) –Cross-browser check –Screen resolution check –Script/SSI check See Web Design Quality Assurance ProcedureWeb Design Quality Assurance Procedure

13 QA for maintenance What should be included in the process? –Markup validation –Link integrity check –Check content changes –Accessibility check See Web Maintenance Quality Assurance ProcedureWeb Maintenance Quality Assurance Procedure

14 Questions? Reminder –Please add your name to attendance book –Please complete your feedback form